Homecomings by C.P. Snow

IN the middle of the night, Margaret was at last asleep. We had both lain for a long time, not speaking; in the quiet I knew she was awake, just as I had listened and known years before, when Sheila was beside me in insomnia. But in those nights I had only her to look after, as soon as she was asleep my watch was over: that night, I lay wide awake, Margaret's breathing steady at last, in a claustrophobia of dread.

I dreaded any intimation of sound that might turn into the telephone ringing. I dreaded the morning coming.