CHAP 3 — The Door
The bedroom door was closed.
Not locked.
But it felt like one more thing in the apartment that had been shut too long.
David stood outside it with Mikey crying against his shoulder and Clara holding the hem of his coat.
“Jessica,” he called. “Open the door.”
Inside, something shifted.
Then nothing.
He pushed once.
The door caught on laundry piled behind it.
He pushed harder.
The gap widened.
The smell hit first.
Sour milk.
Damp clothes.
Stale air.
The room was dark except for a thin strip of streetlight cutting through the curtains. Plates sat on the floor with dried food hardened at the edges. Baby bottles rolled under the dresser. An empty diaper box had been crushed beside the bed. Clothes formed soft, defeated hills everywhere.
And Jessica sat in the corner between the bed and the wall.
Knees pulled to her chest.
Hair unwashed.
Face pale.
Eyes hollow and wild.
She looked at David as if she had been expecting judgment to walk through the door all day.
Anger rose in him automatically.
It was easier than fear.
“What is happening in here?” he demanded.
Jessica flinched.
Clara flinched too.
That stopped him.
Jessica rocked once, arms locked around her knees.
“I can’t do this anymore,” she whispered.
David stared.
“What?”
Her voice rose, breaking apart.
“I can’t do this anymore, David! I can’t!”
Mikey screamed harder.
Jessica covered her ears.
“I hear him even when he sleeps. I hear him crying in the walls. I close my eyes and the whole room moves. Clara asks me questions and I can’t make my mouth answer. I try to stand up and my body won’t do it.”
David’s grip tightened around Mikey.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
Jessica laughed once.
It sounded like pain.
“I did.”
He had no answer.
She looked at him with sudden venom, not because she hated him, but because she had been alone too long.
“I told you I was scared. I told you something was wrong. I told you I didn’t feel like myself. You said everybody’s tired.”
David felt the words land exactly where they belonged.
Jessica pointed weakly toward the hallway.
“And then she started helping. A little at first. Bringing bottles. Finding diapers. Rocking him. Then more. Then I couldn’t stop it because every time she fixed something, I hated myself less for one minute.”
Clara began crying silently.
David looked from his wife to his daughter to the baby in his arms.
The apartment was not a mess.
It was a distress signal.
And he had stepped over it for months.
He pulled out his phone.
Jessica’s eyes widened.
“Don’t call your mother. She’ll say I’m crazy.”
David shook his head.
“No.”
May you like
His voice trembled.
“I’m calling for help.”
