The Open Window

Lavinia wanted her husband to go out, and spent twenty minutes inventing a nicer way to say it.

He was doing nothing wrong. That made the problem less convenient. He had come home from work, asked about her day, made tea and sat down to read. The flat contained no argument, no offence she could identify as a reasonable cause for wanting an evening in which nobody might speak to her.

They had been married three weeks. She loved seeing his jacket beside hers, waking with him near, the possibility of a kiss in the kitchen that might become a whole private afternoon. She also missed being the only person in a room without having to account for it.

“You could go and see somebody,” she said at last.

Hugo looked up from his book. “I could.”

“You haven’t seen your friends much.”

“I saw two of them on Monday.”…