No More Secondhand Souvenirs

In our eight years of marriage, Graham brought me a snow globe every single time he returned from a business trip.

When I resigned from my staff writer position at "Wanderer" to care for his sick mother, he had pulled me into his arms, burying his face in my neck.

"Shirley," he’d whispered, his chest hitching with tender guilt, "wherever you can't go, I'll go for you. I'll see it all through my eyes, and one day, I'll walk every single one of those streets with you."

For our eighth anniversary, he wore the sharp charcoal suit I loved best. He fastened a delicate diamond pendant around my throat with steady, practiced fingers, then spritzed a custom fragrance behind my ears.

Etched into the heavy glass flacon were nine words:

"No matter how far I wander, I return only to you."

He tilted my chin, kissing me with a softness so disarming it made my throat ache. "To the only Mrs. Dalton."

Tears pricked my eyes. Standing there, I genuinely believed that eight years of swallowed pride and domestic exhaustion had finally found their harbor.

Then Margot arrived at the anniversary dinner.

She slipped into the ballroom with her hand looped casually through Graham’s elbow. With sickening intimacy, she reached up to straighten his lapel, then leaned in close, inhaling against the crook of my neck.

"Graham," she purred, her lips curving into a sharp, knowing smirk, "you actually gave her the seventh draft? The one I threw out?"

She reached into her clutch and produced an identical crystal bottle.

"He had it blended in Grasse to bottle the scent of our first night under the northern lights," she said smoothly, meeting my gaze without a flicker of shame. "And those snow globes? I was the one who bought them at the airport gift shops. My carry-on was too full, so I told him to take the clutter home to keep you happy."

The heavy, suffocating scent of birch and bergamot surged down my throat.

I looked at Graham. His handsome face had gone stark, bloodless white.

The devotion I had