Wife's Secret: She Never Left the City
"I've been assigned to work out of town for a year, Hunter, but we'll finally be able to buy a house once I return," Queenie Sorenson, my newlywed wife, says.
She then moves her paralyzed grandfather, Oscar Sorenson, and her younger brother, Adam Sorenson, straight into our rental apartment after telling me that. She looks at me and says, "I'll have to trouble you to take care of Grandpa and Adam."
She leaves in a hurry after that.
I have taken care of Oscar's daily needs entirely on my own and handled dropping off and picking up Adam from kindergarten since that day, working around the clock.
Queenie goes from frequently sending messages to check in on me to claiming she is too swamped with work to have any free time, rarely even calling.
I finally make it through the year, but Queenie sends me a message, saying, "I'm still not done with my work, so I might need to stay for another year."
It isn't until Adam's birthday that I find a message from Queenie on his smartwatch.
"Joseph and I will pick you up at the usual spot on Friday to celebrate your birthday. You can just tell Hunter that you're sleeping over at a classmate's house Friday night and won't be home. You have to make sure he doesn't catch on."
I realize then that Queenie's supposed out-of-town assignment has actually always been within the city.