After Ordinary

The bathwater has gone tepid by the time I notice I’m shivering. I haven’t moved. The glass of white wine rests on the edge of the tub, sweating onto the tile like it’s been working harder than I have all day.

Upstairs, the kids are finally asleep—teeth brushed, stories read, questions answered twice, because bedtime always brings out emergencies. I can still hear the echo of their laughter from earlier, bright and sharp, the kind that makes you believe you’re doing something right.

Dinner is still sitting in my head. Not the food, but his face when he tasted it. The pause. The look. The way disappointment slid so easily into something colder.

He didn’t say it loudly. Just a small huff, muttered too dry, like a suggestion. Like I should be grateful he noticed at all.

I run my fingers over my stomach beneath the water, tracing the place his eyes always seem to land. I remember the way he leaned back in his chair, how he mentioned his mother’s cooking as if it were an accident, as if comparison hadn’t been the point.

He was already heading for the door before I could clear the plates.

I followed him down the hallway, asking him to wait.

I was hoping we could spend some time together this evening.

The words echo now, bouncing around my head as tears slip into the bathwater. I didn’t cry then. I remember his expression more clearly than anything else—the surprise, almost offense, that I’d asked at all.

“Lauren,” he said, tired and distant, “I just worked all day. It’s loud here. And you…” He trailed off, his eyes flicking over me. “You’ve changed.”

I didn’t argue. I didn’t correct him. I stood there, absorbing it, already knowing how the moment would end.

The part I can’t stop thinking about is how unsurprised I was. How familiar the disappointment felt. Like something I’d been carrying for a long time without admitting it was heavy.

I took the glass of wine in my hand and put the rim to my lips, tilting my head back to finish it. The taste barely registered.

I stood on unsteady legs and dressed for bed, moving quietly, careful not to wake anyone – out of habit more than necessity.

When my head finally hit the pillow, sleep came quickly, heavy and unresisting.

What lingered wasn’t exhaustion, but the thought I hadn’t let myself finish earlier: this wasn’t a bad night. This was an ordinary one.

And for the first time, I understood that ordinariness was the problem.

Morning comes softly.

I wake before my alarm, the house still and pale with early light. For a moment, I lie there waiting for the familiar knot in my chest – the inventory of what needs to be done, what might be said wrong, what mood he might be in.

It doesn’t come. I linger a moment longer, listening to the soft scrape of a chair and the low hum of the refrigerator. There’s a smell of toast in the kitchen, warm and slightly burnt at the edges, and I breathe it in, letting it anchor me to the present. Sunlight pools on the living room rug, gold on beige. It’s a quiet moment, one that makes me realize how much I’ve been missing by bracing for disappointment.

Down the hall, the kids are already awake. I hear drawers opening, bare feet on the floor, a whispered argument over whose turn it is to pick a cartoon. There’s no tension in it. Just life.

In the kitchen, I pour cereal and slice fruit, moving easily, without the tight urgency that usually sits between my shoulders. I catch myself humming – something absentminded and off-key – and stop, startled by the sound.

“Mom,” my daughter says, studying me from her chair, “you’re in a good mood.”

I almost correct her. Almost explain that nothing is different, that I’m just tired, that today will be like any other.

But I don’t.

I look around the table: sticky fingers, mismatched socks, a milk spill that I’ll clean up later. The noise is manageable. The mess is survivable. I am not bracing myself for anything.

“I think I slept well,” I say instead, smiling as my son reaches his tiny hand out to hold onto mine.

The words feel small, but they stay with me long after breakfast ends. I feel the gentle rhythm of their lives settling around me, and it steadies something in my chest.

Later that afternoon, my son asks for help with his laces. He’s sitting on the floor by the door, tongue caught between his teeth as he struggles with the tennis shoes.

“You’re doing it wrong,” he mutters to himself, already frustrated.

The words stop me cold.

I crouch beside him. “Hey,” I say gently, reaching for the knot. “There’s no wrong way when you’re still learning.”

He looks up at me, uncertain. “Daddy says – “

“I know,” I interrupt softly, before he can finish. The interruption feels unfamiliar in my mouth. But necessary.

I take his hands in mine, guiding them slowly. “We don’t talk to ourselves like that here.”

He nods, relieved, and when the bow finally holds, he grins like he’s accomplished something enormous.

I smile back, but my chest feels tight.

Because I know now that love isn’t just what we endure. It’s what we allow to take root.

That evening, when my phone lights up with his name, I don’t feel the usual rush of dread or hope. I don’t rehearse my tone. I don’t brace myself.

I let it ring while I finish reading a bedtime story.

My daughter leans into me, warm and heavy with sleep. My son’s breathing evens out beside her.

I stay there longer than necessary, listening to the quiet, committing it to memory.

I don’t know exactly when I’ll leave.

I only know this: I will not teach them that love sounds like dismissal, or that care must be earned by becoming smaller.

And to me, that feels like a good start. Today is the first step towards creating a life that not only what my kids deserve, but the life I deserve as well.