11. Will #2
“Your cousin.”
“Yes.”
“The cousin you’ve never mentioned. The cousin whose name you can’t seem to remember when I ask.”
“I don’t have to explain myself to you.”
“No.” My mother’s voice went flat. Dead. “I suppose you don’t.”
Footsteps. A door closing. And then nothing.
No yelling, no crying, no resolution. Just silence that stretched for twenty years, through dinners where they sat at opposite ends of the table, through parties where they performed the perfect marriage, through a lifetime of lies so polished they looked like truth.
My father had been wrong. The woman wasn’t his cousin. I found that out years later, after he died, when a stranger showed up at his funeral and wept in the back row. A woman I’d never seen before, crying for a man she’d loved in secret for thirty years.
My mother had known. She must have known. But she’d never confronted him again, never demanded the truth, never fought for what was real. She’d chosen cold silence over messy truth, and their marriage had frozen around that choice.
I’d sworn I’d never be like them.
I’d sworn I’d have the real thing or nothing at all.
And now I was standing in my empty house at midnight, wondering if I’d just made the same mistake.
My phone rang. Mother, the screen said.
I almost didn’t answer. I wasn’t in the mood for her particular brand of advice, her careful euphemisms and unspoken judgments.
But habit won out, and I pressed accept.
“William.” Her voice was bright and brittle, the tone she used when she was pretending everything was fine. “I heard Blair took Henry to her grandmother’s for a little visit. How nice for them. A change of scenery.”
“Mother.”
“I’m sure whatever misunderstanding you’ve had will sort itself out. Your father and I had our rough patches too, you know. The key is discretion. What happens between a husband and wife should stay between a husband and wife. No need to involve the whole town.”
“Mother, stop.”
“I’m only saying that these things have a way of blowing over if you just give them time. A few weeks of space, and she’ll come around. They always do. Your father and I learned that early on.”
“They always do?” I laughed, and it came out harsh. “Is that what happened with you and Dad? You gave him space and he came around?”
Silence.
“I know about the mistress, Mother. I know about the thirty years. I know you smiled at parties and pretended everything was fine while your marriage rotted from the inside.”
“William.”
“And I know you think that’s how it’s supposed to be.
Discretion. Performance. Keeping up appearances no matter what’s actually true.
” I was gripping the phone so hard my hand hurt.
“But I’m not going to do that. I’m not going to spend the next thirty years lying to everyone, including myself.
I’d rather know the truth, even if it destroys me. ”
“The truth rarely helps as much as you think it will.”
“Maybe not. But at least I’ll know.”
I hung up before she could respond.
The study was dark. I turned on the lamp and stood there, looking at the gold box on my desk. Such a small thing. A gift wrapped in hope, waiting for someone brave enough to open it.
I crossed to the dresser first. Picked up the bottle of Blair’s perfume, the one I’d bought her last Christmas.
Wrong brand again, but she’d worn it anyway.
I unscrewed the cap and held it to my nose, breathing in the scent of her, and stood there for a long moment, hating myself for how much I needed this.
Then I set the perfume down and walked back to the desk.
I picked up the gold box.
Set it down.
Picked it up again.
My hands were shaking. I hated that my hands were shaking. I was a grown man, capable and competent, the sort of man who walked into any room and owned it. But here, alone with a gold box and the ruins of my marriage, I was twelve years old again, hiding on the stairs, afraid to know the truth.
I pulled the ribbon.
Lifted the lid.
Inside, nestled in tissue paper, were the smallest shoes I’d ever seen. Tiny baby shoes. White canvas with tiny anchors embroidered on the toes. They were impossibly delicate, impossibly precious, designed for feet that hadn’t existed yet when Blair had picked them out.
A note was tucked beside them. Her handwriting, familiar as my own.
Happy ten years. Here’s to ten thousand more. Love, your Blair.
Your Blair.
I sat down on the floor of my study. I couldn’t feel my legs. Couldn’t feel anything except those tiny shoes in my hands and what I’d done pressing on my chest.
She’d been planning to announce her pregnancy. Our pregnancy. She’d wrapped this gift and put it in her purse and come to our anniversary party ready to share the happiest news of our lives.
And I had asked her if the baby was mine.
I thought about her face when I’d said it. The shock. The hurt. The moment the light behind her eyes had simply gone out.
I thought about all the times I’d cataloged her behavior, building a case out of coincidences and fears. The lunches with Trip. The phone flipped face down. The ring on her finger in the jewelry store window.
I thought about the story she’d told me. Trip is gay. He’s proposing to Luca. He’s been hiding his whole life.
What if it was true?
What if I had destroyed my marriage over nothing?
The shoes were so small in my hands. Designed for a baby who would grow up in this house, learn to walk on these floors, sail in this harbor.
I caught myself hoping, absurdly, with no way yet of knowing, that it was a girl.
A little girl with her mother’s stubborn chin.
A baby whose first memory of its father might be the night he broke its mother’s heart.
I sat on the floor of my study, holding those tiny shoes, and I didn’t get up for a very long time.