For five years I sent my dead husband’s parents two hundred dollars every month, until my downstairs neighbor whispered, “Stop paying them and check the hallway camera,” and I saw the man we buried let himself inside.
“Is that this month’s?” she asked.
I nodded and slid the envelope through the gap.
Two hundred dollars. Again.
She snatched it so fast the corner scraped my knuckles. Then she tucked it into the pocket of her faded housecoat without even counting it. That hurt more than if she had counted it twice. It told me this had become routine to her. As natural as breathing. As ordinary as the mail.
mail.
“I brought chicken noodle too,” I said, lifting the dish a little. “For you and Dad.”
“We already ate.”
It was not even six o’clock.
The apartment behind her was dim. The blinds were shut tight the way they always were. The air inside looked still, heavy, packed with old secrets. I could never see farther than the narrow slice between the door and the frame. Just a lamp with a yellow shade. Part of the hall table. The edge of a chair.
