Selma kept a travel bag behind the wardrobe, only half packed. Her husband Oskar had worked far away for months, returning exhausted and leaving before they managed to talk. Meanwhile, she had grown close to Viktor, a translator renting premises opposite her shop. They planned to go away together for a few days.
Viktor was not a passing stranger. They talked at length, walked after closing time and had kissed once. Selma knew she had to tell Oskar what had happened. Each time he called, she heard the exhaustion in his voice and postponed the conversation. In her mind, going away had become a way to make the decision real.
News of Oskar's sudden death came in the morning through his company and family. Selma sat beside the half-packed bag. She could not connect the man she had intended to leave with the man to whom she would never explain anything again. Viktor came, left food and went away when she asked to be alone.
Weeks passed among documents, visits and things people brought because they did not know what to say. Oskar's clothes came back in two boxes. In one, she found small receipts, a spare charger and an unsent postcard. He had written only that she would like the view from the window.
Suddenly, the house was full of him. She remembered jokes she had already forgotten and moments of closeness she had pushed aside with anger in recent months. She felt guilt, but also a love that had not disappeared merely because their relationship had become difficult. After three months, Viktor told her he still had a reservation for another trip.
Selma asked him to cancel it. She admitted she no longer knew whether she wanted a relationship with him. He reminded her of what she had said before the tragedy. She said those words had been true then, but she could not ask him to wait while her life took shape again. She promised an answer she actually felt, not the one that would hurt him least.
Viktor accepted it after several painful attempts to find another interpretation. Their last meeting was brief. He returned her book; she returned his scarf. They did not agree to remain friends simply to make the parting sound nicer. Necessary distance was the only honest thing they could still give each other.
The following spring, Selma traveled alone to the town on the postcard. Sitting beside a café window, she wrote several sentences about Oskar, including the angry ones. That evening, she closed the notebook and went for a walk. His photograph stayed in her room. She did not carry it into every hour still ahead of her.