She looked at him lying on the sofa and she knew she didn’t love him anymore. She made him his dinner and he ate it without saying anything, and she knew she didn’t love him anymore. In bed that night she kissed him on the cheek and he just lay there gazing at the ceiling. She turned over on her side and closed her eyes. And she knew she didn’t love him anymore.
The next morning when she woke up he was still lying there. She got out of bed and began her morning routine. She stood in front of the freestanding mirror and put on her make up. Outside it was grey and early. The street lamps were still glowing orange. There was snow on the window ledge. As she moved around the bedroom she noticed him watching her. But he wasn’t showing any expression.
In the kitchen she heated some water on the electric hob. When it came to the boil she made two cups of tea, one for her, one for him. Before returning to the bedroom to drink her tea she leaned against the kitchen wall and put her hand over her mouth. She hoped he might wash the dirty dishes in the sink while she was at work. She hoped she might come back and find dinner in the oven. She hoped he would show her a job he had found in the weekly classifieds and tell her he was going to apply for it. She knew she was wasting her time thinking like this.
Back in bed he had pushed himself up into a sitting position with a pillow supporting him. He took the cup of tea from her. She ran her fingers through his hair. He sipped his tea. She wondered if there was any point in asking him if he had any plans for the day. Instead she let him to drink his tea and went to turn on the television. It was on top of the chest of drawers. She asked him if he wanted to watch anything. He looked up at her but said nothing, so she put the news on. There was an article about extreme swimming. In spite of freezing temperatures, some people were taking an early morning dip in one of the lakes in town. Two men said they did it to wake themselves up. She thought these people were mad, but then she wished she could do it to her husband. Make him swim in the icy water.
The clock on wall showed a quarter past eight. It was time for her to go to work. She went down the corridor into the lounge and found her handbag and checked to see if she had her cigarettes. She went into the bathroom and took down some aspirin from the bathroom cabinet. She put the aspirin in her bag and then remembered her purse with her travel card in it. She found it under a couple of newspapers on the dinner table. One of the newspapers was folded open on the classifieds page. She noticed her husband had circled a job advertisement. It was for Blockbuster Video. She didn’t know what to think, and it was time to go. She took her coat from the stand by the door, but just as she slid back the latch and was about to step out, her husband called her name. She was sure she didn’t love him anymore.
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