Chapter Fourteen #2
I had known about the appointment, of course I did—she had put it in the calendar, she had told me that morning, and I do listen to her, every word from her mouth. I had run out of excuses to get her to reschedule.
I removed it from the shop calendar when I got in that morning, so Aubree wouldn't ask about it.
Wendy stressed to me that she couldn't reschedule, and by the time it rolled around, I couldn't bring myself to go. I couldn't walk into that appointment that she had so painstakingly set up and lie to her in front of a therapist.
She had made the appointment with such great intentions, because she wanted to fight for us, and I couldn't find it in me to make a mockery of it.
I decided not to go, and when she got home, I played stupid. I knew where she was, but I asked her anyway to help gain some sort of plausible deniability.
So goddamn wrong and cruel, and I am still so fucking ashamed of myself for it.
Pathetic. Weak. Useless.
I thought... I don't even know what I thought. I wasn't really planning for the future anymore at that point. I was living second to second.
I won't go to the therapy appointment, and that will solve the problem for now. Wendy will get over it like she's gotten over the other times I've been absent, she'll smooth it over with the boys, she'll understand, and that will be that. I'll worry about the next thing when it comes.
All I was focused on was myself, my selfish fear.
I don't answer the question, and she sighs.
"Answer me this. Did you purposefully miss it?"
The shame is a vice grip around my throat, squeezing tighter and tighter, stealing my voice away.
I nod. Just once.
Her entire face collapses, and I want the floor to open up and swallow me whole. The disappointment, the heartbreak, the utter devastation on her face that I've put there threatens to drown me.
Wendy is silent for a couple of long moments, breathing heavily like she's run a long distance.
No more tears fall, but her shoulders shake like she's weeping. She raises her hands to her eyes and presses the palms in, breathing deep through her nose and out her mouth.
The lack of a ring on her finger hits like a punch.
Not able to take it anymore, I take one step toward her, but she quickly drops her hands, arctic eyes locked onto mine.
"Okay," she sniffs, roughly grabbing a tissue from the box we keep on the coffee table. She dabs at her eyes and takes deep breaths. "So there's nothing left for us, but you still need to be a father. That's nonnegotiable."
"Baby—"
"You cannot check out anymore. I won't allow it, do you hear me?"
I don't respond. I can't. Everything is moving too fast and too slow.
"Wendy..."
"You will not miss any more of Liam's basketball games.
You will not miss any more of Noah's art shows.
You will not treat them, the children you helped create, like they're nothing.
Do you understand? When Liam talks about basketball, you will engage and ask questions.
When Noah shows you his art, you will praise it like he's Picasso.
Because, Atlas? I'm fucking done with my sons' hearts being broken by their father. "
She storms right up to me and gets in my face, and through gritted teeth, she hisses. "You will not be my mother, Atlas. You will not be uninterested and mean. I will not allow it."
All the air is knocked from my lungs at that statement, my eyes going wide and my hand going to my chest.
She stares at me, her green eyes on fire, her mouth a mutinous line, all maternal fire and fury.
I nod my head, barely able to get air in my lungs, let alone words out. She stares at me for a long moment before she nods and steps back.
"Now... I need you to go upstairs and pack your things," her voice is low and steady, completely even.
Cold fear floods my entire body at her words.
She checks her phone and taps on the screen a few times, sending a text.
"Your parents will be here in a few minutes.
They're coming over to bring back the boys, and you'll be staying with them. "
I feel myself start shaking, the words distorted.
"Wendy—"
She glances back up, sliding her phone in her back pocket, and continues on like she doesn't hear me.
"I can't trust you to take care of the boys without help," she says, her voice gradually gaining strength while I feel mine draining from my body.
"You haven't been involved in a year. You don't know them—or their routines—anymore, and you're... you're essentially a stranger to them. They’re not comfortable around you. "
"Wendy, no, ple—"
"You need to find a lawyer. You have thirty days to respond to my attorney.
Read through everything and see if you agree.
I think I was more than fair. All of our correspondence from this day forward that doesn't involve the boys will go through our lawyers.
The clock still starts today, regardless of whether you respond.
We have to be separated for twelve months before they grant the divorce. "
"Wendy, wait—please—please—j-just list—"
"Did you even know I found a job?"
I blink, completely caught off guard by her abrupt question. Job? What job? "What?"
She huffs. "Of course you didn't. I've been working at Mabel's for the last month."
"Mabel's?" I ask, my brain lagging with all of this new information. "Month? Wendy, why—"
"Because I can't rely on you anymore! I'm clearly such a burden that you need to work two jobs to support the kids and me," she says, sarcasm dripping from her tone.
"You're not a burden, you're my wife—the mother of my children!"
I make more than enough to support us at the garage, the jobs on the weekend were... because I needed the excuse to be out of the house.
"Still... I need to find my independence,” Wendy shrugs. “I need to make my own money. I need to pull my weight."
"Wendy, you never have to worry about money, you know I'll—"
"The judge will take a look at what you've been making and decide child and spousal support—"
Desperately, I reach for my wallet in my back pocket, only to remember that my wallet is not there; it's still on my desk, because I sprinted out of the office with just my keys, still in my overalls.
"Do you want money? I'll give you whatever you want—name it, baby—just please... don't... don't leave me, baby, please! Please!"
She looks at me like I've been speaking another language. I realize how irrational I’m acting right now, not making sense—it doesn't even make sense in my brain either.
I removed myself, but now that she's leaving, I don't want her to go. I guess I was just relying on the fact that my wife would always be there.
If I could support them, do what I know best, and make as much money for them as possible, it would supplement the things I couldn't give.
But Wendy doesn't want my money—she wants me. And I denied her that.
I denied our boys that.
Now, she's done and I can't let her go.
"I didn't leave you, Atlas," Wendy says, her voice small and sad. "You left first. You checked out and let me pick up the mess."
Like I said, the truth fucking hurts.
Her words scald me, skin me alive, and I've never felt so helpless, even when I was watching her deliver our boys.
I don't know what to do, I don't know what to say, I messed up too much. It's like the last year I've been living in a daze, and now I've been slapped awake, trying to gather my bearings.
There's nothing to hold onto.
"I just—I couldn't—please, just listen to me—"
"Is there something that you can tell me to make me understand this?" She asks me, her voice softer, and I know what it is—an olive branch. One final chance. “You can tell me why, Atlas. You can tell me anything. I just want the truth, whatever it is.”
Leave it to the woman I've loved since I was twelve years old to strip me to the bone, to see all the way to my marrow, to my very soul.
"Atlas, please... tell me why you stepped back from us?"
This is the moment.
This is when I should tell Wendy—about the fear, about the nightmares, about that night, Silas, and the gun and the screaming and the begging.
This would be the time to unburden it all to Wendy, to my wife, to tell her what's been scraping my insides raw for the past year.
This is the moment to tell Wendy I've been having horrifying nightmares of her dying, of her leaving us—like Carrie left Molly and Jem and Silas—and the only thing that made them stop was pulling away from her.
That I could barely function at work the next day after the nightmares, sleep-deprived from waking up and just holding her to make sure she was alive, scared to go back to sleep and see those images again.
That every time I sent a tow truck out for a car accident, I had to check and double-check that it wasn't her SUV.
That every time my phone rang, I convinced myself that it was someone calling to tell me she was dead or dying.
I buried myself in work because it was the only excuse I could come up with to keep myself out of the house. I could do something productive, make my family money, and secure their future while also maintaining distance.
Problem solved in my head.
Trace noticed, but didn't dig any further. Any time he asked how Wendy and the kids were, I kept my answer the same: my family is perfect, amazing, and wonderful.
I would force us to focus on work, drywall, installing hardwood, or laying tile. Anything to keep my hands and mind busy.
At the garage, since most of the employees are newer hires and my dad never really comes by our location, they don't know that I'm married. Not unless they look closely at my finger where our wedding date is tattooed.
The ones who did know Wendy, when she would come in with the boys to visit, have retired, transferred to another location, or just moved away.
The photos that I used to keep around my office of Wendy and the boys are now locked in the drawer of my desk.