The golden afternoon light was streaming through the kitchen window, catching dust motes dancing in the air. Eleanor, known to everyone as Ellie, hummed softly to herself as she wiped down the counters. From the living room, she could hear the comfortable, familiar sounds of her husband, Frank, clicking through the television channels before settling on a baseball game. The volume was low, a gentle murmur of commentary and crowd noise. It was a perfect, peaceful Saturday, the kind of day that felt like a warm blanket after sixty-two years of marriage.
She picked up her phone, a modern marvel she’d finally embraced, and snapped a quick picture. It was a simple scene: the tidy kitchen, the view into the sun-drenched living room where Frank’s slippered feet were propped up on the ottoman, the game on in the background. It was a slice of contentment. A snapshot of the life they had built together.
She attached it to a text for her best friend, Martha. Their friendship stretched back to the second grade, a lifetime of shared secrets, laughter, and heartache.
“A little slice of heaven on a Saturday. Miss you! Wish you were here for a glass of iced tea. xo – Ellie”
She hit send and went back to puttering, a small smile on her face. Martha had moved to Arizona three years ago to be near her grandkids, and Ellie missed her fiercely. These little photo messages were their way of staying connected, of sharing the mundane, beautiful details of their lives.
Her phone buzzed almost instantly. Martha’s reply.
“Oh, Ellie, it looks so peaceful! So lovely. Give that handsome husband of yours a hug from me. ❤️”
Ellie’s smile widened. She was about to type back when another message from Martha popped up. This one was different.
“Wait… Ellie… can you call me?”
The tone felt off. Martha’s texts were usually filled with emojis and exuberant punctuation. This was stark. Simple. A cold trickle of unease ran down Ellie’s spine. Maybe Martha wasn’t feeling well. She quickly dialed her friend’s number.
Martha picked up on the first ring. “Ellie? Honey, are you okay?”
“I’m fine, dear! Better than fine. Are you alright? You sound strange.”
“I’m… I’m fine,” Martha said, but her voice was tight, thin. “Ellie, the picture you sent. Frank… is he alright?”
Ellie blinked, completely bewildered. She glanced into the living room. Frank’s chest rose and fell steadily. The Red Sox were up to bat. “He’s perfect. He’s watching the game. Why on earth would you ask that?”
There was a long pause on the other end of the line. Ellie could hear Martha take a shaky breath. “Ellie, I need you to listen to me very carefully. Don’t panic. Just look at the picture you sent me. Look at the television screen.”
Now thoroughly confused and with that cold feeling solidifying in her stomach, Ellie pulled the phone away from her ear, pulled up their text thread, and tapped on the photo she had just sent. It expanded on her screen. She saw her clean kitchen, the lovely light, Frank’s feet on the ottoman. Her eyes drifted to the television screen in the background. It was a little blurry, but she could make out the baseball diamond, the players in their white and red uniforms.
“Okay,” Ellie said, bringing the phone back to her ear. “I’m looking. It’s the game.”
“Ellie,” Martha’s voice was a whisper, deadly serious. “The Red Sox are playing the Yankees today. It’s a home game at Fenway.”
“I know that,” Ellie said, a slight laugh in her voice, though it felt forced. “Frank’s been looking forward to it all week.”
“Ellie,” Martha repeated, and now her voice was firm, the voice she used when she was trying to keep someone from hysterics. “Look at the scoreboard. In the picture.”
Ellie zoomed in on the television. The image pixelated, then sharpened. She could see the scoreboard. Red Sox: 4. Yankees: 2. Bottom of the 7th inning.
“So?” Ellie said, her patience beginning to wear thin against the tide of her rising anxiety.
“Ellie, I’ve had the game on in the background all afternoon while I folded laundry,” Martha said, her words slow and deliberate. “The Red Sox and Yankees are playing. But the score is 6 to 3, Yankees. It’s the top of the 5th. The game you’re watching… that score… that’s from a game three years ago. I remember it because it was the game right before my moving truck came.”
The world did not tilt on its axis. It did not spin. Instead, it froze. The gentle hum of the refrigerator ceased. The murmur from the television became a distant, meaningless buzz. Ellie’s blood ran cold. She stood rooted to the spot in her sunny kitchen, her best friend’s breath loud in her ear.
Three years ago.
She looked slowly from her phone into the living room. Frank’s feet hadn’t moved. The game played on. The Frank on her screen, frozen in the photograph, was watching a game from a past that no longer existed.
“Frank?” Her voice came out as a dry croak. She cleared her throat, trying to sound normal. “Frank, honey? Who’s winning?”
There was no answer. Just the sound of the televised crowd cheering a play that had happened three years prior.
“Frank?”
Ellie took a tentative step toward the living room, then another. Her heart was hammering against her ribs, a frantic, terrified drumbeat. She rounded the corner.
Frank was sitting in his recliner, his head tilted back against the headrest, his eyes closed. He looked peaceful. Asleep. The television screen showed a live game—the current game, with the current score. The remote was on his lap.
But on the small table beside his chair, hidden from her view in the kitchen, was his iPad. And on the iPad’s screen, paused perfectly to match the timing of her photograph, was a recorded highlight reel of that Red Sox game from three years ago. The scoreboard read: Red Sox: 4. Yankees: 2. Bottom of the 7th.
He hadn’t been watching the live game at all.
The chill that had been in Ellie’s stomach now encased her entire body. Why? Why would he do that? Why would he pretend?
And then she remembered. Three years ago. The game before Martha’s moving truck came. That was the weekend Frank had had his first major episode. The one the doctors later called a TIA, a transient ischemic attack, a warning stroke. He’d been confused, his speech slightly slurred. He’d insisted he was fine, refused to let her call an ambulance for hours. He’d been terrified. And so had she.
He’d recovered, but he’d never forgotten the fear in her eyes, the panic. He’d hated it. He’d vowed never to worry her like that again.
Ellie’s eyes welled with tears as she understood. He must have had another episode. He must have felt the confusion coming on, the weakness, the fog. He couldn’t follow the live game. It was too fast, too confusing. So he’d put on an old, familiar game he knew by heart. A game from a time when he felt strong and clear-headed. He’d done it to hide his confusion. To protect her from worry. To maintain the illusion, for both of them, that everything was still okay.
The truth behind the cheerful photo wasn’t an affair, or a dark secret. It was something far more profound and heartbreaking. It was a silent, stoic act of love from a man who was trying to shield the woman he loved from the frightening reality of their fading years. It was a beautiful, chilling deception born of devotion.
Ellie didn’t say a word. She walked over to him, gently lifted the iPad from the table, and closed the cover. She placed her hand over his. His eyes fluttered open.
“Everything alright, Ellie-bell?” he asked, his voice warm and steady, his eyes clear now.
She squeezed his hand, her vision blurred with tears. “Everything’s perfect, my love,” she whispered, her voice thick with emotion. “The Red Sox are winning.”
She wouldn’t confront him. She wouldn’t let him know that she knew. She would simply love him. And she would watch him a little more closely from now on, not with fear, but with a fierce, protective grace. The photo had held a chilling truth, but it had also given her a gift: the chance to finally see him, and to return the favor of protection, without him ever having to know.