The Sweater

Jun 22, 2025

Her:
The drive to his parents' house is too long — the kids can never make it in one go without going rangy with restlessness and pees they should have taken before we left the city. We always have to stop midway.

I’m wearing the chocolate-brown and white sweater he gave me for my birthday — one of the only times he's given me something I genuinely like, and I wonder if he’s finally coming to understand me.

I amble behind the kids over to the petting zoo and a llama rushes over to the fence. My son's small red running shoes scramble up the wooden rails and he laughs in glee at the llama, so intent on greeting us.

In a glance, I take in the llama’s white side eye, its fear and outrage and in a beat, it rears back its shaggy head and spits a long stream of foamy hork straight at me — straight at the middle of my chest.

I jump back in shock and disgust as my son laughs so hard he slips from the fence. The spittle drizzles down my soft fuzzy sweater. It’s probably ruined now.

My alpaca sweater.

The llama follows me along the fence line, glaring.

Him:
The drive to my parents is not that bad, but my wife always complains. She says there's no way the kids can sit still that long. Whatever.

Today she’s wearing the sweater I gave her for her birthday. That's a first. She usually returns the things I buy her, or sets them somewhere where she won't have to encounter them — like that crystal elephant. It's way up on the highest window ledge, behind the curtains, collecting greasy dust and small dead bugs.

We pull into the Big Apple. She wants a coffee, so I go in to buy it while she takes the kids to the bathroom, and then the petting zoo. I eat a slice of pie while I'm in the restaurant. It is the Big Apple after all.

As I walk toward the car with two takeout cups, I see my wife wiping at the front of her sweater. The kids are staring at her. An alpaca leans its head over the fence, straining as though trying to get at them.

“Come on, let's go,” I call.

My wife looks up at me. A long, pained, annoyed look.

Oh boy, what have I done this time?
I thought she liked that sweater.

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