Chapter One #3
The husband that used to be so warm, sweet, and protective.
Not this cold, unfeeling, disinterested man he's turned into lately.
A stranger who barely lets me speak before he's running out the door and doesn't answer my texts. This person who sends my calls to voicemail and will walk away from me when I’m trying to talk to him.
I grab a blanket from my trunk, lay it on the ground, and lean against our maple.
And I think.
I think about the way my chest has felt cinched tight with anxiety for weeks.
I think about how I clean obsessively now, not because a clean space brings me happiness, but because scrubbing keeps my hands busy, and if my hands are busy, that keeps me from falling apart.
I think about how I've been skipping meals and forgetting whether I've even eaten that day because my appetite has completely vanished.
I think about how I plaster a smile on my face in front of the boys when all I want to do is cry.
I think about how I give and give and give, pouring myself into tending to everyone else's needs until there's nothing left for me. Even then, it still never feels like enough.
And I think about how I can't go on like this.
It's not just about me, it's about my boys.
Liam, who looks just like his father at that age with unruly dark hair and warm brown eyes. He's the tallest in his grade and broad-shouldered. He's my little basketball star, who I usually have to drag inside from our driveway hoop.
"One more shot, Mama," he always says when I call him in for dinner.
One more shot which, of course, becomes ten more. I let him, because he flashes those puppy-dog eyes at me, his daddy's gift, and I melt every time.
My sweet baby Noah is all me with his red hair and freckled cheeks. He watches The Joy of Painting like it's his religion, narrating his own paintings in his little, perfect Bob Ross imitation.
"Happy little trees, Mama," he tells me, so full of joy it makes my chest ache.
Noah feels everything deeply and finds comfort in expressing himself through his art. He looks up to his older brother so much, following him around like a little shadow, and Liam will always slow down so Noah can keep up.
They're my good, kind boys.
They are impressionable.
They are watching us.
They have fantastic outward influences in their grandparents, Aunt Taylor, Uncle Silas, and Uncle Trace, Noah’s art teacher and Liam’s basketball coach, Trey.
But inside our home, with me, they are absorbing everything—the silences, their father missing dinners and Liam’s basketball games. They listen halfheartedly to every apology I make for their father's absence.
Am I showing them how they should treat their future partners by allowing this marriage to continue?
Am I showing them how to treat the person they love?
Am I demonstrating what love looks like?
Even worse, am I showing them how they should expect to be treated?
They deserve better parents than this version of us. I'm holding on to the rope tightly, calling for help, but no one is pulling me up.
No one is trying to save me.
And maybe that's the truth I've been avoiding all along: no one will save me, I can only save myself.
It's a terrifying thought, because there's always been someone catching me as I fall.
I had just turned eighteen when I saw those two pink lines. Atlas and I had no real plan beyond us together forever.
After the Walmart incident, I started living with the Durants. My mama told Diane I wasn't allowed back in her house, and Diane had said that was just fine, because she wasn't letting me set foot in that house again. She sent Atlas and Emmett to pack up all my belongings.
That night, all four of us made a plan. Atlas and I said that we considered abortion and adoption, but we would be keeping the baby, and we were getting married.
Atlas would still go on to attend technical school to earn his mechanics certification, then work from the ground up at one of his dad's garages.
I was going to attend the local community college to get my bookkeeping certification.
I was always good at quick math and did the books for the owner at the ice cream parlor I worked at since I was fifteen. I finished my certification when I was about seven months pregnant, and worked at the auto shop for a month before Liam decided to make his early appearance.
God, we were so young.
I was terrified throughout my pregnancy—of turning into my mother and failing this little boy and my husband, of not measuring up to Diane as a mother.
But I wanted that baby so badly it hurt. He was half Atlas—the boy I'd loved longer than I knew what love was—and half me.
A physical manifestation of how much we loved each other.
"He's so lucky, baby," Atlas whispers in my ear, standing behind me and caressing my six-month pregnant belly. Ever since I started showing, Atlas couldn't keep his hands off my bump.
Our son kicks hard at his hand, and he barks a laugh, "See, he knows. He has the best Mama in the world."
Tears sting at the memories. Nobody had ever called me the best anything before Atlas.
With my mother, it was disappointments and reprimands for not being good enough, not measuring up to her standards. My father was no help and told me to mind my mother, that she just wants the best for me and that’s to be the best.
With Atlas, I was the best because I was Wendy.
He would always call me the best girlfriend, the best wife, the best mother.
Where did that man go?
Did I do something to chase him away?
Five years after Liam was born, we were settled and still so happy.
We had moved out of his parents' house because Atlas and his best friend, Trace, had built me my dream home. It was just as he had promised—a two-story, four-bedroom house with white siding and dark blue shutters.
A big porch with a swing, a large deck for barbecues, and a huge backyard for our active, almost five-year-old to run around in.
Our little boy was about to enter kindergarten that fall, and I missed my period. I just knew, but I took a test anyway to show Atlas.
He went still as his eyes filled with happy tears before lifting me into the air, both of us laughing and crying as he thanked me for our growing family.
He had gone out right then and there, telling me over his shoulder that he needed to get something, and came back with a giant bouquet of sunflowers—my favorite flowers—and a little shirt for Liam that read 'Big Brother'.
Liam's eyes had gone huge, and he had screamed his happy little head off at the prospect of having a sibling to play with, already declaring that we would name him Velociraptor Vegeta. Thank you to Uncle Trace for showing him Dragon Ball-Z.
While Atlas had fallen on his ass from laughing so hard, I had gently vetoed that name and told our silly little boy to wait until we found out what his sibling was.
His excitement had only increased tenfold when we found out it was another boy, and we all agreed that Noah was a fine name.
My husband was so caring, attentive, and considerate during both pregnancies and deliveries. He held me through the sickness of both pregnancies, through the pain of labor, telling me how proud he was, how strong I was.
In the delivery room—both times—he never left my side, holding my hand, his face pressed against mine while I breathed through contractions.
"I've never seen anything more beautiful," he tells me. "You're doing so good, baby. I'm so proud of you. Breathe with me, okay? In. Out. That's it. I've got you. I love you, I love you..."
When they placed the boys on my chest after they were out, he cried with me both times, hugging us tightly.
"I love you. I love you so much, Wendy," he gently ran a hand over Liam's head, looking at both of us in awe. "Look at him. Look at what you did, baby. You are amazing..."
Then years later, with Noah, it's all the same love.
When Liam storms into the room, eager to meet his baby brother, Atlas scoops him up and brings him to the bed, where Noah rests against my chest.
"Hi, mama," Liam says, kissing my cheek and causing something to click in place in my chest—all of my boys with me. Liam then leans down to kiss Noah's head. "Hi, Noah."
Diane and Emmett watch us proudly from the doorway of the hospital room, allowing our little family to meet.
Atlas grabs his phone and tosses it to his mom, "Mom, take a picture of my beautiful family."
He was so proud. Of us. Of me.
Where did that man go?