The unsolicited fix.

I'd had a hard day. Not catastrophic, just the kind of grinding, low-level hard that leaves you tired in a way that's difficult to explain. I just wanted to tell him about it. Not to fix it — I knew it wasn't fixable. I just wanted him to know.

So I told him. And before I'd even finished he was already problem-solving. Had I tried this? Had I thought about that? What if I just—

I stopped talking.

Not because the suggestions were bad. Some of them were probably right. But I didn't want solutions. I wanted him to just — be there for a minute. To say that sounds really hard. To not immediately try to make it go away.

I said I was fine. He seemed satisfied. I felt completely alone.

She'd had a hard day and I could tell she needed to talk. So I listened. And as she was talking I could already see what the problem was and how to fix it — a few small things, nothing major, completely solvable.

I waited for a pause and offered what I had. I thought that was what love looked like — not just sitting with a problem but actually helping with it. Actually doing something useful.

She went quiet. Said she was fine.

I didn't know what I'd done wrong. I'd been paying attention. I'd been trying to help. I thought that's what she needed.

I spent the rest of the evening wondering if I'd said something wrong.