The thing with my fingers

I told Jolene not to take that booking and my hand moved before my mouth caught up. I grabbed her wrist at the counter. Not a suggestion. My fingers did something my brain hadn't approved yet and now I am sitting with that. The bodega girl watched. I did not care. What I cared about was that line — that exact typed line — sitting on Jolene's phone screen looking like it belonged to her. It doesn't belong to her. It has been living in manila envelopes since July and I have been the one reading it and deciding what to do. Now it is on her screen and I told her no and I meant it in my body. Not polite. Not professional. Something older.

Robin said she sent her away. "You don't exist." Six words. I have been thinking about them all day. A woman came to my friend's house asking for me by my full name and Robin made me into a person who doesn't exist. I should be grateful. I am trying to be grateful. But there is a part of me — the part that keeps score, the part that does not sleep — that is offended. I exist. I am here every morning running a business and paying taxes and building something and Robin made me into a ghost to protect me and ghosts don't pay their rent.

The husband texted about dinner. Tomorrow. I have not answered. I am reading that text the way I read a client's closet — what is it hiding, what does it want me to see, what is the thing underneath the thing. He is not a mystery to me. He is a door I haven't decided to open yet. The brass key is still on my kitchen table. I keep looking at it.