"Because everything else is so easy to fix."

"I don't want to add anything else to the enormous pile. 

"We don't have a lot left."

"I love you. I respect you, and I admire you, and I want you to be happy, and also I promised you I'd take no others, I promised you I'd give up men, we had a long engagement, we've been married for three months, I am not being unreasonable here."

" - I am not saying you are, I am trying to do what you asked."

- sigh. "Good. Thank you."

She closes her eyes and focuses on her breathing for a while longer. Thinks about the version of him that doesn't yell at her.

"Do you actually want me to be happy?"

"Yes. I want you to be happy. - and I want you to be happy about being my wife, not just despite it."

Nod. Shaky breath. "Okay. That's good, see. And I'm not asking because - I'm just trying to keep track, okay, because last night I was trying to tell you that I loved you in part because - because no one else had ever cared what I wanted or how I felt, and you did, and - I must have said it wrong or something because you said that maybe that was stupid."

"You don't love me."

"I didn't say that."

"It's fine. I don't need you to love me. I don't need - anything I can't get myself."

" - you don't get to decide whether I love you or not!"

- well that was a completely stupid thing to say, if he kills her in ten seconds she can't say there wasn't warning.

" - well, I guess not. I wasn't - trying to order you, I just - didn't want you to dance around it -"

She props herself up. She's crying a little.

" - okay. Well. I have - a lot of feelings, and being the same person I was two days ago it is still important to me, actually, to try to represent them accurately when I'm going to go to the trouble of representing them, and I'm not gonna say anything about that unless I'm sure, okay, because I'm not going to - give you things and then arbitrarily take them back - and also if you're gonna expect me to follow all of your orders then you might want to be slightly more clear about which things are orders, okay, because - "

"Sure. I'm new at this. I think for my - for my brother it was a tone of voice thing. I'll figure it out."

"Okay.

"I want you to be okay. I think it will be - bad for you, if you hurt me by accident, even the way you are now."

"Of course."

"Okay, well. I'm trying to - keep that from happening. Too much."

"Okay. 

You are entitled to some time to figure this out. Just - not an unbounded amount of time."

"I get two weeks to solve this problem?"

"If that's specifically a terrible number I'm not wedded to it, it's just traditional."

"What - happens after two weeks."

"We try my theory that you just have some kind of hangup about this and once we actually manage it you'll realize it's fine."

"Once? And then talk?"

"Sure."