He watches his knuckles strain on the handles of the shopping trolley, bone creaking against skin. Ettie is saying something as they walk through the supermarket, something about the ossa buco she’s planning to make this weekend.
He can’t look at her.
‘Adam?’ Ettie’s brow is raised; his gaze skitters to the bags of flour on sale behind her. ‘You okay?’ she asks, laying her hand over his. Their rings clink together, and he suddenly wants to vomit.
‘Just … just thinking about work,’ he says.
She gives him a wry little smile. ‘You promised you’d leave it at the office.’
‘I know, sorry. What were you saying?’
‘I need canned tomatoes.’
‘Right.’
Ettie walks next to him as he pushes the cart, her arm looped through his. Her elderflower perfume, the same one he bought her for their first anniversary back in high school, is gentle amongst the sterile supermarket air. Elderflower is the smell of their home. He stares down at the top of her head, at the silver-white hairs that have begun to twine through her curls.
Adam was looking for their passports when he found the letter in her desk drawer, excitement turning heavy and dreadful. She had been tired lately, but he hadn’t thought … She hadn’t said …
Ettie gently pats his forearm before he can walk past the tomatoes. She reaches down and passes him the cans.
‘Before I forget,’ she says, ‘Grant rang this morning. He and Katie want us over for dinner next weekend.’
‘Sounds good,’ he says, staring at the growing pile of cans.
She laughs, tugging him; they resume their walk down the aisle. ‘You sound like you’d rather get a tooth pulled. I’ll tell him we have other plans —’
‘No, no,’ he says, ‘It’s fine.’
‘He was positively gushing about showing us the new house. I’ve never heard someone so excited about a mortgage,’ Ettie remarks.
‘You know how architects get,’ Adam says, wrestling down a laugh that threatens to turn into a sob.
‘Mm. He told me to let him know if we change our minds about the kitchen.’
‘Him and our bloody kitchen.’
‘You’d think we live in a slum the way he carries on’, she says, ‘I told him I’d much rather go to Nice than have a smart stove. Do we need more pickles?’
‘Yeah. You finished the jar.’
If Ettie notices he’s walking strangely, jerkily, she doesn’t say anything as they make their way towards the pickled goods. She arches onto her tiptoes, looking for her favourite brand. He’s watched her make a ham, cheese and pickle sandwich for lunch almost every day for the past five years.
‘Why didn’t you tell me?’ he whispers.
Ettie stills. The two of them stand there, looking at anything but each other as shoppers pass them by.
‘You saw the letter,’ she says eventually, taking a jar from the shelf.
‘You could have had several cycles of chemo by now.’
She exhales. ‘It’s too late for that.’
‘Doctors can be wrong,’ he says, ‘We’ll get a second opinion.’
‘That was the second opinion,’ she says kindly, and passes him the jar before she reaches for a second one. The glass is cool in his hand and the pickles inside shudder with him.
‘It’s terminal.’ Ettie continues, holding a second jar. ‘No point wasting time and money.’
Something shatters. Suddenly his socks are wet and the smell of elderflower is gone, obscured by the tang of vinegar.
‘I’ll get someone to clean up,’ Ettie says quickly, leaving him to his mess.
He slowly kneels, cheeks and eyes burning. He doesn’t want anyone seeing him like this. The shoes, her gift to him last Christmas, stink of pickling liquid. Tears track down his face, joining the spill. He collects the larger shards of glass and picks up a pickle from where it rests on the linoleum floor.
Ettie reappears, accompanied by a gangly uniformed teenager — Fred, according to his nametag — holding a mop. Adam straightens, hands full of broken glass and the singular pickle. For the first time since stepping into the supermarket, he meets Ettie’s eyes.
‘I’m sorry,’ he says.
‘No problem,’ Fred says, offering a trash bag. Adam lets the glass and the pickle fall into it and moves the trolley out of the teenager’s way. Adam and Ettie stand there, watching as he cleans the floor in a few simple, easy motions and then returns to his day of work.
‘If you knew, you’d cancel our trip,’ she says finally, ‘I’m sorry.’
Adam looks over at Ettie, at the heart-shaped face he has woken up to every day since he was nineteen. Amongst the fading sourness in the air, he can smell elderflowers once more.
‘What happens now?’ she asks quietly. His ribs struggle to contain his heart.
‘We grab another jar of pickles,’ he says, looping his arm through hers once more. ‘And then we book our flights.’
Laura Habib is studying her Master of Creative Writing, Publishing and Editing at the University of Melbourne. When she isn’t writing, she likes to sample fine wines and subpar cheese, often at once.