When Erin came downstairs in a robe, she looked at me, really looked at me, for the first time in a year. She saw the phone exactly where she’d left it, but she saw my stance change. Weight shifted, shoulders dropped, a posture I hadn’t used since my last deployment. “You listened to it,” she said, no trembling, just a strange defiance.
“Eucalyptus,” I said. “That’s what you smell like now.” She crossed her arms. “His name’s Tyler. He owns the gym downtown, the kickboxing place I’ve been going to.” Right, kickboxing. “Don’t look at me like that,” she snapped, anger flaring up out of nowhere. “You’ve been gone 5 years, Ryan. Not physically, you’re just not here.
You come home, you eat, you stare at the wall, you sleep. You’re a corpse.” She took a breath. “He makes me feel alive. He actually looks at me. I want a divorce. We’re going to be together.” I looked around the kitchen, the smudged fridge, the stack of unopened mail, the bowl of browning bananas, and realized with a strange, sharp clarity that I didn’t feel heartbreak. I felt something closer to insult, like territory had been crossed.
“Okay,” I said. Erin blinked, thrown off. “That’s it? You don’t even care.” “Do you want me to break dishes, Erin?” I walked past her, the eucalyptus thick in my nose. “I’ll pack a bag. Have your lawyer draft the papers.” I packed five shirts, three pairs of jeans, a shaving kit, and a lockbox with my old service records. I was backing out of the driveway when my phone rang.
Unknown number. I put it on speaker. “Ryan, this is Tyler.” The protein shake voice. “Erin called me, she’s crying.” He waited for a reaction. When I didn’t give him one, he pushed. “You think you can just walk out on her, leave her with the mess? You’re a coward.”
“She asked for the divorce, Tyler. I’m obliging. You won, congratulations.” “Don’t disrespect her,” he barked. “You come down to my gym. We settle this house situation face-to-face. You’re not walking off with half her equity, you lazy piece of shit. Come down, unless you’re too scared to face a real man.”
I looked at the dashboard clock. I had nothing but time. “Give me the address,” I said. If I had known what that gym visit would set into motion, I might have just kept driving. But I didn’t. I turned around.
Tyler’s gym was wedged between a mattress store and a vape shop. The sign read Titan Combat Academy in sharp red letters. Inside, it smelled like bleach and old sweat. Fluorescent lights buzzing over blue mats and heavy bags swinging on chains. In the center of the room was Tyler, late 20s, spray-tanned, built like a guy who spends more time in the mirror than doing real cardio.
