CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
Sunday, May 28
Andrew
1:00 p.m.
Amy hadn’t returned from work. Andrew’s nerves gnawed at him as he imagined sitting her down and telling her about Max, but he had no other choice. His palms sweated. So when noon passed and her car was still absent from the driveway, he couldn’t ignore the relief her absence brought, and Andrew’s plan adjusted: he’d promised to visit Kathryn. Maybe in the daylight, speaking to her would offer some clarity on the events of the previous day; then he would break the news that would shatter his wife’s world.
He sent Kathryn a text: Did Max come home? Can we talk?
He’s still not home, Kathryn responded. Then, yes .
So much promise in one word.
Andrew showered and dressed, then backed from the driveway and watched cars battle for parking spots along the beach and cruised past the now-full public lot. In the sunshine, the beach was a different universe from the place he’d shared with Max the night before.
Andrew let himself into Kathryn’s house. In the kitchen, the table where Max had confronted them sat vacant, the chairs pushed in, uniform. After their conversation on the beach, Max had asked Andrew to let him out of the car at a house a few blocks from Kathryn’s, and he’d watched Max’s broad shoulders disappear into the night. Andrew clung to the scraps of their conversation beneath the moonlight. Kathryn had twenty years of memories, but these belonged to him.
The roar of the TV floated from Emmy’s room, and Kathryn, dressed in a cream sweater with her hair pulled into a messy bun, popped her head into the hallway and ushered him inside. A vanilla candle flickered on her dresser, and Andrew closed the door behind them. A single empty wineglass sat on her nightstand. “How was your night?” he asked.
“I didn’t sleep much.”
Her bedroom was no longer a strange space to him. Andrew came to the end of her bed and sat down. Laced his fingers. “Neither did I. I stared at the ceiling all night. Alone.” He’d spent so many nights that way. His house still, silent. Their conversation that evening had pinballed in his mind, and he’d felt Kathryn, his arms around her on her bed. What did he want from life? If there were no consequences, what did he truly desire? The answer burned into him, and he’d punched his pillow and turned onto his other side. His bedroom hadn’t felt like his own. Things couldn’t continue the way they were. He was flying too close to the sun. But the thought of losing Kathryn gave him that same swimming feeling of an impending panic attack. He knew what his life was without her, and the thought of returning to that existence felt like slipping back into sleep after jerking awake from a nightmare; a fear of returning to a terrifying void. The thought of losing Amy itched. But he’d gotten a glimpse of the life he and Kathryn had planned. And he could give Max what he never had, a father who stood by him. He was standing at the precipice of something, and whichever way he favored, one side would bloom, while the other would be reduced to ash.
In Kathryn’s room, Andrew beckoned for her to come closer. When she did, he reached out and took her hands in his. “Kathryn, where do we go from here?” Kathryn drooped, uneasy. Andrew dropped her hands and rose. “I’m here. With you. I shouldn’t be doing this, I know that.”
“Drew ...” Trepidation laced her tone.
Kathryn eyed him, taking one tiny step back. Without thinking, Andrew reached for her, and when he did, Kathryn fell into his arms, and he wrapped them around her, as if pulling her closer could somehow shield them from the reality of their lives, from everything that was keeping them apart. When he pulled back slightly, she met his eyes, and without taking a second to think, he met her lips with his. Her response was immediate; she surrendered, parting her lips, and he drew her in greedily. Fire had sparked between them the moment he met her eyes at Starbucks and had grown with every hug, every secretive phone call, every smile they’d shared; now it ignited, raged between them.
They moved as one, took a step closer to her bed, where his mouth broke away from hers momentarily, pressing her against the bedpost as he slipped a hand under her sweater, her skin velvety and warm. He pulled her sweater over her head, losing sight of her for a moment, and when she came back into view, her mouth met his again. He kissed down her neck and chest, and she sighed a soft, desperate noise of encouragement. Kathryn gripped his hair before she ran her hands down his body, stopping where he was hard beneath his jeans. She reached for his belt.
A flash in his mind. Amy. Sunlight glinting off his grill in the backyard. His home. The beep of Amy’s car when she came through the door, chased by a swell of relief that she’d returned safely.
Andrew gasped and jerked back. “Kathryn, stop.” Her hands fell away, and he took another step backward. “We can’t.” He fastened his belt with trembling hands.
Kathryn covered herself with one hand and snatched her sweater off the bed with the other before she yanked it over her head. “Why not, Andrew?”
“Because I’m married .”
Her face flushed. “And? That didn’t matter a moment ago. It hasn’t stopped you from anything you’ve done over the last few months.”
An exasperated sigh burst from him when Kathryn struck the raw nerve reserved for his guilt. She was right. But he couldn’t lose Amy. “That’s not fair. You don’t know the whole story.” Arousal coursed through him. He’d never wanted someone so badly, like if he didn’t have her, he might burst. Desire was chased by white-hot frustration.
“You can’t honestly tell me you don’t feel anything here,” Kathryn spat. “Like you said, you call me every time your wife leaves the house. You two must be blissful if you’re spending all your time with me.”
Kathryn’s words prodded him again. She’d reduced his actions down to the core of his dirty secret, that he desired her. And that his wife’s absence stung. “Is this what you wanted all along?” he demanded. “After all this time you want me again?”
Andrew watched her face bloom with anger. “Don’t put this on me,” she cried. “I didn’t expect to run into you that morning. But when I did, I knew it was time. I owed you an explanation about our son. Our past. But you wanted to get together again and again each week. I never told you to hide this from your wife—that was your choice. I’m not with anyone, Andrew. You are. I never pushed you into this.”
“It’s not that simple,” Andrew snapped, pacing. That familiar tingle, electricity dancing in his fingertips. “She’s ... she’s never there. And you are.”
Kathryn’s lips parted. “So I’m a convenience to you?”
“No. I—there’s something here, Kathryn. I feel it, and I know you feel it, too.”
Kathryn’s jaw hardened in confirmation. Battling images. He wanted her. And part of him feared this more than he’d ever feared anything. But it was impossible. A fantasy. The hurt he’d cause was too much to fathom. If she’d stayed with him, life would have been different.
Exasperation spiked in him. “You just left one day. You disappeared . I deserved to know you were pregnant, and you had a million opportunities to tell me. There were days when you thought about it—I know—don’t tell me you didn’t.” He paced, his molten rage flowing through his entire body.
Tears spilled from Kathryn’s round eyes, but she stared, absorbed each blow he dealt, like she’d been waiting for it for decades.
“When he was born you didn’t call me. Just because you had roommates or friends or whatever, you didn’t think I should know?”
Kathryn’s eyes broke away when Andrew mentioned Max’s birth. He’d struck a nerve.
“You stole twenty years from me. Every milestone, every birthday. All of it. You made a conscious choice to keep all this from me. You made that decision for all three of us, and I can never get that back. And why? I wasn’t a drunk—at least not at that point. I didn’t hit you. I would have made a good father. I would have supported both of you. Always. I just don’t get it.”
“I’m sorry.” Kathryn’s shoulders quivered as she cried. “You’re right.”
“I know I’m fucking right.” His pace quickened. “You act like I shouldn’t have moved on, which is absurd. You chose to stop loving me all those years ago, and now you make me feel bad because I built a life, because I found someone to spend it with.” His feet paused on the rug, and he turned to face her. “Then, one day, you’re standing right in front of me again, out of nowhere. And God , you’re beautiful. And yes, I’ve enjoyed our time together. It’s so easy between us. But that’s not our reality, and now other people stand to get hurt here. I love my wife.” He ran a drenched palm down his face. “And I don’t know if I’ve loved you this whole time or if I fell in love with you all over again, but all I know is I now find myself in the impossible situation of being in love with you, too, Kathryn.”
Kathryn looked up at him, defeated and distraught, and whispered, “I love you, Andrew.”
The words rang in the room.
“But you made your choices,” Andrew said. “And there are no second chances. It’s twenty years too late for us.”
Kathryn swallowed through her tears, then tugged the sleeves of her sweater over her hands. Her voice was hard when she spoke. “Then there’s your answer. Go home to your wife. This is your clean break, and I’ll never breathe a word. You can pretend none of this ever happened, that Max and I don’t exist. I won’t call you. When I see you at Publix, you’ll just be another fucking stranger to me.” Crimson blotches dotted her neck.
Her words severed his patience like the snap of a frayed rope, and he met her cold stare. This was familiar, someone shoving him away. He shoved back. “Fine—that’s exactly what I want.” He opened his hands. Closed them. That tickle spreading. His face, hot, while his body trembled. “For you, for all of this, to just disappear.” He waved an arm at the space around them and saw Kathryn flinch.
He’d meant for the words to hurt her—to slice into the raw place where her words had stabbed him—but the reality of what he’d said—of letting Kathryn go, of letting Max go—came into focus; the tingle surged up his limbs, gripping his throat, and a gray, swimming sensation filled his vision, like he’d slipped beneath murky water. Without his medication, the feeling was overpowering, and Andrew tried to draw a breath, tried to chase away the chills shaking his body, to grasp for control.
Something you can see : the fear emanating from Kathryn’s eyes; the heartbreak, the loneliness, all she’d ever known.
Something you can hear : the blood rushing in and out of his shattered heart.
Something you can taste : bile, metal, salt.
“If that’s what you want, then leave.” Kathryn’s voice a brash whisper.
“Kathryn—”
“Leave!” she shouted, her voice breaking as tears spilled down her face. “Get out of my house right now! Don’t ever speak to me or my son again.”
Color slipped back into Andrew’s vision, anger overriding his panic. He threw his hands up. “No, not yet. Tell me why !” His voice boomed. “It’s all I’ve wanted to know for twenty years. Tell me what’s wrong with me. Tell me why you chose this instead of the life we planned—”
“Because I didn’t think he was yours!”
Andrew stopped, rooted to the floor, and squared his body to face her. “What do you mean?”
Kathryn crumpled, tears rushing down her face. “I’m so sorry.”
Andrew stared, mouth ajar. “Not mine. Then who ?”
Kathryn shook her head. “I ... wasn’t sure. It could have been you. But ...”
“Who else?” Andrew’s voice reverberated off every surface.
Kathryn hung her head and choked a sob.
Pieces snapped together in Andrew’s mind; things that hadn’t made sense suddenly came into focus; old memories took on new meaning. He locked on to her eyes as scalding, poisonous rage flooded every cell in his body. “Nick?”
It couldn’t be true. His brain rejected the thought.
But Kathryn sat before him, racked with sobs, wordlessly confessing the things that had been right there in front of him the entire time, things he was too blind to see. “When?” Andrew shouted. “Were you two”—he couldn’t say the word, couldn’t think it—“the entire time we were living together?”
Kathryn lifted her gaze. “God, no. Just—” Her voice fell, barely audible. “That Christmas when you went home.”
“Just the once?”
Kathryn’s eyes broke away, her cheeks slick with tears, and shook her head. Subtle, but speaking volumes of jagged truth. “And on your birthday.”
Andrew froze, statue still. Cold betrayal washed through him.
Kathryn broke, her body trembling with sobs. “Andrew—”
“Don’t.” He held up a hand. A suffocating tension filled the room. Reality blurred, his entire life a kaleidoscope, shaken. “I need to get out of here.” His words were barely audible. “I need to never see your face again.”
Andrew turned and marched out the door. His movements were automatic; he didn’t think as he started his car, the engine roaring to life. His pulse ticked in his ears as he backed into the street and shifted into drive. Stevie Nicks’s voice blared from the radio, and Andrew stared at the screen for a moment, taking in the words as she sang about picking up the pieces and going home.
Kathryn. Nick. Since the very beginning.
It was as if Stevie’s voice—as if the entire universe—was mocking him for his blindness. He punched the radio until the music abruptly muted, leaving the screen broken, distorted with blobs of black. Andrew didn’t care, he wrapped his hands around the steering wheel and sped up the street.