Chapter 6 - What Silas Had Never Known
Silas knew about the cancer.
He knew about the rent.
He knew Beatrice could be cruel.
He did not know how completely Claire had accepted it.
That came out three nights after the wedding.
“You told me your mom was difficult,” Silas said. “You never told me she was controlling who could contact you.”
“I didn’t know.”
“You knew some of it.”
Claire stiffened.
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“You knew she made you feel ashamed for being sick.”
“That’s different.”
“Is it?”
Claire stood.
The apartment still smelled faintly of wedding flowers.
For the first time since the ceremony, anger turned toward the wrong person.
“You think I chose this?”
“No.”
“You think I enjoyed living in that basement?”
“No.”
“Then stop acting like I failed some test.”
Silas was quiet.
Claire immediately hated herself for the sentence.
Silas had driven her to infusions.
Held ice chips to her lips when she couldn’t drink.
Shaved the last uneven patches of hair from her head when they started falling out in clumps.
He had never once made her illness about himself.
“I’m sorry,” she said.
Silas looked toward the window.
“I’m not angry you stayed there.”
“Then what?”
“I’m angry she taught you that accepting help meant owing somebody.”
Claire sat down again.
Silas continued more carefully.
“Every time I offered something, you turned it into a debt calculation.”
Claire stared at him.
He was right.
When he bought groceries, she reimbursed him.
When he missed work for treatment, she tracked his hours.
When he offered his apartment, she refused because she could not contribute equally.
Beatrice had not created that entirely.
But she had reinforced it.
Claire’s independence had become something easy to exploit because asking for less felt safer than admitting she needed more.
“I thought I was protecting us,” Claire said.
“From what?”
“From you eventually resenting me.”
Silas’s face changed.
That answer wounded him.
Claire reached for his hand.
He let her take it.
Then his phone buzzed.
Diane.
She had found something in an old family group chat.
A message from Beatrice written two weeks after Claire moved into the basement.
She’s staying with me now. At least the extra money will help cover the house until I figure things out.
Below it was another message.
From Diane.
Extra money? Claire is paying you?
May you like
Beatrice never answered.
She had known exactly what she was doing from the beginning.
