On Sunday mornings, it was her habit to leave them in bed together, the baby and the man. She had at first released herself from their sleep in increments — a foot, a knee, an elbow, until, at last, she'd eased out of the nimbus of their moist breaths.
There had been no purpose to her escape, then, except to see if she could.
The first time, she did not know what to do with herself. Her arms hung empty. She lifted one, settled it on the bannister, soft wood, tacky with humidity. Her pastel drawings hung on the wall. Her fingers recalled the silky dust of them. She longed to touch, but they were sealed beneath glass, their framing a gift from the man.
She made it to the bottom of the stairs that first time before she heard the rasping of the sheets. She could see the baby without seeing him, so many times had she witnessed his wayward flailing. Soon, he would wail in frustration, then, go still, as if waiting.
She returned to them.
The next Sunday, she got all the way to the kitchen. It was still dark, the blue darkness that presages dawn. She ran her fingers over the kettle's cool, slick surface, made dizzy by the sheer cleanness of it. Here, she could smell bananas overripening, there, the stale onion remains of last night's dinner. She opened the refrigerator to breathe in the chill. But she heard it, then, faintly, the scratching of tiny fingernails on sheets.
That week, the man told her she seemed preoccupied. He didn't leave room for a response. His talk made a balloon around them. He brought home his day for her, emptied it into the balloon, and she took it in, as she had always done, like air.
The next Sunday, she roamed the house. Quiet, in the dark, it felt smaller to her. She heard nothing from the baby and so did not return to bed, but made coffee and breakfast for the man. He was pleased.
That week she spent long hours in stillness. Time dropped away. The baby was undemanding. The man asked if she was well. She smiled at him, and he took that for an answer.
That Sunday, she wanted to go outside of the house. It was earlier and darker. The grass was long and would be wet. Her robe would drag behind her like a queen's, making a scratchy sound. At the threshold, she stopped, listened, heard the baby sigh and turn over in his sleep. He was searching for her, for his four o'clock feed.
That week she turned on the music. Rachmaninoff, Wagner, anybody loud. The baby didn't mind. He kicked his little feet and pumped his little arms. Sometimes his face grew red, but she did not hear him cry.
When the man came home on Thursday, the house was dark. She had not realized, until she heard the click of his key in the lock. He slapped at the light switch and the foyer was flooded and just for a minute he looked afraid, as if he might drown in all that light. "You're sitting in the dark," he said and this time left a pause, a breach in the conversational bubble, so she said, "It's not dark if you're not used to the light." And he frowned and went about flipping switches until the house was warm with it. And he went to the pad on the floor where the baby lay squinting. "I'm worried about you," he said. She made no response. It wasn't clear to whom he was speaking.
That Sunday, she got some boxes from the attic and in the quiet of the predawn, she packed away the books she meant to read someday and the magazines she'd let slide. She stacked them in the closet under the stairs.
On Monday, the house had a crisper feel. She put the boxes on the street for the trash men and found that she could turn the music down.
The baby cried now when she touched it during the day, so she only did so when necessary.
On Tuesday, she awoke at her Sunday time. The house had that same Sunday feeling. So she got up, as if it were Sunday, and packed seven more boxes. She opened her closet and took armfuls of clothes, one after another, until it was a clean white space. She packed the clothes in the boxes.
On Wednesday, she emptied out the linen closet and three kitchen cabinets before she heard it, a little sob from the baby. She listened hard, but there was nothing more, so she packed another box. It was easy, now. Now that she didn't sort through. It was easy and fast to just put it all in the boxes. She stowed them, as before, in the closet under the stairs. The trash men only came on Mondays.
On Thursday — or was it Friday? — she packed up all the winter stuff from the coat closet. Now, whole sections of the house were empty. When it was light, she scrubbed them with bleach.
The baby cried when she touched it. So she didn't touch it. She propped its bottle against the crib and went back to cleaning.
"Are you sleeping?" the man said sometime that weekend. "Your eyes look bad." But he'd left no room for an answer. All that space, but no room.
He must have noticed the baby not wanting her because he cared for it that weekend. It no longer sought her for a four o'clock feed. But she knew it didn't sleep.
On Monday, she called the movers.
They asked her destination. She hadn't anticipated the question and said, "Phoenix," the first place that came to mind.
They wanted a lot of information, but finally agreed to come the following Monday. Would they pack everything? she asked. Yes, they said. Everything.
At last, the house would be empty.
That Sunday, she slept.
Ashley Kaufman is currently located in Oklahoma City. Her recent online work can be found in Mad Hatters' Review and Susurrus. New print work will appear in this summer's Pearl.