“Which point?”
“That you had stopped appreciating me.”
There it was.
The truth, finally stripped of its disguise.
“So you wanted me afraid you’d replace me.”
“That’s not what I said.”
“It’s exactly what you did.”
He exhaled hard.
“Can we not do this while I’m stuck in here? I need you to help me get out first.
Then we’ll talk at home.”
For years, that sentence probably would have worked.
A crisis would have rearranged everything.
I would have put my feelings aside.
Found out what paperwork needed signing.
Moved money around if necessary.
Driven across town.
Brought him clean clothes.
Told myself the marriage could be dealt with later.
But later was how we’d reached this point.
“I’m not coming,” I said.
At first he seemed not to understand.
“What?”
“I’m not coming to get you.”
“Lauren, I’m your husband.”
I looked at the faint crack in the kitchen ceiling, the same one I’d stared at night after night while he slept beside me.
“Two weeks ago, my husband told me I wasn’t special enough for him.
Last night I learned he invented the people he blamed for saying it.
Then he attacked the friend who told him the truth.”
“I pushed him.”
“And the police took you away.”
“So you’re just abandoning me?”
That word almost impressed me.
Abandoning.
As if I had somehow created the distance between us by refusing to keep running across it alone.
“You told me to believe there was something better out there for you,” I said.
“I finally believed you meant it.”
“Lauren—”
“Call your lawyer.”
Then I ended the call.
My hands shook afterward.
That surprised me.
I had imagined decisive moments would feel clean.
They don’t.
Sometimes your body grieves a choice your mind already knows is necessary.
I sat at the kitchen table until the coffee went cold.
Then I opened my laptop.
One of the studio apartments I’d bookmarked was still available.
I scheduled a viewing.
Over the next week, Evan came home, but not to the marriage he’d left.
We slept in separate rooms.
He apologized in fragments, usually followed by explanations.
He was stressed.
He’d had too much to drink.
He only wanted to know I still cared.
Nick had embarrassed him.
The guys had ganged up on him.
