THE WHITE SHEET

Paul stood on the white sheet.

He had been standing there for three minutes.

Perhaps four.

Karen said three was sufficient, but Paul had learned that with Karen, sufficient was a dangerous word.

He was naked except for his socks, which he had been instructed to remove next.

The sheet was perfectly white.

Not hospital white.

Not funeral white.

Karen called it clean white.

There was a difference.

Everything Paul brought home from the police station was considered contaminated. His boots. His trousers. His shirt. His belt. Sometimes even his thoughts, although Karen had never actually said that.

Not in so many words.

He stood there, exhausted, looking at the bathroom door.

“Shower first,” Karen said.

“I know.”

“You know what?”

Paul closed his eyes.

“Shower first.”

“Good.”

Thirty-five years of marriage.

Thirty-five years of policing.

Thirty-five years of coming home to the woman who knew exactly where he had been, who he had spoken to, what he had touched and, increasingly, what he had been thinking.

The house had become a checkpoint.

Karen was the border.

Paul was the contraband.

He sighed.

That was another thing she didn't like.

Sighing.

It suggested resentment.

Resentment suggested secrets.

Secrets suggested guilt.

And guilt, in Karen's mind, was practically a confession.

She had not always been like this.

Or perhaps she had.

Perhaps grief had simply given her permission.

When Paul's father died, the cancer had eaten him slowly.

Not dramatically.

That would have been easier.

Instead, it had taken him piece by piece, patiently, like some enormous invisible crab beneath the bed.

The appetite first.

Then the strength.

Then the dignity.

Then the voice.

Paul had watched it happen and felt himself coming apart with him.

Karen arrived at exactly the right moment.

She became indispensable.

She took him to the priest.

She hid the Jack Daniel's.

She made appointments.

She organised the funeral.

She told him when to sleep.

When to eat.

When to stop drinking.

When to pray.

When to grieve.

And Paul, who was drowning, mistook the hand around his wrist for a lifeline.

Thank God for Karen.

He used to think that.

Thank God for Karen.

Over and over.

Like a prayer.

Like a confession.

Like an instruction.

She moved into his house.

Then she rearranged it.

Then she rearranged him.

Marriage followed quickly.

She was a good Catholic girl.

Especially when kneeling.

Paul remembered laughing about that once.

Karen didn't.

Karen remembered everything.

She was organised to a fault.

God knew Paul was failing at the seams.

Then came the baby.

Unexpected.

Wonderful.

Terrifying.

A new life.

Paul held that tiny, furious creature and felt something inside him click back into place.

Complete.

For the first time in years, perhaps.

He had a family.

A home.

A respectable job.

A wife who loved him.

A child who needed him.

Everything was all right.

Everything was absolutely, perfectly—

“Paul?”

He opened his eyes.

Karen was standing in the doorway.

“You've been staring at the wall.”

“I was thinking.”

“About what?”

“Nothing.”

Her face changed.

Only slightly.

But Paul knew that face.

“Nothing?”

“I was tired.”

“You're always tired lately.”

He looked at her.

She looked back.

For a moment they were simply husband and wife.

Then Karen smiled.

It was a small smile.

Almost tender.

“You should shower.”

“Yes.”

Paul stepped off the sheet.

Behind him, Karen immediately folded it.

Carefully.

Precisely.

As though something poisonous had fallen onto it.

The police force had taught Paul many things.

How to lie.

How to watch.

How to recognise fear.

How to recognise guilt.

How to recognise the moment a person decided they had nothing left to lose.

He had also learned that the most dangerous people weren't always criminals.

Sometimes they wore wedding rings.

Sometimes they made the bed.

Sometimes they packed your lunch.

Sometimes they stood waiting for you when you came home.

And sometimes they loved you so thoroughly that you couldn't remember where their life ended and yours began.

Paul showered.

He watched the dirty water disappear down the plughole.

He wondered whether Karen could smell guilt.

Perhaps she could.

Perhaps that was why she had become so vigilant.

Because there was something in the house that she had never found.

Something Paul had buried so deeply that even he occasionally forgot it existed.

His old friend.

His lawyer friend.

Years ago.

A man Paul had known for years.

A man who trusted him.

A man who had eventually been arrested.

Convicted.

Sentenced to nineteen years.

Nineteen.

Paul had always found that number strangely satisfying.

It was long enough to destroy a life.

Not long enough to make the newspapers interested forever.

Nobody knew.

Nobody had ever known.

The evidence had appeared in the right place.

The information had reached the right people.

The investigation had moved in precisely the right direction.

And Paul had watched from the shadows.

His colleagues called it good police work.

His lawyer friend called it betrayal.

But he had never known who betrayed him.

That was the beauty of it.

Paul dried himself.

Outside, Karen was waiting.

“You've been a long time.”

“Sorry.”

“Were you thinking again?”

“No.”

Another smile.

This one didn't reach her eyes.

Paul looked at his wife.

Thirty-five years.

She knew everything about him.

Everything except the one thing that mattered.

And suddenly, horribly, Paul wondered whether Karen had known all along.

Not the details.

Not the evidence.

Just the shape of it.

The smell of it.

The stain beneath the floorboards.

Perhaps that was why she insisted upon the white sheet.

Perhaps she wasn't trying to keep the filth out.

Perhaps she was waiting for it to reveal itself.

Paul looked down.

There was a tiny dark mark on the pristine white fabric.

Karen saw it too.

Neither of them spoke.

Then Karen bent down.

Very slowly.

She touched the mark with one finger.

And smiled.

“Paul,” she whispered.

“Yes?”

“Tell me where you've been.”

And suddenly the house seemed very small.

Much smaller than it had been yesterday.

Much smaller than it had been thirty-five years ago.

Much smaller than a prison cell.

Because a prisoner, at least, knows when the door is locked.