Part 4 — My husband told me that he was at work on Thursdays, but when I saw him in the hall, an unfamiliar woman immediately turned pale

…the document was handed to me by the bank’s lawyer that same day, at two in the afternoon.

Rain drops ran down the windows in his office. The lawyer’s pen lay on the desk, with a small dark green stone set in its top, and the stone flashed every time the headlights of cars passed outside the window.

“This is an additional credit agreement,” he told me. “Jason signed it in your name two months ago.”

“Another one?”

“With this document, your house was used as collateral.”

I looked at the paper.

My name was written there again.

But the signature was not mine.

That same evening the lawyer told me that it was no longer only a matter of marital betrayal. It was about forgery, fraud, and Jason’s desire to cover the entire business with my property.

Jason contacted me ten times.

I did not answer the first call.

On the second, he left a voice message.

“Claire, please, do not go to the lawyers yet. Everything will be fixed.”

On the third call, his lawyer called me.

“Madam, if we reach an agreement, we will avoid court.”

“An agreement about what?”

“You will sign that you knew about the documents. In exchange, Jason will leave you your house.”

I was silent for several seconds.

“He will leave me my house, which he was stealing with my forged signature?”

“It is not that simple.”

“For me, it is very simple.”

The lawyer exhaled.

“Then we cannot help you.”

“That is unfortunate. And you will no longer receive Jason’s money.”

That same night I went to the police.

In the station’s small room, the white lamp lit the ceiling so harshly that everything looked more severe. The papers of my statement lay on the table. The officer listened to the recording, then played Jason’s words again.

“Claire will not find out anything.”

It was my husband’s voice.

But for the first time I heard it the way a stranger would hear it.

Not as a tired man.

Not as a frightened husband.

As a person who was planning how to erase my life so that he himself could live peacefully.

The officer turned off the recorder.

“Are you ready to submit this as official material?”

I took the metronome from my bag and placed it on the table. Its pendulum was still moving.

“Yes.”

The next morning Jason came home. I did not open the door. He knocked for a long time, then called the neighbor.

“Tell her that I only want to talk.”

The neighbor passed everything on to me.

I still did not open the door.

“Claire, Brooke means nothing. It was only dancing.”

I stood on the other side of the door.

“Then why did you bury me alive for her?”

He could not answer.

“Because you were my wife until my comfort became inconvenienced by you. Then you turned me into a memory.”

“I am not against you.”

“No. You are simply against the consequences that your choice brought.”

Jason stood at the door for almost twenty minutes. At last, the footsteps in the corridor grew quiet.

One week later we met in court.

The courtroom was small. There was dust on the windowsill, while Jason’s hands were shaking so much that he held the glass of water with both hands.

His new lawyer was sitting there too, but a few minutes before the statement he nodded to Jason.

“I am no longer participating in this case,” he said.

Jason stood up.

“What do you mean, you are no longer participating?”

“You told me that you had your wife’s consent. Now I know that this was not true.”

“You promised to defend me!”

“I did not promise to defend a lie.”

Jason’s face became gray.

Brooke was there too. She did not hide anything in her testimony. She described every Thursday, everything he had said, and how Jason told her that his marriage belonged in the past.

“I thought he was a free man,” she said. “Now I understand that he was only playing at freedom.”

Jason lowered his head.

The recording was played in court.

His voice sounded again.

“Claire will not find out anything.”

This time he sat there and listened to his own words. His eyes widened. It was as if he realized for the first time that the voice everyone heard truly belonged to him.

“This is cut out of context,” he said.

The judge looked at him.

“Which part is not your voice?”

Jason fell silent.

The documents were sent for examination. The signatures were confirmed to be forged. The bank canceled the loan, his company began bankruptcy proceedings, and the case took a criminal direction.

I returned to the house.

On the first night the rooms seemed too large. The bedroom closet was half-empty. Jason had left one photograph—the photograph from our wedding, where we were both laughing and still believed that love could withstand everything.

I did not tear up the photograph.

I simply put it in a drawer.

As for the metronome, I placed it on the kitchen shelf.

Its pendulum stopped, because for the first time in years I no longer wanted to set it in motion.

Three months later I rented a new apartment in a small town, beside the river. In the morning I worked at the municipal library, and in the evening I went to free dancing lessons.

On the first day the tango instructor asked me:

“Do you have a partner?”

“Not yet.”

“Then you will begin alone.”

“Probably, that is better for me.”

My first step came out badly. My foot slipped and I laughed. Before, at such moments Jason would say that dancing was not for him.

Now I understood that sometimes a person simply does not dance with the people with whom they should dance.

Four months later the first snow came. I was sitting with my sister in a small café, while her seven-year-old girl was drawing on paper.

“Who is this?” I asked.

“You,” she answered me. “You are holding music in your hand.”

In the drawing, a woman stood holding a small brass metronome. White dots were falling around her.

“Why does she not have a partner?” I asked.

The girl put down the pencil.

“Because she is already dancing in the right rhythm.”

It was a child’s answer, but that evening I could not sleep for a long time.

At last Jason sent me one letter.

“I have lost everything. If you are ever able, come and talk to me. I want to explain why I did it.”

I read the letter twice.

Then I deleted it.

In reply I sent him only one sentence:

“Your reasons are no longer my life.”

After that he did not contact me again.

Neither did I miss him.

Sometimes I still dream of that old hall, the warm amber lamps, and the moment when the music stopped. But in the dream the door opens differently now.

I no longer stand on the threshold.

I enter.

The metronome is in my bag. Its brass surface reflects the light of the snow, and the pendulum begins moving again.

One, two.

One, two.

This time I choose the rhythm.