Do you ever truly know the person you love?

“Say Yes” is a short story by Tobias Wolff. It was written and published in 1985. The story is mostly in the form of dialogue between a husband and wife. Ann and her husband are in the kitchen doing dishes. When the topic of interracial marriage comes up, Ann sees a look on her husband’s face that she has never seen before. Her husband explained how he did not understand how relationships like that worked. He did not think they should even be a thing. Ann’s demeanor changes. Things were tense, as she questioned her husband. He could tell by the look on his wife’s face that he had messed up — big time. She asks him to explain his reasoning, and he says that black and white people are so different that they could never truly know each other. He compares it to being in a relationship with a foreigner; he did not understand that either. She finally asks the big question, “Would you marry me if I were black?” He tries to avoid the question, but Ann does not let him. Finally, he says no. After that, Ann is completely indifferent to her husband. She is so calm that her husband wishes she were angry.

The last line is extremely telling. Wolff states, “His heart pounded the way it had on their first night together, the way it still did when he woke at a noise in the darkness and waited to hear it again – the sound of someone moving through the house, a stranger.” Wolff is alluding that Ann and her husband are now strangers. We see a lot of irony in this story. The husband tells Ann that interracial couples do not work, because they can not know each other. However, it seems like Ann does not know her husband at all. Ann’s name is mentioned in the dialogue many times, but her husband’s never is. This points to the barriers and lack of understanding in their relationship. Wolff poses an extremely important question: Can you ever fully know someone?