But that small guilt, I think, was part of what tipped me so easily into suspicion the next morning.

Some buried part of me, having felt relief at their leaving, was almost primed to discover that they had deserved to be left, that my relief had been justified by something more than mere fatigue.

It is an ugly little mechanism of the heart, the way guilt about a feeling can make you almost eager to find a reason the feeling was earned.

I did not notice it working in me at the time.