I just need cereal. That’s it. Just get some cereal and get out.

Mari knew that it wasn’t true. At best, it was a lie that had some basis in a suspiciously convenient truth. Knowing better didn’t keep her from telling herself the lie, however, repeating it again and again as she closed her car door and began crossing the parking lot. She kept her eyes on the ground in front of her, refusing to look up at the doors of the grocery store even as she moved in a straight line toward them. For some reason, it made the task of getting there more tolerable to pretend that she was headed anywhere else.

As much as she hated deceit—especially when deceiving herself—recent events had reminded Mari of the value in being able to set the truth aside for a moment when it became too great a burden to bear. Sometimes, the truth needed to be exchanged for something more palatable, something every bit as fulfilling and satisfying to fill the void and to keep her from falling into it. In a sense, anything would do. Setting aside reality was inherently dangerous, and the specifics of the ways and means ultimately mattered little as the slope was always going to be slippery. Given the choice, however, Mari felt that nothing satisfied like vice. It was destructive, but so was everything else that came with denying reality. Vice was different from most of the alternatives in that she could account for it, mitigating the damage of its less fortunate effects and keeping it from hurting anyone but her. It was just a matter of picking the right one. Some problem or another always got through the cracks, but it never mattered in the end if it felt good enough to balance out the bad. If nothing else, she was faced with a choice of damnations, either crushed beneath the truth or poisoned by anything else. Either way, she was on a bullet train to hell and, as long as that was going to be the case, she’d decided that she may as well make the ride comfortable.

For all of its charm, however, vice wasn’t a perfect solution. It was effective, but not always convenient, especially considering the ones she’d chosen. Instead of wrestling with her demons, she generally preferred to drown them. The choice began with a chance encounter, but it was a path she continued to follow as the result of a calculated decision. She wasn’t proud of how she made her way through life, but it at least kept her afloat after all else had failed her. Peace packaged in glass was as warm and comforting as the touch it replaced, even if it was fleeting. Potentially even more important was the fact that its dangers were predictable, the hidden thorns of a rose whose stings could be avoided through nothing more than reasonable precautions. Mornings after could be endured with medicines and endurance, and she was at least reasonably certain that the lure of nights before could be resisted if it ever proved necessary. Fear of not being able to say the same of alternatives kept Mari from straying too far from her chosen path. At the end of the day, she still needed to function.

Unfortunately, she was in a moment in which she needed to function as she made her way across the parking lot. Allison wasn’t going to be back in the kitchen until Monday morning, which meant two days of working open to close before returning to her regular schedule. There was still time for a blissful escape, but not the time it would take to recover enough to work for fourteen hours straight. It was particularly unfortunate considering the reason that Allison was gone; Mari needed an escape more than ever. The one positive facet of the situation was that working such long days didn’t leave much time to think about it, especially with how quickly business was picking up leading into the upcoming tourism season. The thought of returning home from work with only enough time and energy to sleep was welcome, enough that, for the first time, Mari lamented the fact that business had been slow enough for her to leave for the night relatively early. Avoiding the extra hour of work caused by customers who came in ten minutes before closing was why she had time to visit the grocery store instead of going to bed too tired to think about being hungry. She’d sulked for those last ten minutes of the night, thinking that not having excess free time that had to be spent sober was why she volunteered to take charge of the kitchen in addition to her normal responsibilities in Allison’s absence.

No…no, that’s not true.

Setting the truth aside was a convenient substitute for a bottle, but it was a learned skill. Between the facts that it ran counter to Mari’s nature and that she’d never considered practicing it until recently, she’d spent the entire day telling herself convenient versions of the truth only to slip back into correcting her course and acknowledging things for what they were purely as a reflex. The damage was done, though, and Mari didn’t have the energy to spend on trying to put the genie back into the bottle. The truth was that she volunteered because she wanted to help Allison, even if it meant helping her move beyond her reach.

Mari wanted to be angry, to scream into the void about how it was unfair or how Remy didn’t deserve her or anything other than the one truth that she hadn’t yet found a way to ignore. Everything she’d learned about Remy suggested that she deserved to be with Allison—as far as Mari was concerned, even more than she did. She couldn’t say that it wasn’t fair, either. There wasn’t anything unfair about the fact that Allison had a preference and, as long as Mari was being honest, she couldn’t even call it a preference. As far as she knew, Allison had never even considered her as an option to compare to Remy. The truth was that none of it was anyone’s fault; it was just what happened and, looking at it objectively, it was actually a positive result. Two out of three people were happy, and that was two more than life ever promised. The fact that she was the one left out in the cold didn’t change that things were as good as they reasonably could be.

Then why am I here?

The belief that she’d put the matter behind her was one of the convenient realities that Mari had managed to convince herself was true over the last several days. It was at least partially true, with her having made peace with the fact that she needed to let go of her dreams of any future that included Allison the last time she found herself in this store. It was true that she’d started the process, but it was longer and more difficult than simply choosing to do it. She wanted it to be over, to be able to wake up and feel nothing more than the usual pains morning brought. It was easier to endure when remembering that she’d already started and, when the waiting became too much, to pretend that she was closer to the end of the journey than the beginning. It also made her previous trip easier to think of it as just being one more step along that journey, one that would cover miles instead of inches.

That still doesn’t answer my question.

Mari sighed, resigning herself to moving forward without an answer and blindly hoping to find it along the way. Much like spending her every waking hour working, mindlessly toiling was another way of coping. As she came near the doors, they slid open and exhaled the fragrance of expensive baked goods while filling the quiet outside with the sound of violins. Mari groaned quietly, unable to stop herself from thinking of it all as pretentious and unnecessary. She silenced the thought as soon as she felt it forming, however, recognizing it as a coping mechanism that she refused to tolerate. She couldn’t say that she hadn’t spent at least some time being angry with Remy about how events unfolded, but she knew what was wrong with it and, at the very least, she could force herself to not tolerate it. Allison deserved to be happy, and Remy was her best chance.

Mari picked up a basket and began aimlessly wandering the aisles, looking at nothing in particular with the hope that something would jog her memory and remind her of what excuse she’d found to be there. Instead, her thoughts were occupied by trying to understand why she’d actually come. Having spoken to Remy the last time, her role in whatever developed between her and Allison was done. She wasn’t needed anymore, a thought that pained her too much to think that she wasn’t aware. It was broken glass under her skin, every movement causing it to stab and tear open new wounds every time her heart beat. She wondered if it was a sign that she was beginning to let go that the thought of Allison’s being with someone else somehow didn’t hurt her nearly as much as the knowledge that she wasn’t needed any longer, her excuses for remaining present in Allison’s life long since exhausted. Instinct and experience both made it perfectly clear that nothing good could come of overstaying her welcome.

“Can I help you find anything?”

Feeling something uncomfortable in the air, Mari looked around and turned to see that she was the focus of someone’s attention. It stood to reason that she felt something was wrong; that was as quick a way to unsettle her as any. She raced to organize her scattered thoughts in an attempt to give the situation context, but she couldn’t immediately find any. She was reasonably certain that she didn’t know the woman who was in front of her, watching her cautiously with an uncomfortably familiar expression that looked like sympathy. She was waiting, giving the impression that she’d said something and was expecting a response. Her blouse and apron made her look like a store employee, giving Mari hope that whatever she was missing was something that could be easily dismissed.

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“Sorry, what?”

The woman smiled kindly, giving Mari a warm feeling that she detested. “Can I help you with anything?”

I doubt it. Though annoyed by the interruption of her muddled thoughts, Mari was relieved that, at the very least, it was as simple a matter as she’d hoped. “Oh…no, thank you.”

The woman nodded politely, but didn’t seem to be in a hurry to go anywhere. “Just out of curiosity, what are you making? Stir-fry?”

Why the hell would I be making—?

Mari was relieved to see the woman finally break eye contact, unsure of how much more she could take of the gentle kindness in her gaze. Wondering what she was looking at now, Mari followed her eyes down to her hands and saw that she was holding a package of glass noodles that she couldn’t remember picking up. Her frustration with the situation growing as she considered the prospect of explaining anything even vaguely resembling the truth to a complete stranger, she set aside her confusion and took what looked like the quickest end to the encounter.

“Yeah…yeah, I’m making stir-fry…apparently.”

The woman laughed softly, the cheerful sound cutting through the haze in Mari’s mind and, for a moment, entirely derailing her mood. It wasn’t until she spoke again that Mari was able to remember to resist the inexplicable comfort that she was feeling and silently wonder what she’d found so amusing.

“Well, I’m guessing it’s going to be good. You look like you know what you’re doing.”

Again, confusion led Mari to follow the woman’s gaze as she wondered what it was about her appearance that was giving any kind of impression other than of someone who wanted to be left alone. Noticing that her attention was now focused on her chest, Mari looked down and realized that she’d never taken off her chef coat. There was a moment of panic as, in an instant, it occurred to her just how quickly word of her presence there—now for the third time—could travel the several blocks back to either Lily or Allison and raise any number of questions that it made her sick to even consider answering.

“Oh! N—no, I mean…not really. It’s not my specialty or anything. I just…kind of picked these up.”

There was another wave of fear as Mari heard how unconvincing she sounded, again suffering the consequences of telling the truth as a reflex. She braced herself for the the questioning that seemed inevitable, but it never came. The woman merely nodded, apparently satisfied with what she’d heard.

“Hmm…in that case, I might have a chance, after all.”

Disoriented from having bounced from confusion to fear to relief so many times, it took Mari a moment to shift back to confusion. “A chance at what?”

“Oh, I was just wondering how my stir-fry would compare to a professional’s. What do you think?”

How the hell would I know?

Mari wanted to be more irritated, but she couldn’t bring any significant anger to bear against someone who seemed to be going out of her way to be kind. Much of the reason she hated dealing with genuinely kind people was how disarming they could be. Without anger at her disposal, Mari felt defenseless. Searching for a more appropriate response than the first one to occur to her, she noticed that the woman’s expression appeared to have changed slightly as she waited for a response. Her smile was still present, but there was a sense of expectation that didn’t seem to have anything to do with waiting for an answer for her question. Sensing a shift in mood that she couldn’t quite place, Mari again relied on a reflex to navigate the conversation and defaulted to humility.

“To be honest, I’m really not even qualified to say. I’ve never even studied it formally or anything. It’s just something that I make once in a while.”

“Oh…in that case, want to get together and compare notes? If you’re free tonight, I’ll be closing up here in about fifteen minutes.”

Didn’t I just say I’m not qualified to—wait, what?

Finally growing accustomed to the situation, Mari’s mind had begun to race as it attempted to account for the endless directions the conversation could potentially take and prepare responses for various outcomes. Somehow, she’d said the one thing that it had never even occurred to Mari to suspect was coming, much less ready a response to address. Her mind was again sent reeling, and the added mystery of what the woman was suddenly smiling so widely about wasn’t helping. In her desperation to say anything to fill the silence and keep things moving forward, Mari didn’t bother resisting the urge to be at least partially honest.

“I…sorry, but work is hectic right now and I have to be up early in the morning. In about seven hours, actually.”

The woman looked slightly disappointed, but it didn’t last long before her cheerful smile returned. “Oh…I know how that can be, trust me. I was in the same position around this time last night. Well, how about stopping by again when things settle down a bit and you’ve got more time? We could always try again then. Or, you know…you could just stop by to say hello, if you want. I wouldn’t mind that, either.” Before Mari could do more than nod in response, she smiled again and began walking away while looking back over her shoulder. “Oh, by the way, my name is Jade.”

“M—Mari.”

“Mari? Pretty…it suits you.”

With a quick wave, Jade made her way along the aisle and disappeared around a corner. Finally finding the freedom she’d been waiting for since the conversation began, Mari wasn’t entirely certain what to do with it. She wasn’t sure how long she’d been standing there and trying to collect herself before finally remembering her earlier sense of urgency in leaving before being discovered. It seemed like a lost cause, but it still felt like the right thing to do in the moment. Nothing about being surrounded by people was helping her process what she’d just experienced.

Several minutes later, Mari was dragging her feet across the parking lot and heading toward her car, suddenly exhausted and carrying nothing but the glass noodles she’d picked up by mistake and only bought for the sake of not raising any more questions about why she was there. Opening her car door, she threw them into the passenger seat with no intention of as much as thinking about them again; even if she’d had the time to spare for doing any more cooking that day, she wouldn’t have the energy. As she thought about what fast food options were still available, she realized that she didn’t have the appetite, either. The thoughts filling her head didn’t seem to be leaving room for much else.

Jade was pretty. Mari had no other way to describe her. She seemed nice enough, radiating kindness that, given the effect that it had, could only be assumed to be genuine. She had at least one shared interest, and she was the type to make the first move. In addition to everything else, she seemed interested. It should’ve been a moment worth celebrating, or even considering. As Mari sat in her car thinking, though, there was nothing. Not interest or disinterest, just…nothing. She felt empty, devoid of even the ability to take any interest in what possibilities may or may not be presenting themselves. She just felt hollow, and even disgust or anger would’ve been better. As much as she wanted the pain to subside, it only seemed to happen in the worst possible ways.

As if on cue, Mari’s phone chimed. Seeing her attorney’s name caused her to lose all interest, instead quieting the phone before starting her car and heading home. Sleep was the only reprieve she had, and she wasn’t going to ruin her chances at it by giving the incessant messages any more attention than they’d already gotten from her so far. There was no way it was anything other than a plea to finally respond to the message she’d seen a day earlier, as if she could somehow summon the strength to do so and was simply refusing. Try as she might, however, Mari couldn’t push the matter out of her mind as it forced the original message to the front of her thoughts for what felt like the hundredth time.

I’ve just heard from Cara’s attorney. She’s willing to drop her claim to all shared assets and move forward with an uncontested divorce, but only on one condition: She’s insisting on a face-to-face meeting, but she won’t say what it’s about. Whatever it is, I’ve already received confirmation that showing up and hearing what she has to say is the only condition. I know you don’t want to hear this, but the deal is airtight and you should take it. She’s dragged this out long enough, and this is an opportunity to finally end it. Call me and we’ll go over the details.