The following weekend, Sabrina brought two.<\/p>\n
A month later, she and Derek arrived with three huge bags packed with jeans, towels, children\u2019s clothes, sheets, and whatever else had accumulated during the week.<\/p>\n
Nobody asked anymore.<\/p>\n
Derek would carry the bags through my kitchen and drop them beside the basement door. Sabrina would kiss my cheek, send the children into the backyard, and by late afternoon they expected everything to be washed, dried, folded, and ready to take home.<\/p>\n
For a while, I kept telling myself I was helping.<\/p>\n
They both worked. Their children were seven and four. Life was busy, and I had more free time than they did.<\/p>\n
But there is a difference between helping somebody and quietly becoming responsible for a job that was never yours.<\/p>\n
Most Saturdays, I spent hours walking up and down the basement stairs while everyone else sat on the patio. I\u2019d hear Sabrina laughing with the kids while I pulled warm shirts from the dryer and matched socks that didn\u2019t belong to me.<\/p>\n
Eventually, even the thank-yous disappeared.<\/p>\n
The moment that changed things came after they stayed overnight following a family dinner.<\/p>\n
We were eating breakfast when I finally said, \u201cSabrina, I don\u2019t mind helping once in a while, but bringing your entire week\u2019s laundry here every Saturday is getting to be too much.\u201d<\/p>\n
She took a sip of coffee and laughed.<\/p>\n
\u201cMarian, you\u2019re home all day anyway.\u201d<\/p>\n
I waited for Derek to say something.<\/p>\n
He didn\u2019t.<\/p>\n
My son suddenly found the butter on his toast extremely interesting.<\/p>\n
That hurt more than Sabrina\u2019s comment.<\/p>\n
I wasn\u2019t asking him to fight with his wife. I only wanted some sign that he understood my time still belonged to me, even if I no longer had a boss waiting for me on Monday morning.<\/p>\n
Instead, he kept eating.<\/p>\n
I cleared the table and decided I wasn\u2019t going to argue again.<\/p>\n
The following Saturday, Sabrina arrived with four laundry bags.<\/p>\n
Four.<\/p>\n
Derek carried two inside while she dragged the others toward the basement door.<\/p>\n
\u201cTerrible week,\u201d she said with a tired laugh.<\/p>\n
I smiled.<\/p>\n
\u201cLeave them downstairs.\u201d<\/p>\n
She looked surprised, almost as if she\u2019d expected another lecture.<\/p>\n
Then she relaxed.<\/p>\n
\u201cThanks, Marian.\u201d<\/p>\n
That afternoon, everyone ate burgers in the backyard. I waited until nobody was paying attention, went downstairs, and emptied all four bags onto the laundry-room floor.<\/p>\n
I had been planning to sort everything into separate baskets and leave the detergent beside the washing machine. If Sabrina thought four bags were such an easy job, she could see exactly how easy they were when she had to do them herself.<\/p>\n
I made one pile for Sabrina, one for Derek, and another for the children.<\/p>\n
Then I picked up a pale blue dress shirt.<\/p>\n
It wasn\u2019t Derek\u2019s.<\/p>\n
He worked at an engineering company where he wore polos most days, and even when he needed something formal, he hadn\u2019t owned shirts like this in years.<\/p>\n
I found another.<\/p>\n
Then a pair of gray trousers with a waist much smaller than my son\u2019s.<\/p>\n
By the time I reached the bottom of the second bag, there were six men\u2019s shirts, two pairs of trousers, an old cardigan, and several pieces that clearly belonged to someone else.<\/p>\n
Three of the shirts still had dry-cleaning tags attached.<\/p>\n
I stood in the middle of my basement holding one of them and felt my imagination head somewhere ugly.<\/p>\n
Then I stopped myself.<\/p>\n
A strange shirt was not proof of an affair, and I wasn\u2019t about to turn my son\u2019s marriage upside down because I had watched too many television dramas.<\/p>\n
Besides, that wasn\u2019t why I had gone downstairs.<\/p>\n
I found four empty baskets.<\/p>\n
One said SABRINA.<\/p>\n
One said DEREK.<\/p>\n
The third said KIDS.<\/p>\n
On the last sheet of paper, I simply wrote UNKNOWN.<\/p>\n
I placed detergent and dryer sheets on top of the washing machine, pulled out the folding table, and went upstairs without washing a single sock.<\/p>\n
Then I ate my burger while it was still hot.<\/p>\n
Around six, Sabrina disappeared downstairs to collect the laundry.<\/p>\n
Less than a minute later, we heard her yell.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat did you do?\u201d<\/p>\n
Derek and I hurried downstairs.<\/p>\n
Sabrina stood in the middle of the laundry room staring at the four full baskets as though she\u2019d discovered I\u2019d set fire to her clothes.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhy is everything still dirty?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI sorted it for you.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYou didn\u2019t wash anything?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cNo.\u201d<\/p>\n
She looked genuinely confused.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut we have to leave soon. The kids need clothes for school, and Derek needs work clothes.\u201d<\/p>\n
I pointed toward the washing machine.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s working perfectly.\u201d<\/p>\n
Sabrina stared at me.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou expect us to do four baskets now?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYou brought four bags here this morning because you expected me to do four baskets.\u201d<\/p>\n
Her cheeks turned red.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s different.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cHow?\u201d<\/p>\n
For several seconds, she had nothing.<\/p>\n
Finally, she said, \u201cBecause you always do it.\u201d<\/p>\n
That was the answer I had been waiting for.<\/p>\n
Not that I\u2019d offered.<\/p>\n
Not that she thought I enjoyed it.<\/p>\n
Simply that I always did it.<\/p>\n
Derek shifted uncomfortably beside us.<\/p>\n
\u201cMaybe we should just take everything home.\u201d<\/p>\n
Sabrina turned toward him. \u201cAnd do what? Spend the whole night washing clothes? You need shirts Monday, and the kids barely have clean uniforms.\u201d<\/p>\n
I leaned against the dryer.<\/p>\n
\u201cNow you understand what my Saturdays have looked like.\u201d<\/p>\n
Her face hardened.<\/p>\n
\u201cI never forced you.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cNo. You just stopped asking.\u201d<\/p>\n
Before she could answer, her eyes moved toward the fourth basket.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat is that?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThings I couldn\u2019t place.\u201d<\/p>\n
She crossed the room too quickly.<\/p>\n
Derek noticed too.<\/p>\n
He reached the basket first and pulled out the blue shirt.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis isn\u2019t mine.\u201d<\/p>\n
Sabrina froze.<\/p>\n
He lifted the gray trousers next.<\/p>\n
\u201cNeither are these.\u201d<\/p>\n
The argument changed immediately.<\/p>\n
Derek looked at his wife. \u201cWhose clothes are these?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIt doesn\u2019t matter.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIt does to me.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cDerek, give me the shirt.\u201d<\/p>\n
She reached for it, but he held it back.<\/p>\n
I stepped between them before the whole thing turned into something neither of them could take back.<\/p>\n
\u201cI found them while sorting,\u201d I said. \u201cI didn\u2019t assume anything, and neither should you until she explains.\u201d<\/p>\n
Sabrina looked at me, and for the first time that afternoon, the anger left her face.<\/p>\n
She suddenly looked exhausted.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey\u2019re my father\u2019s.\u201d<\/p>\n
Derek frowned.<\/p>\n
\u201cYour dad\u2019s?\u201d<\/p>\n
She sat down heavily on the chair near the folding table.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe moved out of his house three weeks ago.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cMoved where?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cTo a senior apartment near my office.\u201d<\/p>\n
Derek stared at her.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou never told me he moved.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cHe didn\u2019t want people knowing yet.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m your husband.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI know.\u201d<\/p>\n
Sabrina pressed both hands against her forehead.<\/p>\n
Her father, Roland, had been living alone since her mother died. Over the last year, managing the house had become harder for him, and after a fall on the back steps frightened Sabrina, he finally agreed to move somewhere smaller.<\/p>\n
Nothing catastrophic had happened.<\/p>\n
He simply couldn\u2019t keep doing everything alone.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve been going there after work,\u201d Sabrina explained. \u201cI get his groceries, help with paperwork, bring things from the old house, and deal with whatever he forgot that day.\u201d<\/p>\n
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