Becky was finally getting her divorce. She'd wanted it for years but it would always seem that she was the 'bad guy' if she divorced him. She had even tried to drive him to divorce her.

He never did. She came to believe that he, Martin, actually believed in and took his vows seriously. That seemed good, but not after 10 or so years of being married.

So, finally she was going to file and deal with whatever came up. Meanwhile she stuck the container of stuff she had in her purse, into the refrigerator. She thought about putting a label on it telling Martin not to eat it.

She wasn't exactly sure what it was...food or some experimental concoction from one of her catty friends who thought she deserved to be 'free'. The friend had said, well she outlandishly claimed, that if anyone ate it they might transform ...she thought it was, into a dog...or something.

Martin, despite his degrees and qualifications, for all his professional climbing and his lengthy resumé, was not the brightest man about the kitchen. This was reason #6 that Becky had wanted a divorce, always cooking no matter if she was sick, or working, on her birthday. Even their past three anniversaries, Martin hadn't even bothered to book a restaurant, or even DoorDash some cheap pizza. Becky had resolved, at a certain point, that if he came home from work late enough that his dinner had been put in the fridge, and he could not figure out the two buttons on the microwave to warm the thing up, he would have to eat it cold.

This was the same logic that preceded Becky's decision to leave the unnamed plastic container exactly where it was, and Martin's later bewildered call from the kitchen hours later, hunched over a half full bowl of the stuff, tie trailing into the thick, green liquid.

"Rebecca?" He could barely fit his mouth around the word as he gagged. "What is this?"

Becky didn't look up from her phone as she scrolled the daily news, leant against the doorway like it was nothing. "Pea soup."

Martin shook his head and crossed the room. "Smell this. Does it smell good to you?" He held out a spoonful of the stuff in question, which Becky lifted her nose to with all the care of a tired house cat.

She shrugged. "Throw it away if it seems off, then," she said, before retreating back to her room, or the guest bedroom, as it formerly had been, before the papers and before the feeling of sharing skin with him made something inside her twist like a jellied eel.

She was roused only an hour later by the sudden urge to pee, and made her way to the shared bathroom at the foot of the stairs, lock turned. She knocked.

"Martin? Are you in there?"

"Yeah--I--Becky, I think that soup gave me food poisoning," he croaked out, and as if on cue, a clattering sound of limbs and bottles fell from behind the door.

"Martin? Did you fall?"

There was a silence at that, and it stretched on long enough to worry Becky. She may not have been able to stand the man anymore but she definitely wouldn't wish death on him, or even concussion. Becky knocked again, raising her red-nailed fist to the door, hand poised over the handle to break the thing down.

And then, from the other side of the door, came a soft bark.

There was no way..!
Becky turned the doorknob. This, the Master bedroom, had the nice bathroom; and she really had to pee. She looked over, debating, then not caring about public opinion in the privacy of home she walked both toward the bathroom and him *if he's not dying I'm peeing first*.
"You OK?" she queried as she walked the mid-line of bathroom and soon to be ex.

A sort of grunt, then "Uh...yeah..!" breathed out by Martin solidified her decision in favor of self care.
"Good. I'll be out in a minute." Becky stepped quickly, turning toward the bathroom. He was not prone, he wasn't laid out on the floor "I gotta pee!" she blurted, speeding to the bathroom. He was just on hands and knees...probably going to get sick. *All the more reason I get to that toilet first* she justified internally, "Ya doin' OK, hmmm?" It came out of her almost breezily, like to a child. *Or a pet* the thought crossed her mind - but it hadn't been a bark. No, he'd grunted when he told her he was ok so that's all it had been when she imagined a bark too.

Martin heard the powerful spray of her pee hitting the bowl water. It always amazed him how loud that came out for someone who had to sit to do it...but his stomach hurt, so it wasn't a conscious thought so much as ingrained instinct from the marriage. The acrid odor however... Martin was not in the bathroom...and he could still smell the sharpness.
He didn't try standing *stomach hurts too much, might get sick* but the scent drew him without thought or alarm.
He caught himself, crawling to the bathroom..! He stopped as soon as he realized. Alarmed but not thinking about it...his stomach really hurt. He didn't focus on anything but keeping whatever he'd eaten down, as Becky finished and came over to him.

She saw how his head hung, kneeling there on all fours as she approached. She stopped, looming over him in her bare feet and long t-shirt she wore to bed. She was about to run her fingers across his head, like she'd used to in the past if he was sick to his stomach.

Martin looked up from her feet, not consciously but he looked up to her...and was rewarded by the touch of her hand along the side of his head, over his ear, sliding to his neck.

Becky softened seeing him like this, looking up like that.
"You doing alright?"

It was soft, her voice, like it hadn't been in a long time. But Martin didn't notice the words. He was aware of scent...her scent...

Becky looked down at Martin, his chest heaving with the effort of keeping his stomach obedient, hand poised just behind his ear. She paused.

"Are you really feeling that sick, Martin?" She asked.

"Yeah, I think it--" he paused then, if only to whimper slightly at the pressure building up in his stomach. "It really didn't agree with me." His back arched slightly as he retched again, and Becky found herself lunging for the trashcan to drag in front of him. He pushed it away and rolled onto his back, curling in on himself like a stuck beetle.

"If it's really that bad, you should go on a walk. Get some fresh air."

A walk. Something in him lit up at the phrase, some small idiot furnace stoking itself in his chest, as the nausea took a back seat to an urge so pure and so stupid he almost laughed at himself. He wanted to go on a walk. He needed to go on a walk, the way he'd needed things maybe twice before in his adult life, those being his ex, Janine, and Becky, back when they were young and stupid.

"Yeah," he said, and his voice came out too eager, cracking like a teenager's. "Yeah, actually. Fresh air. Good idea." He was up on his feet immediately, swaying in the doorway with one hand braced on the frame.

"...Okay," Becky said slowly. "Good."

He didn't move to get dressed. He didn't move at all, actually, just stood there vibrating slightly, eyes flicking toward the front hall nervously. Becky followed his gaze. By the door, on the little hook that had held the leash of her mother's ancient terrier, dead six years now. It was caked in dust from the years of being told Becky would go to the dump tomorrow, and tomorrow and tomorrow.

Something cold slid down Becky's spine. "Get dressed," she told him. "We'll go in five minutes."

"Can we go now?"

"Martin." Becky exhaled through her nose. Ten years of marriage and she had never once seen him this transparent, immediately legible, with every thought written right there on his face for her to read like a headline. "Fine," she said. "Shoes."

He practically sprinted toward the closet, and Becky found her hand going to the hook in the hallway as if it was separated from every other instinct in her body. She turned it over once, the old clip still stiff, and looked at Martin lacing his shoes with the frantic, fumbling joy of a man late for something wonderful, and the next words tumbled from her mouth with the same disjoint that had caused her to grab the leash in the first place.

"Do you want this?" she said, holding it up.

Martin looked up. His whole face did something Becky had never seen it do before, not when he proposed, not at their wedding, or even when Becky handed him the divorce papers. An unguarded, undignified, total-body grin and small wiggle of anticipation. "Please," he said.