They Went on a Holiday Cruise and Left Me With a Man They Called a “Problem”

unfamiliar sounds: the soft squeak of the guest room door, the low rumble of pipes, the almost inaudible creak of floorboards beneath different feet. My house, which had always felt entirely mine, now contained a second orbit.

“Four days,” I whispered to the dark. “You can survive four days.”

It sounded very close to a prayer.

By the second morning, it continue reading …