Chapter 145
THERE WAS NEVER GOING TO be a good time to tell Paul I wanted a divorce, but what I finally decided was that I needed to deal with my marriage before I could do anything else.
So, on a Thursday evening in early August, I made salmon fillets, which I served on fregole, and suggested we take our plates out into the garden, where I poured us each a glass of wine. I was so nervous I could barely eat, but after Paul had cleaned his plate, I told him we had to talk.
He had been about to take a sip of wine, but he set down the glass. The way he looked at me, sort of expectantly, I’d have sworn he knew what I was going to say.
“I’m not going to New London with you,” I whispered.
He took this in, then said, “You’re not?”
“I’m not.”
I studied my wineglass, afraid to look at him and glad that I had chosen to give him this news on our patio, where, if he became irate, Allegra might poke her head out the door and ask if everything was okay.
“I’m sorry,” I said.
“Sorry for what?”
“All of it, I guess.”
Paul was so calm, it surprised me. “Want to tell me what’s going on?”
My strategy, to the extent that I had one, was to focus on us. If I had to tell him about Teo, I would. But for Paul’s sake as much as my own, I hoped it wouldn’t come to that, and certainly not right away.
“I don’t think this is what a marriage is meant to feel like,” I started.
“Is this about the thing last fall?” asked Paul. “Because I told you I was sorry about that.”
“I know you did,” I said.
“It was a mistake, and you’re meant to forgive people when they make mistakes.”
“Yeah,” I said. “And I do. Try to. But I still think that, with us, there’s something missing.”
“That isn’t true,” he argued. “We’re good together.”
I bit my lip, trying to figure out what to say to that. “I think we were good together in the beginning. The very beginning. But things moved so fast.”
“I thought you liked that. It was romantic, remember?”
“Mmm-hmm,” I said. “It was.”
How to explain that I thought Paul’s orders had put undue pressure on us, that if we had been allowed to date for even another couple of months, we might not have gotten married at all?
“Do you ever worry we got married to solve a problem instead of getting married because we wanted to be married?”
“The problem being me going overseas?”
I nodded.
“That’s bullshit, and you know it.”
I tried another tack. “After Lenny died, I put my whole life on hold. And then you came along, and it was like I had permission to start living again. Italy was going to be this big adventure, and I was overdue for one of those.”
“So you’re saying you married me to go to Italy?”
“Absolutely not,” I insisted. “But do you really think we would have gotten married if Italy hadn’t been in the mix?”
He acknowledged that we might have waited, but not that we wouldn’t have gotten married at all.
The cat found us, and I set my plate down at my feet.
“That’s disgusting,” said Paul as we watched the cat devour the salmon.
“Why?” I asked.
He sighed.
“I think we’re very different people,” I said, slowly. “And I’m sorry it took me so long to figure it out.”
He leaned back in his chair, and finally asked the question I’d been dreading. “Is there someone else?”
I had told myself at the outset that I wasn’t going to lie. All the lying made me feel like crap, and it wasn’t fair to Paul. Plus, it had jeopardized my relationships with Laura and Teo and even Francesca. I was done with it, but I didn’t know if Paul could handle what came next.
“It’s Teo, isn’t it?”
I nodded.
“How long?”
“A couple of months,” I said, my voice shaking.
It was his turn to nod.
“I’m sorry,” I said, again.
“You’re sorry for fucking him, or sorry you’ve got to sit here having this god-awful conversation with me?” What I was mostly sorry for was that I hadn’t had the wherewithal to leave Paul before I started anything with Teo. Doing it this way hadn’t been fair to any of us.
“So, what, are you just going to ride off into the sunset with him now?” Paul asked.
I couldn’t bring myself to tell him that Teo and I hadn’t spoken in weeks and that I might have damaged the relationship beyond repair. “I don’t know.”
“Yeah, right.”
“I’m telling you the truth. I love him, but I don’t know what I’m doing. I don’t even know if I’m staying in Italy. I just know that you and I can’t be married anymore.”
This hurt him, I could tell. But I was trying to put it as simply and delicately as I could.
He folded his hands behind his head, cracked his neck in at least three different places, and stood. “I think I’m going to sleep on the ship tonight.”
“Okay,” I said, then thought to ask if he wanted me to drive him to the pier.
He nodded, and I waited on the patio while he packed a bag. When he was ready to go, he leaned his head out the door to get my attention.
I stood and dumped the rest of my wine into the shrubs, then carried the glass and the plate, which Miele had licked clean, into the kitchen. “Do you want me to pick you up in the morning?” I asked as I retrieved my purse from the living room.
He shook his head. “I can shower on the ship.”
“Right,” I said. “Yeah, okay.”
We left the house through the front door and locked it behind us, then got in the Chevelle for what would turn out to be the last drive we ever took together. I think I’m glad I didn’t know it at the time.