Chapter 13

When I pick up Leah from preschool, Mila is waiting to speak to me.

“We have an issue with Leah, Mrs. Ross,” Mila says to me in a grave voice. She called me “Mrs. Ross” instead of “Jane,” which is very serious. Almost nobody calls me “Mrs. Ross” since I didn’t officially change my name, but some people just assume that’s what I go by since that’s Ben and Leah’s last name.

“What’s wrong?” I ask, glancing nervously at my daughter. She seems to be playing happily with her friends. Is there some broken bone that she’s hiding really well?

Mila points to a corner of the room. I see that on the light blue paint of the wall, Leah has scribbled her name. My jaw drops open when I see it. Aside from the E being backwards, she wrote her name perfectly.

“Wow,” I say. “She wrote her name! ”

“She wrote on the wall , Mrs. Ross!” Pink circles appear on both of Mila’s plump cheeks. “That’s not acceptable behavior.”

“I know but…” I look at the scribbles in the shape of letters. She’s only three and she can write her name! My child is a legit genius. “It’s impressive . Isn’t it?”

Mila gives me a look. She seems really focused on the fact that Leah wrote on the wall and less so on how impressive what she wrote was. I bet Einstein used to scribble on the walls. And his teacher probably yelled at his mother for it.

By the time Mila finally gets done scolding me and I pry Leah away from the blocks she’s playing with, I’ve wasted a good twenty minutes at the daycare. It’s pitch black when we get outside and the first thing I do is step right in a big puddle of melted snow, soaking my foot. It’s my right foot, so every time I press a pedal on the drive home, I feel the water squishing against my toes.

The house is dark when I pull into the garage—it seems like Ben had to go in to the office today. As much as I resent his easy days when he hangs around the house, I feel a little scared in this big place without him. Ben grew up in a big house with his two brothers, but I was always in a tiny apartment my whole life, so it can sometimes be terrifying here. I flick on all the lights the second I come in, so the house doesn’t feel quite so lonely .

“Hey, Leah,” I say. “Want to try your brand new potty?”

Leah stares at me blankly. “What’s a potty?”

No. She did not just say that to me. My (newly discovered) genius child who I have been begging to use a potty for the last freaking year did not just ask me what a potty is. This is not really happening.

“ That’s a potty!” I practically yell, pointing to the Frozen potty that I spent a small fortune on. Then I point at the frog potty, “And that’s a potty.”

Leah blinks a few times. “Oh.”

I give up.

“Mommy has to go change her socks,” I sigh. “Do you want to watch Dora?”

Leah nods happily and skips off to the couch, singing to herself, “Skip, skip, skip to my Mommy.” I set her up with the television and a snack, then I trudge upstairs to get some socks that aren’t drenched with ice-cold water.

When I get to our bedroom, I peel off my wet socks and toss them in the laundry hamper. I notice that Ben’s boxers are right next to the hamper. I’m not sure why he can’t seem to actually get them into the hamper. He’s so close—why can’t he get them inside ?

I go to the bathroom in my bare feet because I’ve got to go, and I know what a potty is. Right away, I discover that the toilet paper roll is empty. (Thankfully, I discover this before peeing.) I know this is a complaint in every marriage, but I’m not sure why Ben can’t manage to ever change the toilet paper roll. He claims that I use more toilet paper than he does, but that’s absolutely not true. I’ve seen him walk into that bathroom with a full roll of toilet paper in place that’s gone when he exits the bathroom. Honestly, I don’t even know what he does with all that toilet paper. I can’t even begin to imagine. Origami? Fake snow? Am I going to go up to the attic one day and discover rows of toilet paper forts?

I asked Ben to buy some toilet paper a few days ago and he claimed to have done it. So I check under the sink, which is where we keep the toilet paper rolls. And sure enough, there’s a giant pack of twenty-four rolls of toilet paper. Except there’s only one problem: it’s Scout toilet paper.

I’m going to have to call Scout out for being the absolute worst toilet paper in the history of existence. I’m serious—I’d rather wipe myself with some twigs and leaves than use Scout. It claims to be soft but it’s not. It claims to be two-ply, but that doesn’t mean much when each ply is practically nonexistent. Worst toilet paper ever .

I can’t believe Ben bought Scout toilet paper. He knows I hate it. Now I’ve got twenty-four rolls of completely useless toilet paper. Wonderful.

A door slams downstairs. Ben is home.

I race downstairs without bothering to put on socks, the uncarpeted stairs ice-cold against the soles of my bare feet. Ben is coming into the foyer dressed in his big, puffy black coat. His nose and cheeks are pink since he parked on the street and had to walk to the front door, and when he pulls off his hat, his brown hair practically sticks up straight in the air. He looks so cute that some of my anger about the toilet paper evaporates.

Ben pulls off his coat and hangs it up in the closet, but fails to get his shoes on the shoe rack. It’s like the laundry hamper—if you’re going to put them right beside the rack, why not put them on the rack?

“Hey,” I say.

He looks up at me and offers a tired smile as he loosens the knot on his tie. “Hey, Jane. Sorry I’m late—rough commute today.”

He leans in to give me a hug and a kiss, which I accept somewhat stiffly. He doesn’t seem to notice though and heads to the kitchen. I follow him.

“Listen,” I say. “I was just in the bathroom and I noticed you bought Scout toilet paper…”

“Yeah.” Ben reaches up on one of the shelves in the kitchen and pulls out a jar of Nutella. Every once in a while, he takes a break from peanut butter and has Nutella instead, which I believe has hazelnuts in it, but it’s basically just spreadable chocolate. After a full day of obese patients with heart disease, it’s hard not to wince when I see my husband eating spoonfuls from a big jar of chocolate. “I got it two days ago. ”

“But why did you buy Scout toilet paper?” I say. “You know I hate that brand. They’re the worst.”

Ben pauses mid-bite of Nutella. “I didn’t know you hate Scout toilet paper. How would I know that?”

“I’ve told you that a million times!” I cry.

“I don’t remember that,” says the guy with the worst memory in the world, apparently.

“Trust me.” I fold my arms across my chest. “I told you. Scout toilet paper is basically unusable.”

“I had no idea you were such a toilet paper diva,” Ben mutters.

“I’m not a toilet paper diva!” Any affection I had for my husband when he first walked in the door is fading fast. “I just don’t like that one brand! Anything else would have been better.”

“I don’t know what to tell you.” He takes another spoonful of Nutella. “You told me to buy toilet paper and I did. I had no idea that I had to be so selective about which brand to buy.”

“Well, now we’ve got twenty-four rolls of crappy toilet paper,” I point out.

On another occasion, I’m sure Ben would have cracked a joke about my saying “crappy toilet paper,” but now he just sighs. “Listen, Jane,” he says, “I had a bad day at work and I’ve been stuck in traffic for almost two hours. Can we discuss the toilet paper another time? ”

“Fine,” I say, even though I know I’m the one who’s now going to have to go out and buy new toilet paper. He’s not even offering. He’s just standing there, eating spoonfuls of Nutella. Well, at least tomorrow is Saturday.

“Please don’t eat half the jar of Nutella,” I tell him. “I’m making dinner soon.”

“I’m not eating half the jar,” he says around a mouthful of hazelnut and chocolate.

“You know,” I say, “maybe you wouldn’t be gaining so much weight if you’d stop eating peanut butter and chocolate all the time.”

I counsel patients on their weight so often, the words come out almost automatically. But I can tell as soon as they leave my mouth that it was the wrong thing to say. The red that had faded from Ben’s face when he came indoors now rises up again in his cheeks.

“Thanks for the tip, Jane,” he says through his teeth. He tosses the spoon on the counter and practically throws the Nutella back on the shelf. He slams the cabinet door shut. “I’m going upstairs. I’d like to be alone for a while.”

“Okay,” I say in a small voice. “Um, do you still want to have dinner with us later?”

“I don’t know,” he mutters. “I guess so. Whatever.”

He brushes past me, and a few seconds later, I hear his footsteps on the stairs. The door to our bedroom slams shut and I’m left alone once again.