Page 7 of The New Couple in 5B

“What was that about?” I ask. I’m antsy to get to the bathroom. Fifteen minutes have passed.

He drops onto the couch, staring at the envelope in his hands.

“Rosie,” he says, a smile tugging at the corners of his lips. “Ivan left us the apartment.”

All our luck has been bad lately. It doesn’t seem possible that we could receive such a boon, this change of fortune. If you can consider it good fortune to take what probably truly belongs to someone else. I don’t allow myself to accept it, push away, still focused on my other hopes.

“Give me a second,” I say. He nods, opening the envelope, lifting out the documents. Two sets of keys clatter to the distressed wood coffee table.

In the bathroom, I lock the door and close my eyes.Please, please, please.

But when I open them again, my heart sinks hard into the pit of my stomach. Just one blue line. I bite back my tears of disappointment, brace against its powerful waves. We haven’t been trying that long, I tell myself. It shouldn’t hurt this much. We’re young. It’sreallynot a good time to be having a baby.

I sit on the toilet and focus on my breath.

Then, I wrap it all up—the test, the wrapper, the box—in tissues and toss it into the wastepaper basket. I haven’t told Chad that my period is late. No reason to bring him on the roller-coaster ride with me. I stare at myself in the mirror, look into my own dark eyes, run my fingers through the thick waves of my hair and put on a smile worthy of my actor husband.Pull yourself together.

When I step back outside, Chad is staring at the keys in his hand.

“It’s ours,” he says. “It’s all right here. The keys, the deed, the co-op documents.”

“That’s—wow,” I say, sitting beside him.

“Oh, my God, Rosie,” he says, grabbing both my hands. “That place. It’s worth a fortune.”

A two-bedroom apartment with stunning views and washed with lights in a prewar building with a doorman. Hardwood floors, towering ceilings, a working fireplace. I can hardly bring myself to imagine us there.

“It’s hard to celebrate this,” he says. “Because Ivan’s gone. But—wow.”

I don’t want to say what I’m thinking because I’m the pragmatist and he’s the dreamer. But what are the taxes on an inheritance like that? That maintenance—it’s huge. Can we even afford to inherit something worth that much?

“What about Dana?” I think about the angry flush on her cheeks, the sadness in her eyes.

He lifts his shoulders. “What about her? Where was she when Ivan was dying? I mean, she never even called. He hadn’t spoken to her in over a decade.”

It’s complicated, I want to tell him, when you’re estranged from your parents. Would I go home if I learned my father was on his deathbed? I can’t say. Maybe not. But then again, I wouldn’t expect an inheritance, either.

“She’s going to sue us for it,” I say, thinking about the angry flush on her cheeks, her parting threat.

He seems to consider, looking at the documents that are spread out, the two sets of keys that catch the meager light coming in from the window. “Let her.”

“Rosie,” he says, pulling me closer, leaning in. His eyes search my face. “It’s okay to be happy about this. Be happy for us.”

Then we’re making out, the apartment and everything else forgotten. The heat between us comes up fast; it always does. We haven’t been married that long, less than a year, just a simple affair at city hall, a gathering of friends at our favorite bar afterward. We keep promising each other a honeymoon, but we’ve been hustling so much to make ends meet, to take care of Ivan, it hasn’t happened.

His lips on my neck, his hands tearing at my white silk blouse. It falls to the floor and then I’m unzipping his jeans, hiking up my skirt and climbing on top of him. He slides easily inside me, hard, hungry. I let the passion take me as he puts his lips to my breast. It’s fast and intense, hot. I push myself deeper and he drops his head back in pleasure, groans, helpless. I put my lips on the soft flesh of his exposed throat. His arms close around me. Everything but this is gone.

“Rosie,” he whispers. “I love you so much.”

Bottle rockets of pleasure shoot through me as he climaxes with a moan that sounds like pain, and my body answers with a shuddering orgasm. I drop against him, my gaze falling outside. I forgot to pull the shades. All the windows are dark except one. The yoga mom is standing there watching us. She must have seen the whole thing.

Luckily, I’m not the shy type. When she sees me looking, she turns away, embarrassed, and shuts the shade hard. I giggle to myself, tell Chad about the yoga mom, remark how we should be more careful.

“Authors gone wild,” he says. We both get a laugh out of that one.

I keep my gaze out the window, wondering if anyone else saw. There’s a painter on the top floor; sometimes he works all night. There are a couple of young women on three who look like they have office jobs. They always have friends over, or they’re on their big couch, sweats on, hair up, Netflix, Uber Eats. They seem sweet, young. They usually go to bed around ten, are gone for the day by seven. The rest of the windows are shaded most of the time.

“I’m going to call Olivia.”

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