agreed more.
As far as she could tell, God was no longer between them at all. He had been replaced by the army and the war. When they went to bed, most often they would lie there without speaking, Harriet with her lamp off, Joe with his lit. Harriet, wide awake, on her right side staring into the wall, Joe, half asleep, still pulling his glazed eyes across the pages of some report. And when they made love, or made something, Harriet no longer felt like she was holding her husband. No matter how close she pressed her body to his, no matter how hard she squeezed them together, she always felt as though she was apart from him, standing at attention. Instead of kissing him and staring into his eyes, as she had once done, inhaling and exhaling on the same count, she now moved her face off to one side to avoid breathing his already warm, used air. Joe was Husband, Harriet was Wife. He did his thing, she did hers.
Harriet was taking a load of her own clothes from the washer when a woman walked through the front door, letting in a rush of wind and noise from the street. The woman stopped just inside the doorway, eyeing Harriet and her pile of clothes that now dominated the otherwise bare folding tables. This made Harriet feel uneasy, which always happened when people stared at her, so she returned to her work. She tossed her clothes into the dryer and pressed the button, her neon cottons and pastel pants forming a giant laundry kaleidoscope. She wore those vibrant colors because it made her happy. Because she could. And, mostly, because Joe wasn�t around. This was her separate wardrobe she always wore when he was away, since he would not allow her to wear such �ridiculous clothes.� She was a woman, not a little girl, he would say. It was time for her to grow up and look like a woman should. What should a woman look like?
While Harriet wasn�t paying attention, the woman had slipped over
to the Lost and Found box and started rummaging through its contents. She seemed quite intent on finding whatever it was she was looking for, as several items had spilled out onto the laundromat floor. The woman was taller than average, definitely taller than Harriet, though Harriet often cringed when the doctor told her she was �average� or �normal� as he should expect any woman to be. The woman had blonde hair that, in the right light from the giant window behind her, looked a darker brown on occasion, and was streaked with pale blonde highlights that, in the same glinting light, reflected almost white. She had removed her sunglasses when she came inside, so it was quite evident that she didn�t wear prescription lenses. Though, as Harriet well knew, it was quite possible that she wore contacts. She showed almost no skin with her outfit � a blue, long-sleeved jogging suit. She might be a runner. Or a politician. Surely not a wife? Could this woman possibly have been the one to drive her husband to leave her? Could she have been the one who treated him so poorly? She didn�t look evil at all. Could Harriet have been wrong about the ringless man? She turned around completely to face the woman, though she remained standing with her back against dryer.
�Were you looking for something?� asked Harriet. �I might be able to help you.� Although if she were looking for her husband, that was out of the question, since Harriet couldn�t even seem to find her own.
�I seem to have lost my ring,� she said. �I�ve looked everywhere for it. This was the only other place I could think of. Have you seen my ring?� My ring? Was it actually hers, or was she claiming for her husband?
�I found a ring,� said Harriet, as she walked right up to the woman. �It was in my washing machine.� She didn�t know why