Ada walked through their neat front garden, which looked as unremarkable as yesterday. The front door key still fit in the lock, and she let the keychain dangle a moment. She unbuttoned her brown coat then bent to dust off her trousers and retie a lace in her leather shoes. Her wristwatch said it had only been twenty-four hours. So far it looked like she had pulled it off. What awaited her, what would be the price for her rebellion? She turned the key, picked up her small overnight bag, and stepped gingerly through the doorway.

“I’m home,” she called out, although she wasn’t expecting anyone to be there. She took off her coat and hung it on the tall, wooden hall tree. Her dark shirt was still fastened to the top. Her exterior was unchanged; she was still a stereotypical librarian, but she felt the beginnings of a secret internal transformation.

In their spotless kitchen she could detect a faint garlic smell, but nothing seemed out of place. Relief flooded through her. The crumpled note in her cursive hand was still on the pale-orange Formica counter. Dear Geoff, going to Santa Barbara to ride an ostrich! Be back tomorrow morning. Don’t forget to take your medicines, they are ready in your pillbox. Dinner’s in the fridge. Love Ada

Tuesday morning, her husband would be at the bank. It was spring break at the elementary school where she worked as a part-time temporary librarian, so she wasn’t expected there. Ada adored her job and was energized by the children’s effervescent energy and charming chaos.

She had done it. She had traveled on her own and spent a night by herself for the first time in her life. It was liberating, revitalizing. Now that Leo had left for college, there was something about turning forty that had motivated her. She couldn’t spend another year of the rest of her life with him. She had made up her mind to finally leave. Soon.

As Ada watched the water boil in the glass kettle, even the transient, translucent bubbles sounded noisy in the suburban quiet. She sat at the small kitchen table with her cup of tea, reflecting on her momentous adventure. But it wasn’t long before his awful hypnotic taunts started echoing and swirling and whispering loudly in this oppressive space. You are worthless. Who else would have you? Over the years he had infiltrated her mind. He had known perfectly how to inflict deep wounds, ones the world could not see. Ada’s new confidence started to wane, and she felt trapped and squashed and smaller than ever.

She had considered just running away, maybe to live with Leo, but he was still studying and didn’t have any money yet. So, she chose a short adventure, a test. Much furtive planning had gone into this excursion. Ada researched online at school where Geoff couldn’t check her search history. She had asked Leo to send her a little cash and had secretly saved coins left over from grocery shopping. This trip would only be overnight because he couldn’t report her missing for twenty-four hours. And she decided to leave on a weekday and return the following morning so he would be at work. He never missed a day.

She had chosen OstrichLand near Buellton, California, as her first destination. Ada had overheard one of the teachers at school describing how they had ridden ostriches on a family vacation to Africa. Riding an ostrich! How exotic and daring. She watched videos in the library. Apparently, there’s quite a strategy to it. First you have to make friends with the ostrich, which sounded laughable. She didn’t know how to make friends with humans so maybe an ostrich was as good a place to start as any. Walk slowly, talk quietly, feed it a little. Then they cover the head with a type of canvas sock so it doesn’t get scared. When the ostrich is ready, they help you up, and you tuck your legs inside their wings and press inward, hugging their soft bodies. It seems logical to clasp the neck, but that can strangle them, so you hold onto their wings. Then the helpers say, “Go!” The birds take off, running around, and people usually stay only for fifteen to twenty seconds. How silly did they look, hanging on for dear life, smiling and laughing. Less than half a minute of wild adrenaline-surging excitement. It looked…possible? Yes, possible! She needed to do something wild, something unexpected, something extraordinary.

As she set off on her trip, Ada kept looking around, expecting him to grab her shoulder, to hear “Where are you going?” She tried to look natural. It became easier when she realized she just needed to blend into her surroundings, to disappear. She was used to doing that.

After a brief tousle with the ticket vending machine, she boarded a morning bus from Las Vegas to Santa Barbara. From a window seat she immersed herself in the gorgeous passing scenery, the deep blue Pacific Ocean peeking in and out of view, the Californian light so bright she could see it with her eyes closed. She watched the people around her, wondering about their lives, what were they going through? Everyone looks normal from the outside, she thought, even Geoff.

She transferred to the Buellton bus, then took a short walk in the dusty sunshine to OstrichLand. She pocketed the admission ticket and wandered around, fascinated by the prehistoric-looking birds in their smelly enclosures. An enthusiastic college student led the afternoon tour. “These living dinosaurs are the world’s largest and heaviest flightless birds that lay the biggest eggs,” she said, emphasizing the superlatives. “They can’t fly but they can run awfully fast, over forty miles per hour, faster than a car. Their eyes are bigger than their tiny brains and they can’t count. Look at the babies, aren’t they supercute!”

When the tour was over, Ada bravely approached the guide. “Excuse me, where can I ride an ostrich?” she asked.

“Oh, I’m afraid we don’t do that here. It’s really not ethical for our birds. Their legs are too skinny. They train ostriches for riding in some farms in Africa, but we don’t do it.”

Ada started to crumble, her face puckering, her eyes blinking. Why didn’t she know that? How stupid not to have checked. Typical. She was incompetent, pathetic, useless. She heard all his words with their awful power.

She paused, determined to stop berating herself. Yes, she should have made sure that she could ride the ostriches before she came. But this wasn’t going to crush her. She would not cry. She could bear this small disappointment. This was just a trial for all the other challenges ahead. Ada needed a new mantra. I am strong!

She made her way to the local motel that Leo had reserved for her using a made-up name. Geoff would be home by now, and he would be angry that she wasn’t there to cook dinner. He would have rung Leo, but they had arranged that her son would not pick up. Geoff would be driving around, looking for her, furious. She had a sudden thought: could he have planted a GPS tracker in her bag? She would check at the motel.

It started to rain, and fat drops quickly soaked her, plastering her hair to her ears. But she didn’t mind; the warm, wet rain on her skin washed away her numbness, making her feel alive, real.

The bored motel attendant looked up from his phone game and handed her the receipt and a large wooden keychain. She carefully unlocked her assigned door and surveyed the dimly lit musty room. She hoped there were clean sheets on the metal single bed, which was covered with a faded, flower bedspread and a limp pillow. On the bedside table, there was an old lamp with a yellowed shade and a tattered magazine. The room was darkened by dusty venetian blinds covering the grimy window. Pink fixtures and tiles decorated the bathroom. No landline phone. No television. No bottles of her mother’s alcoholic poison in a minibar. The whole place seemed like it was stuck in the 1960s. Ada was delighted.

The dribbles from the shower were surprisingly agreeable, gently massaging her back. She dried off using the thin dirty-white towel, gently rubbing old scars on her inner wrists. Her stomach growled. She opened her bag and took out the meal she had packed, as well as a murder mystery book from the library. Her enjoyment of ordinary activities was heightened: the simple ham and cheese sandwiches and thermos of black tea were especially delicious, and reading quietly on a saggy old bed in a peculiar, dated motel gave her such pleasure.

After a few pages, her eyelids became heavy. She closed the book and turned out the light. Sleep was usually her sanctuary where she could retreat from belonging to someone else. Tonight, she didn’t want to sleep, she wanted to make every moment count, to cherish this brief freedom. She could sleep when she was dead.

What lovely soft silence. She lay in the bed looking up at the low ceiling, so proud of herself, even if she hadn’t ridden an ostrich today.

Ada was scared about returning, of course. Geoff would be livid. What might be her punishment? Take away her precious new job?

Why did she marry him when she was a fragile eighteen-year-old girl? She had adored him at first. He was a few years older than her, gentle and quietly spoken, polite and affectionate. Flowers, constant calls, dinner dates, promises to care for her forever. She was attracted to his self-assuredness and maturity. But it didn’t last; it was all fake.

She felt a brief spasm of guilt about her plan to leave.

Some days there were flashes of his warm charm, especially when he had gone too far; it reeled her back in. Sometimes, she even thought she could continue to live with him. But then she remembered all over again, how he controlled her, how he made her feel. Useless. Invisible. As if her life wasn’t her own. No, it was more than that. He made her believe her life wasn’t worth living.

The landline rang loudly, startling her out of her reverie. She picked up the receiver. “Hello, this is Ada speaking.”

 “Hi Ada, it’s Magda, Geoff’s secretary from work, how are you?” Magda’s words always ran together. “Geoff didn’t come to work today, and he’s not answering his cell phone, so I thought I’d try your house. Is he sick?” Ada said nothing, twirling the phone cord. Magda prattled on, ignoring the pause. “It’s very unusual of him not to let me know if he’s not coming in, do you know where he is?”

“No, I don’t. I’ve been away for a night, I just arrived home.” Ada was trying to keep her voice steady. “Let me look around and I’ll call you back.”

Ada slowly replaced the phone in the cradle and leant against the wall for a moment, an intense thumping in her chest driving up into her neck. Where was Geoff? Had he followed her? Had he laid a trap for her?

In the living room, hardbound books were tightly stacked next to his old leather reading chair. Each evening after dinner he read nonfiction, memoirs, and war books while she knitted silently in the lonely frigid space.

She walked through the open door of Leo’s room. She often came in and sat on his bed, which was made up ready for him. She picked up an old photo of him with dark curls, now he wore it short. Lovely Leo was her joy and finest achievement in life; he had kept her alive. But Leo had also been the victim of his father’s controlling behavior. Geoff believed in “spare the rod, spoil the child.” It broke her heart how he treated their kind, sensitive son. She had tried to shield Leo, enrolling him in music classes, encouraging sports, booking summer camps. Geoff allowed these activities; maybe he thought a busy boy would stay out of trouble.

Luckily, Leo was smart. He always spoke carefully, knowing that loose words have consequences. As soon as he could, he went as far away as possible, to college on the East Coast on a full scholarship. Then, Geoff had finally relented and allowed her to work part-time as a school library assistant. There were strict rules: he would drop her off in the morning, she could walk home, she should call him as soon as she arrived back at the house, she was not to talk to anyone.

In his tidy office, she shuffled recent mailings and documents on his desk, not knowing anything about their finances. Her husband was a miser. He accounted for everything, including her meagre earnings, in their simple unadorned lives. There was a locked filing cabinet, but she didn’t know where the key was. How was she was going to support herself when she left him?

In their single bathroom, his toothbrush and shaving tools were neatly arranged on the vanity. Where was his pillbox, which he usually left there? He needed a handful of candy-colored pills each day to manage his poorly pumping heart. He didn’t usually discuss his health issues with her, but recently, he had a new diagnosis of an irregular heart rhythm, and he wanted Ada to know what to do if he had a strange turn. Ada found it difficult to keep up with his complicated history and instructions: diagnoses, drug brands, generic names, different doses, potential complications, possible interactions. But when she heard he was on digitalis, she listened more intently. Wasn’t that from the foxglove plant, a favorite poison of Agatha Christie? When his eyesight started failing him, she was allowed to fill the pillbox, and this small task had given her a tiny kernel of power.

One more room in the house to check, which Ada deliberately saved for last. Sweat prickled on her forehead and palms. Heavy legs took her towards their closed bedroom door, as if walking through mud. The round doorknob turned easily, and the creaky door swung open revealing their two single beds.

There was her bald, pyjamaed husband lying face-up in his bed, completely still, the covers tight over his bulging belly. She held her breath and took a few more steps forward. He was an unbreathing, unnatural, shade of gray. She tentatively touched his arm and was repulsed by his cold corpse. The pillbox was on the central table, and she was pleased to see the little squares for yesterday were empty. She let out her breath. It was over.

Ada dialed 911 for the ambulance, even though it was clearly too late. She didn’t know who else to call; doctors don’t do house visits any more even for the living. The paramedics came and took him to the local emergency room where he was officially pronounced dead. Everyone at the hospital was kind and sympathetic, understanding her sudden shock and tears and silence. No mention of an autopsy. Why would they? A fifty-year-old man with cardiac disease died of a heart attack.

Sitting on her foldable camp bed, Ada looked out on the dusty plain. Her tent companion was showering after their busy day. There was still enough light to finish writing a postcard to Leo. When would he receive it and read it? She knew he didn’t check his snail mail regularly, and she hoped he wouldn’t throw out the postcard by accident, thinking the small card with a picture of an ostrich on it was some type of unsolicited add.

My dear Leo,

I hope you are well. I did it! I rode an ostrich today! It was amazing! The ostrich farm helpers really do say, “Go! Go! Go!” They are mean birds, but it’s not their fault, that’s just how they are.

I’m going to keep traveling for now. I need to get to know myself and figure out what I want to do next. Don’t worry, the lawyer said there’s plenty of money. He told me that I was a lucky woman and Geoff was such a good man for taking care of me until the end. Ha!

I wish you were here! I can’t wait to see you and tell you all about my adventures and the interesting people I’ve met. Looking forward to Thanksgiving together.

Love Mom.