Chapter 26 Rhys
Rhys
“Dad, those are getting burned,” Finn observes, pointing at the griddle where I’m making pancakes, from scratch, not a box, because Jayne doesn’t do that.
“It’s called caramelization,” I lie, flipping a pancake that looks like it’s been through a coal mine.
Mikaela blinks at me over her orange juice. “That’s not what Mom’s pancakes look like.”
“Mom’s pancakes are a work of art, Peanut.” I plate the burnt one for myself. “These are rustic.”
Jayne walks in just in time. “Rustic?”
“Authentic?” I suggest. “Artisanal?”
She smirks and hands me her phone. “Can you read this email and tell me if I sound like a B?”
“You never sound like a….”
She’s been asking me to look at her communications and plans as she works on the merger with Harcourt. I feel good about being able to help her.
I scroll, taking in her phrasing, the delicate spine of steel threaded through every line. “Jayne,” I say quietly, unable to keep the awe from my voice. “You should get into politics. You’re a consummate diplomat.”
Doubt creases her beautiful forehead. “Yeah?”
“Yeah.” I shake my head, almost laughing because I can’t believe she doesn’t see it. “You managed to get your point across and tell the Harcourt paralegals they were behaving like spoiled brats—without being rude. Not even a little.”
She opens her mouth to protest, but I hold her phone up like evidence.
“You soothed their egos, made them feel heard, reassured them, and still held the line. That’s a masterclass in leadership, Jayne.”
She all but leaps and wraps her arms around me, holds me tight.
Mikaela claps. “Kiss! Kiss!”
Finn groans. “Oh my God. You’ve got to stop all this kissing and stuff in front of minors. It’s gross. It’s child abuse.”
We kiss. Because what the hell else are we supposed to do?
But it’s not all smooth sailing.
There was the time when I decided—foolishly—to attempt chicken marsala for dinner.
Halfway through chopping mushrooms, I remembered I had to move the clothes from the washer to the dryer, but as I was coming back to the kitchen, I stopped to check the hinge on Finn’s door.
While I was doing all that, I left the pan simmering (a mistake any first-year resident would be ashamed of).
I ran when the smoke alarm started screaming like it was auditioning for a horror movie.
Jayne walked in as I was flapping a dish towel under it.
“Jesus, Rhys,” she coughed. “What happened?”
“I stepped away for ten minutes.”
“Uh-huh. And the Marsala gods smote you.” She opened a window. “You sure you’re not missing the hospital right now?”
“Desperately.”
We laughed. It dissolved the panic as easily as water cuts through heat.
We had Chinese takeout for dinner that night.
The kids came home sunburned and wired from camp. Someone spilled tomato juice on the couch. Mikaela’s hair was full of glitter. Finn’s knee was bandaged. Everyone was talking at once.
I thought then that these are the best sounds in the world, second only to the first heartbeat after asystole.
Jayne’s new job has already meant that she’s spending more and more time at work. This is the second time this week she’s missed dinner. Not having her home is no fun. I miss her.
I realize that this is how she felt when I wasn’t around, and I wasn’t around a lot.
Once the kids get to bed, I sit on the porch.
It’s a warm summer day, and once you lather yourself in bug spray, you can actually sit outside without being molested by mosquitoes.
I drink a beer and watch the fireflies flashing over our yard.
I think about how I have changed in these past months—well, not changed, exactly, more like I have altered my priorities. But Jayne, she’s alive in a way I haven’t seen in years. She’s excited about life.
I’m proud of her. More than proud. I’m in awe.
I feel tremendously guilty for making her think that her job wasn’t as important as mine. It will take time before I forgive myself for what I put her through, even though she has forgiven me.
I know she’s afraid of what will happen when I go back to the hospital. She’s worried that the scales will tip, and my work will take precedence over hers. I can tell her until I go red in the face that won’t happen, but she won’t believe it until she sees it.
It hurts that she doesn’t trust me. But I don’t hold it against her. This is, after all, my doing.
Headlights wash over the driveway. A smile tugs at my lips. My wife’s home. I’m happy. How simple is that, huh?
I go into the house and meet Jayne by the kitchen door. She looks exhausted, wrung out by her day. Her shoulders slump, her blouse is wrinkled, and her eyes have that sharp, tired sheen I used to see in the mirror every night.
In her case, it happens occasionally. It’s not a regular thing, which makes it palatable. I won’t let her spiral as I did. That’s a promise.
“Hey.” I take her bag from her and kiss her lips. “I was about to text you.”
“I’m sorry,” she whispers. “I stayed late. The client—”
“Shh.” I set her bag on the kitchen counter. “Have you eaten?”
She shakes her head.
“Get changed while I heat food for you.”
She smiles wanly at me. “What did you cook?”
“I finally got the chicken marsala right!”
“I can’t wait to taste it.”
I heat water to cook fresh tagliatelle and turn on the oven to heat the chicken.
I pour a glass of white wine for her, set the table, and even light a candle.
The water is boiling by the time she comes back. “Sit, have some wine, and I’ll have the food ready in no time.”
“You know, you’ve gotten really good at cooking.” She sniffs the wine and then takes a tentative sip.
“You think so?”
“Well, I have to eat the marsala to be sure,” she teases.
“Baby, this is gonna knock your socks off. The kids said it’s the best meal they’ve ever eaten…or the best meal that I’ve ever cooked that they’ve eaten.” I drop the pasta into the water and stir. “It’s fuzzy.”
She leans back in her chair, and that exhaustion, which had been there just moments ago is gone. She used to do this for me before we slid into a cycle of bitterness and avoidance.
I plate the food as artistically as I can and put it in front of her.
“This is amazing,” she declares after taking a bite.
“Oh, fuck, wait.” I rush to the fridge and pull out the chopped parsley I saved for garnish, sprinkling it over the chicken and pasta. “Now it’s ready, signora.”
“Grazie mille, signore.”
I sit with her while she eats, listening as she tells me about her day.
The avalanche of emails, the merger headaches, the million tiny fires she put out with that calm competence I’m still learning to match.
And as she talks, I feel something I haven’t felt in weeks.
The faint tug of missing work. Missing the part of my brain that solves impossible puzzles. Missing the tension of a room where the next decision matters.
Sure, making chicken marsala isn’t easy, but it’s still a hell of a lot easier than cracking a sternum.
Claire warned me this would happen. That once the exhaustion drained out of my system and I finally slipped into a rhythm, the part of me that’s built for high stakes would kick in.
But when I look at Jayne, I know that whatever I miss doesn’t even come close to what I almost lost.
When she’s done, I take her plate before she can stand. I don’t let her lift a finger. I want to take care of my wife, even if it’s something small, something mundane. I want to shoulder a fraction of what she’s carried for me, for us, for years.
If I’d opened my eyes earlier….
God. What would our life have been like? What would we have spared ourselves?
But thinking like that only leads backward, and backward isn’t where we’re going.
Claire’s right, I’ve been looking at myself through a lens where I’m the villain in my own family story. Like I’ve been a shitty husband and father forever. But that isn’t true.
This is just a season where I needed to step up. And I took too long to do it. I wasn’t absent because I didn’t love them. I wasn’t dismissive because I didn’t value my wife. I was drowning, and I didn’t even know it.
But I’m here now, and I’m trying to give myself grace.
After a few minutes, Jayne says quietly, “I’m scared.”
My heart lurches. “Of what?”
“That this…us…won’t last. That we’ll go back to what we were. You busy at work, me suffocating at home.”
I reach across the table and take her hand.
“I’m scared too,” I admit. The truth is raw. “Every time I forget a permission slip or burn dinner, I think, ‘This is it. This is where she loses faith in me again.’ I keep waiting to fuck up and lose you.”
She gapes at me, stunned. “Really?”
“Yeah.” I shrug helplessly. “I don’t want to go back there, Jayne. I won’t.”
“I won’t lose faith in you, Rhys. Not again. I don’t want you to live with that.”
She walks around the table, and slips her arms around my neck. I pull her into my lap because I need her close, need the grounding weight of her more than I need air.
“I can’t help how I feel, but I’m working on it.”
“We’ll figure it out,” she whispers.
I bury my face in her neck. “No more pretending we’re fine if we’re not. Deal?”
“Deal.”
We stay like that in the quiet kitchen, holding each other, not as the broken versions of ourselves we were, but as the people we’re becoming.
“I won’t ever let you down if I can help it, Jayne.”
“I know.”
“I will make mistakes,” I warn her.
“So will I.”
“We’ll give each other grace,” I say, remembering Clare’s advice.
“Yes, Rhys.”