The Two Keys

Aom placed the spare key beside Stefan’s coffee as though she were adding one final item to breakfast. It had a blue plastic cap and a tiny rubber sandal on the ring. Stefan turned it over, kissed her forehead and put it in his pocket.

Later that afternoon, he gave her a fob for his apartment building.

Aom photographed neither exchange. She did, however, stop answering a man who had been asking whether she was free on Sunday.

She worked evenings in Patong and rented a room above a small shop. Stefan’s apartment was quieter, cooler and had a washing machine that did not require coins. During the second week she began arriving with things that needed washing. During the third, some of them stopped going home.

Stefan considered this practical. He liked finding her there after dinner. He liked that she knew which supermarket sold the bread he wanted. He liked waking up to somebody moving around the kitchen, provided the movement did not begin before nine.

The spare fob had originally been requested because he was tired of going downstairs to let her in.

For Aom, it had solved a different problem.

She had not asked him to promise anything. Asking made things awkward. Instead, she added a toothbrush, then face wash, then the charger she used most. Each object gave her a little more evidence without requiring him to say a sentence.

Stefan performed his own version of the arrangement. Her key meant he could leave his helmet at her room before going out. It meant he had somewhere convenient to change if they met in Patong. He began referring to the room as “our little base,” which sounded affectionate and mostly described parking.

On Friday, Aom found a message on the kitchen counter. Stefan’s brother was coming for a week. Would she move her things into the cupboard?

There was a smiley face at the bottom.

She read it standing beside a drying rack full of clothes from the life she thought they were sharing. Moving them was easy. Deciding what the request meant took longer.

That night she asked whether his brother knew about her.

“Of course,” Stefan said.

“What does he know?”

Stefan paused. He had mentioned meeting somebody. He had probably said she was nice. He could not remember the exact wording, which suddenly seemed like something he should have remembered.

Aom put the fob on the table.

“I gave you my room key,” she said.

“I gave you mine.”

“Yes. What is mine for?”

For once, they stayed with the question. She said she was not moving in with a man who thought she was occasionally leaving laundry. He said he had not realised she was moving in at all.

It was an uncomfortable conversation. Nobody delivered a clever final line. The fan clicked on each rotation while they worked through several things the keys had been saying on their behalf.

On Sunday, Stefan went to her room. He knocked, although the blue key was still in his pocket.

Aom opened the door.

He held up a bag of food. She let him in.

He put his helmet beside the door, then picked it up again.

“Should I leave this here?”

This time, he waited for the answer.