Chapter Ten
Wendy
November
The waiting game is hard.
Counting helps.
It's been four weeks since Atlas has spoken a word to me. He seems to have pulled himself even tighter in whatever shell he's hiding in, retreating too far for me to reach now.
These days, he comes home even later and is out of the house before I'm up. That's fine.
It's been four weeks since I started my job. I still love it, something that surprises me every morning that I wake up and don't dread the day ahead.
Sure, I've had to step back on being Noah's Room Mom, which he's a little sad about. I've been relying more and more on Diane and Emmett for childcare, but everything is still going really well.
The two paychecks I received filled me with immense pride, and I cried when I saw the direct deposit hit my account that first time.
It's been three weeks since I met with Imani in her office, finally saying out loud what I've been pushing down for years.
It's been two weeks since I signed and returned all my paperwork for the separation, each signature a quiet act of reclaiming Wendy.
It's been one week since Mabel told me how happy she's been having my help at the store.
After she threatened to throw her computer in the dumpster out back, I've started running through the store’s numbers for her in the back office, just double-checking since she knows I have some experience. The fact that she trusts me with her store—her baby—makes me feel good.
And in six hours, Atlas will be served the separation paperwork and will go to his parents' house.
They will watch the boys while Atlas and I talk when he gets home. Then they’ll drop them off at home after Atlas has packed his things, and I will talk with them.
Emmett had already said he would personally ride back to their house with Atlas to make sure he left our home formally. I know Atlas most likely won't resist, but I think his father wants to have a few words with his son anyway.
Maybe I could have gone that route first, having his parents speak with him, but the more I think about it, that's just more work for me.
And if only his parents can get through to him, like he's a misbehaving teenager, essentially ordering him to actually be a husband and a father, well... I think that's something irreparable.
So, I'm spending my day off at the hair salon, getting my first haircut in... way too long.
Taylor’s nails scratch my scalp at the shampoo bowl as she rinses out the gloss. I never dye my natural ginger hair, but Taylor added shine for the new Wendy I’m creating. She shuts off the water, towels my hair, and guides me to her station.
Taylor works at her mom's salon, where she's swept hair and answered phones since she was a teenager. She's been cutting my hair since we were thirteen, using scissors stolen from her mom's kit. I like to say that I helped make her a child prodigy.
She's been cutting the boys' hair since they were toddlers. Atlas and I tried taking them to his barber once, but Noah cried, and my stubborn Liam hated his haircut so much he refused to look in the mirror for days.
The boys feel safe with Aunt Taylor.
"So," Taylor says, spinning me around in the chair and grinning, "what are we thinking?"
I shrug. "Surprise me."
That mischievous glint flashes in her hazel eyes. "A pixie cut?!"
"Okay, not that surprising," I laugh, and Taylor giggles, combing through my hair.
It's in desperate need of a cut, my hair falling down to my belly button with straggly, broken ends. I've been just throwing it up in a mom bun, a claw clip, or braiding it down my back to keep it out of my face while I work or run errands, too tired to actually style it.
I used to love my hair, thick and curly and voluminous when I really tried. I should get back to that. I think taking some pride in something—putting actual effort into my appearance—might help rebuild what I've allowed to erode inside me: my self-esteem.
Atlas has always thought I was beautiful.
He's seen me at my worst, and he's seen me at my best, and he's never thought otherwise. But along the way, I stopped doing my hair and makeup because I had two boys who needed my attention.
I would get haircuts with Taylor that were more about function than expression. There was no me-time left, and any scraps I found went toward catching up on sleep.
Not anymore.
It's time to really find Wendy again.
Or maybe make a new Wendy.
"Hm..." Taylor says, running her hand through my hair. Her eyes scan my head of hair, eyes glazed over as she works her hair magic in her mind.
"Ooh," she says suddenly. "I've got it. Victoria's Secret Bombshell."
I smile immediately, remembering our teen years were spent flipping through her mom's Victoria's Secret catalogues, sprawled on the floor, admiring the women with their big, glossy curls and unapologetic confidence.
For every special occasion, Taylor would give me a blowout like that. I guess we're returning to form.
Taylor bounces in excitement at my nod, grabbing some clips to section my hair. She looks at me in the mirror, my hair between the blades of her scissors, and asks, "Ready?"
I smile.
Snip.
An hour later, she's adding some finishing spray to my hair.
"You truly are my pièce de résistance," she says, affecting a French accent, and making me laugh. She puts the bottle down, fluffs my hair, and spins me around to the mirror.
My eyes widen.
"Taylor..."
"I know."
"Taylor."
"I know, I'm a fucking artist," she says, kissing her fingers like a chef.
Taylor really outdid herself. She cut about seven inches, and now it bounces, falling to my breasts in glossy and bouncy curls.
I feel beautiful, and I know it's not only because of the hair. It's because my smile comes easily to my face now. It's the independence I've been cultivating, and from my own happiness, my boys seem to smile a little easier these days, too.
For the last year, I've completely wrung myself out running the house, trying to get Atlas to just talk with me, and facing the reality of my failing marriage.
Every single time I've tried to speak to him, I’ve been shut down or completely ignored, like I’m not even there.
He won't respond to my texts or calls, and documentation of that was sent to Imani.
I've tried to engage him physically and been rejected, to my complete shame and embarrassment.
I made a couple's therapy appointment, set the reminders in three calendars, and he didn't show up. As a matter of fact, he was home and was confused about where I was.
Sure, I could have asked him that night why he didn't show up. Did he not see the reminders on his phone? Did he not remember me reminding him that morning?
But the thing is, Atlas is not my child; he is my husband. He is a fully grown man, and I cannot just hold his hand and walk him through this life while I'm trying to actually raise and take care of our two children.
The hardest pill to swallow is that I cannot force him to change. Imani told me, from years of experience, that change has to come from within—it has to be wanted.
She's seen men truly dig deep to change for their wives and earn them back.
Most of the time, they make excuses, they dig in stubbornly, and they divorce the women who love them because they think there's nothing wrong.
Then months later comes the regret, the begging, the pleading, the talks of going to therapy to fix things when they finally realize too late that pride and ego cost them the one who truly cared.
Knowing all of this, that my situation is not unique, doesn't help me. It sure as hell doesn't stop the guilt from flaring inside of me like poison, the questions spinning around my head.
Could I have done more? Should I have laid down in front of his truck and forced him to talk? Should I have tied him to a chair and made him listen to me? What else could I have done?
And why should I even lower myself to that?
I'm the woman, the mom, the wife, the martyr.
It all should just fall to me, all the housework, all the childcare, all the emotional labor, while Atlas can just check in and out whenever he wants.
I will never, ever, lower myself to be the woman begging for her husband to give her a scrap of attention. Not anymore. Not when I have two boys who are watching.
I will be the example. I will show them that they deserve not only love, but respect from their future partners.
They deserve effort, not the bare minimum.
I've tried and tried and tried to make this marriage work, I've stripped myself raw to do it, and all I've learned is that it cannot work when only one person is actually trying.
So, maybe this separation filing will be a wake-up call for Atlas, but at this point, I'm done trying to be a wife to a man who doesn't care about me.
All I want is for him to be a father to his sons.
Bare fucking minimum.