18. Adam
— ? —
Adam
Six calls today. Six. Not one of them picked up.
They’re dodging me. I know they are. You don’t grow up with these people without learning the difference between somebody who’s actually busy and somebody who’s watching your name light up their phone and just letting it ring.
These are guys I’ve known since prep school. Guys whose weddings I stood up in.
And now I’m getting sent to voicemail like a telemarketer.
I put the phone face-down and pour a drink I don’t even want. Just to give my hands a job.
This was supposed to be done by now. That’s the part that’s eating me.
Six weeks ago it was easy. My brother, Saint Clarence, takes in his brother’s runaway bride and tucks her away in his guest house.
I didn’t even have to lie. I just had to ask the right question out loud, to the right people, the ones who can’t hold water.
What kind of man takes in his brother’s ex?
You have to wonder about a guy like that. He’s always been unstable, hasn’t he?
That’s all it takes. You say it to three people at a party, quiet, like you’re worried about him. By the weekend the whole circle’s repeating it back to you like they came up with it themselves.
And it worked. For a while it worked great.
Then she put a ring on.
The drink burns and I let it. Because I did not see that coming. Charly, of all people. I figured she’d fall apart quiet in some sad little apartment and stay out of my way.
Instead she shows up on his arm at that big party of his. Ring on her finger. Smiling like she’s never had a bad day in her life.
And just like that my crazy brother isn’t crazy anymore. He’s a guy who’s settling down. A guy with a future.
And the bitter ex in the story isn’t him.
It’s me.
There was a lunch yesterday. Old group, same restaurant we’ve been going to for years. I walked in the way I always do, smiling, hand out.
And Whitfield looks up from his plate and his face just falls.
Not into anger. Into pity. He felt sorry for me. That’s so much worse than hate. Hate you can fight. Pity means they’ve already decided you’re finished.
He pats my arm. Says the family stuff is a shame, says maybe I should take some time for myself. And the whole table goes quiet.
That specific quiet. The one that tells you they were talking about you right up until you walked over.
I left before the food came. Said a thing came up. Nothing came up. I had a parking ticket and a long drive home and the brand-new fact that people I’ve known my whole life feel sorry for me now.
My dad hasn’t called me back in nine days.
My mom texts me about the weather in Tuscany and asks if I’m “doing okay,” which is her polite way of saying don’t make this any worse for the rest of us.
“You’re drinking before noon now.”
I don’t turn around. Rebecca’s voice went flat weeks ago, all the air let out of it, and I’ve stopped pretending I care.
“It’s a bad week. Some of us work.”
“Some of us.” She breathes out, almost a laugh, not quite. “That’s great, Adam. Really great.”
I turn. She’s in the doorway in one of my old shirts, hair shoved back, a packed bag hanging off her shoulder. She looks like hell. She’s looked like hell for a while now, and I keep waiting for it to get to me, and it just doesn’t.
“What’s that?”
“My stuff. Enough to get me through the week.” She lets the bag slide off her shoulder and sets it by the door. “I’m leaving, Adam.”
I look at the bag. I look at her. And all that comes up in me is this small, far-off annoyance. The kind you get when a phone won’t stop ringing two rooms away.
“Leaving for where.”
“Don’t. Don’t make me spell it out like I’m being dramatic.
” Her hands are shaking and she presses them flat to her sides to stop it.
“I’m leaving you. For good. I never should’ve married you.
I knew it walking down the aisle and I did it anyway, because I’d already burned everything else down and you were what was left. ”
“You’re upset. You lost the baby, you’re not thinking straight, and now you want to torch your whole life over a rough couple of months.”
It’s out before I can stop it, and I know it’s wrong, because her face goes dead still.
“Say that again.” Quiet. “Say I lost the baby. Like she slipped out of my pocket. Like you were anywhere near me when it happened.”
“Don’t twist this into me being cruel,” I say. “I’m the one still standing here trying to talk to you.”
“I lost our baby and you weren’t even home.
” Her voice splits down the middle and she lets it.
“Eight months, Adam. We’d picked a name.
And the night it happened, where were you?
Out at Clarence’s place, drunk, at eleven at night, swinging at your own brother because you needed somebody to blame.
I was alone in our apartment and you were across town picking a fight. ”
“You think I didn’t lose her too?” It comes out harder than I mean it.
“She was mine too, Rebecca. But one of us has to keep this household running, one of us has to actually function and answer the phone and bring in money, and I can’t afford to sit on the floor of a nursery and fall apart for two weeks straight.
Somebody has to keep the lights on while you grieve. ”
“You’re not working.” She laughs, and it’s an awful sound.
“Don’t you dare call it that. You’re not bringing in money, Adam, you’re on the phone day and night trying to destroy your brother.
That’s the household you’re keeping running.
That’s what you’ve been doing while I sit at her grave by myself. ”
“That’s not what this is.”
“You’re so eaten up by your own pride that we lost the only thing that ever mattered and you still can’t put it down.
So tell me. What do you actually get out of it?
At the end of all this, when you’ve torn Clarence’s whole life apart, what do you win?
Because it won’t be me, and it won’t be her, and it won’t be anybody who loves you, because there’s nobody left. ”
“I’m allowed to grieve my own way.”
“Don’t you say grieve to me.” She says it like the word is rotten in her mouth. “You haven’t grieved a single second. The night we lost her you were across town throwing punches at your brother. That’s where your grief went.”
“He started it.”
“Of course he didn’t fight back. He never does.
” She drags the back of her hand across her face, fast, mad at her own tears.
“It’s always Clarence with you. Every single time.
Something goes wrong in your life and somehow it’s his fault, and you go at him like he’s the reason for all of it.
He’s not. He never was. He just had the nerve to do well, and you’ve never forgiven him for it. ”
“This isn’t about Clarence.”
“Then come to the grave with me.” She says it flat, and it stops me cold, because I wasn’t expecting it. “Once. Just once. I go every day, Adam.”
“Rebecca, don’t start with this.”
“Every morning. I drive out there and I sit in the grass and I talk to her.” Her voice is climbing. “And I’ve asked you how many times now? And every time you’ve got a reason. A call. A meeting. A headache.”
“That’s not fair.”
“Our daughter is in the ground and you can’t give her twenty minutes.
” She’s crying and not bothering to stop it.
“But you’ll drive across town at eleven at night to throw a punch at your brother.
So don’t stand there and tell me this isn’t about Clarence.
You’ve got nothing left for anybody but him. ”
I don’t have anything for that. So I don’t say anything.
“You don’t even know where she’s buried.” She wipes her face. “You couldn’t drive there if you tried. I picked the plot. I picked the little tree. I did all of it by myself, while you were on the phone running your little campaign.”
That one lands somewhere I don’t like. So I do what I always do with things I don’t like. I throw it back.
“You want to talk about Clarence? You?” I set the glass down hard enough that she hears it. “You’re the one who stole your own sister’s fiancé. She stood there on your wedding day and showed you exactly what I was. Handed you the proof. Begged you not to do it. And you married me anyway.”
“Adam, stop it.”
“So don’t stand in my kitchen acting like you’re better than me. You knew what I was. You knew all of it and you still wanted me. You don’t get to play sorry now just because it stopped being fun.”
She doesn’t flinch this time. She comes off the doorframe, crosses the kitchen, and gets right in my space.
“Don’t you dare put this all on me. You came after me. You.” She jabs a finger at my chest. “You were engaged to my sister and you cornered me at every dinner, every party, telling me I was the one you really wanted. That proposing to her was a mistake.”
“Rebecca, that’s not what happened.”
“I was weak and I was stupid and I just wanted to be the one somebody picked, for once in my life, and you knew that. You knew exactly what to say to me.” Her voice keeps climbing and she lets it.
“You built this whole thing. You lied to her, you lied to me, you lied to everybody. And now you want to stand here and act like I’m the only one who did anything? ”
“You’re the one who said yes.”
“You got down on one knee and begged me to.” She’s shaking. “And the whole time you already knew you’d do to me exactly what you did to her.”
Her hand comes up out of nowhere, and the slap lands hard enough that my head turns with it. The sting spreads across my cheek. She’s breathing hard. So am I.
“That’s for both of us,” she says.
I don’t touch my face. I won’t give her that. But it takes everything I’ve got.
She steps back. Picks the bag up and slings it over her shoulder. And when she looks at me again the anger’s gone out of her, and what’s left is so much worse, because it’s nothing at all.