The Day She Chose to Be Good
By Caldwell
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She decided, the moment the alarm went off, that today would be different.
Not different in the way she sometimes meant - the vague, hungover “I’ll drink more water” type of different. No.
Today would be properly different. Thoroughly, decisively, morally different.
She lay still for a moment, staring at the patch of ceiling where a crack, shaped vaguely like a map of Portugal, always made her feel she ought to travel more. Then she breathed in, heavy and determined, as if trying to inflate some part of herself that had been slumped for years.
She would stop the affair.
There: the words were said, even if only in her head. Marked. Filed. Pinned to the noticeboard of her conscience.
She sat up and swung her legs out of bed and felt a lightness she hadn’t felt in months.
Not joy - that would be overstating it - but a kind of freshly-laundered clarity.
As if the mist on the bathroom mirror had finally cleared.
(If she ever said that out loud, she knew she’d deserve to be slapped.)
She padded to the kitchen. The spoon from last night’s yoghurt cup sat in the sink, leaning against a mug with a lipstick crescent. Normally, she’d leave both until evening. Or the next morning. Or until fruit flies were circling politely.
But today…
She sighed. “It’ll still be here later,” she murmured. “And I’ll still be the one washing it.”
She rinsed the spoon, washed the mug, wiped the counter.
A tiny thing.
Pathetic, almost.
But she liked the feeling.
A little cog turning a fraction smoother.
Two streets away, Quentin chewed the last of a mint and hated himself for buying spearmint again. He only bought menthol. But the shop had rearranged the shelves and he’d panicked. When he panicked, he reverted to his birth name.
Quentin panicked.
Bill did not.
That was the whole point.
He was legally Quentin William Gregson, but spiritually, emotionally, and socially, he was Bill.
Everybody at the bar called him Bill - as if they could see into his very bones and recognise that “Quentin” was simply not sustainable. The name was the auditory equivalent of corduroy trousers: rustling, affected, and trying too hard.
He often wondered what his parents were thinking. They were Bill people. Entirely Bill-coded. His father had hands like spades and a habit of falling asleep in his armchair, staring at nothing in particular. His mother ironed jeans. Neither of them had ever said the word “Quentin” in a natural tone of voice. It had always come out like a question or a warning.
High expectations, he guessed.
They must have hoped for a surgeon.
Or a novelist.
Or a man who spoke Italian recreationally.
Instead, he’d become… well.
This.
A profession that thrived on silence and discretion and invoices paid in unmarked envelopes. He didn’t dislike the work, but he wouldn’t have said he liked it either. It was simply what he did. Like people who worked in call centres, or at airports, or in those grey office blocks beside motorways that never seemed to have any real purpose.
No passion.
Just competence.
He swallowed the mint, wiped his fingers on the steering wheel, and returned his eyes to the house where she lived.
The wife had hired him.
She had looked at him with exhausted fury and said, “I want her gone. I don’t want him back. I just want her gone.”
He liked clients who were clear.
Back inside, she grabbed her keys, checked her reflection (twice), and made herself smile. Just a twitch at the corners. Enough to tell herself she existed.
When she reversed out of her driveway, she made a private vow:
No more selfish shortcuts.
No more tiny cruelties disguised as efficiency.
She paused at the end of her road, letting a flustered-looking man jog across. Normally, she’d have pulled out anyway, making him do that awkward you-run-I-run dance. But today she gestured graciously, saintly almost.
The man smiled - a real smile, surprised and grateful.
It warmed her in a way that felt disconcertingly wholesome.
Quentin observed her pull out and instantly regretted having to follow someone newly considerate. The worst type. They stopped at amber. They let buses out. They slowed at puddles.
He checked the instructions in his head.
Job scheduled for 8:55 a.m.
Accident arranged behind the building - a mix of faulty wiring, a metal fire door, and a conveniently nudged petrol can.
Nothing complicated.
He’d done the job the night before, working under a headlamp like a camping enthusiast who’d lost his way and decided to take revenge on infrastructure.
Everything was in place. All she had to do was show up to work.
At the first roundabout, she did something unheard of: she let three cars go ahead of her. Three! It felt reckless, indulgent.
One driver gave a little wave of thanks.
Another mouthed “cheers.”
She felt a strange buzz.
Is this how people were meant to treat each other?
Was this why some people seemed light and breezy - because they’d been doing this all along?
She had spent years thinking selfishness was efficient.
A kind of life-hack.
But now she was starting to realise that every selfish act was just a delayed burden, something she’d circle back to eventually. A hurt she’d have to manage. A lie she’d have to remember.
She exhaled with something close to pride.
Then she saw the next car trying to merge.
She slowed. Gave a generous wave.
The driver who slipped in front of her didn’t smile.
Didn’t wave.
Didn’t even look.
He simply sneered through his windscreen.
Quentin.
She felt her good mood jolt slightly, but she steadied herself.
Maybe he’s having a rough morning, she thought.
We all have those.
She wouldn’t let it dent her new resolve.
Quentin, meanwhile, was muttering.
“Waste of time,” he said. “Human respite services, that’s what this road has become.”
He had no love for courtesy. Courtesy complicated timing.
But he took satisfaction in one thing:
Her kindness was laying the tracks for her own doom.
It was neat.
Poetic, even.
If he were the type to notice poetry.
A few streets later, she saw the bus stop. The one with the deep puddle she normally ploughed through on rainy days. A childish part of her used to enjoy the way people flinched and lifted their bags too late.
But today she slowed, edging cautiously around the water.
An elderly man nodded at her as she passed.
More warmth bloomed in her chest.
“This is… nice,” she said aloud.
“Who knew?”
Quentin, directly behind her, accelerated.
The puddle rose in a triumphant arch and soaked the waiting commuters.
He barked a laugh.
Balance restored.
She reached the long road that curved toward the office district. Still ten minutes early - astonishing, given her uncharacteristic patience.
She felt proud enough to hum.
That’s when she saw him: a teenage boy on crutches, struggling to cross the road toward the bus stop on the other side. His backpack was sliding off one shoulder. His hair was chaotic. His jeans were torn in the way that suggested an injury, not fashion.
Skateboard, she guessed.
Weekend. Overconfidence. Gangly limbs. Gravity.
She slowed to a stop, gesturing him across.
It took time - far more than she’d expected - but she didn’t mind. He gave her an embarrassed, grateful smile.
Her chest warmed again.
This, she thought, is who I want to be.
Quentin watched the teen hobble across with growing irritation.
“Obstacle,” he muttered. “Detour with bones.”
He drummed the steering wheel. The timing was beginning to tighten. He needed her at the building soon - he’d calibrated the job for a specific window, tested the fuse with the precision of a man who had once almost electrocuted himself due to impatience.
He blew out a breath.
Bill would’ve been patient.
Quentin was not.
By the time she reached the office parking lot, she felt almost euphoric.
She would end the affair.
She would apologise.
She would turn her life around.
She saw him - the colleague - waiting by the back entrance with a coffee in hand, looking tired and nervous.
She summoned her courage.
“Hi,” she said, stepping out of the car.
He opened his mouth, but she lifted a hand.
“No. Let me. I’m ending it.”
His eyes widened.
“I shouldn’t have… I mean, we shouldn’t have. I don’t know what I was thinking. I think I just liked the attention. And your wife - I actually like her, which makes this even worse. I can’t be this person anymore. I don’t want to be.”
He blinked, speechless.
“You deserve to sort your marriage out. Or not. But without me. And I deserve to not feel like I’m constantly leaving a dirty spoon in the sink.”
He didn’t get the metaphor. Who would?
But she felt free the moment she said it.
She smiled.
A real smile.
He started to reach for her arm.
“Wait-”
But she stepped away.
“I’m done,” she said, still smiling. “Today is the day I turn it around.”
She walked toward the metal fire door at the side of the building.
From his vantage point by the dumpsters, Quentin grinned.
She was right on time.
This was the moment.
She reached for the metal handle.
Her colleague shouted something - but not at her.
At the fuse box.
Quentin’s grin widened.
She pulled the door.
A bright white arc snapped from the fuse box to the doorframe.
Her body jerked violently.
The air seemed to pause.
The petrol across the ground shimmered.
Then it ignited.
A deep whump of flame rolled through the alleyway.
Heat blossomed.
The shockwave knocked Quentin’s cap off.
She fell instantly, her last expression strangely serene - almost pleased, as if she’d gone out on a day when she’d done everything right.
Quentin brushed soot from his jacket, retrieved his cap, and sighed.
Efficient.
Clean enough.
On schedule.
He muttered:
“…Should’ve named me Bill.”
Then he walked away, already thinking about breakfast.
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