The thing you haven't said

There's a letter from the bank in the kitchen drawer that you've read four times. The number in it is one you can't make work, and you've been moving money around for a month to keep it from being visible, and it's still not working, and your partner thinks the account is fine because you've said it is.

Or it's a scan. The appointment was two weeks ago and the result is on Thursday, and you've told nobody, because nothing's certain and telling would make people worry about a thing that might be nothing. You've slept badly for a fortnight and said you're tired from work.

Or it's the marriage, which has gone quiet in a way you can't name, and your sister asked last week how things were and you said "fine". Or it's your son, who's stopped talking about school, and you've noticed and haven't said, to him or to anyone. Or it's the spreadsheet at work with the mistake in it that hasn't come to light and will, and you've spent three weeks waiting for the email.

These are invented, and I'd guess one of them isn't far off. What they have in common is that each is a real thing, of a size that would be hard for anyone to carry, and each is being carried by one person, in a house or an office full of people who'd want to know. And each time someone has asked how you are, you've said the word that ends the question.

Some words. I'll call the heavy thing the worry, whatever it is. Holding it alone I'll call carrying it. The thought that telling would load someone I'll call the burden belief, because it's a belief and I'm going to test it. The conversation in which you tell someone I'll call the telling, and the person you tell the listener. The worry as it exists in your head, unspoken, I'll call the private version, and what it becomes once said, the spoken version. The way your mind goes back to the worry through the day, on the bus and in the shower and at three in the morning, I'll call the wander, which is a researcher's word I'll credit when I come to it. Telling the whole thing at once, rather than in hints, is one sitting. What you ask the listener for, to listen, to advise or to do something, is the request. And the person whose worry it also is, usually a partner, is the co-owner.

Before you go on, do one thing. Write the worry down in one sentence. Then write how long you've carried it. Then write who knows. For most readers the third line is one word, and the second line is longer than they'd have guessed. Keep the page. The book is about getting a second name onto the third line.