Chapter Four Nora #2
“Well, fine. So he can afford to take some mental health time. That’s not a bad thing.”
He arched a brow. “You used to make fun of that stuff.”
Sometimes, having known Sam for so long was a burden. He was relentless in his knowledge of her. Who she was, who she’d been before, and who she wanted to be. He was just a lot sometimes, so no wonder she hadn’t told him about the separation.
“Okay, sure,” she said. “There was a time when I had never been to therapy. Now I have.”
“It seems to have really helped,” he said, deadpan. She couldn’t tell if he meant it or not.
“You should go sometime.”
“I’m good.”
“Are you?”
“Are you? You’re the one who just told me your husband is off on some journey to find himself.”
“Yeah. He is. It doesn’t have anything to do with me. That’s called being in a mature relationship, Sam. Everything he does isn’t about me.”
“Yeah. Well. I’ve never been married, so forgive me . . . but I kind of thought the point of marriage was that everything you do is about your spouse, actually.”
“No. I think that’s codependency.”
“Well. Neither of us would know anything about that.”
That made her smile. One of Sam’s ex-girlfriends had accused the two of them of being codependent. Which was funny, because neither of them had ever been able to afford to be codependent on anyone or anything. They were connected, sure. But that wasn’t the same.
She could see back to that afternoon when they had sat down with the Ouija board.
She’d bought it at a yard sale for twenty-five cents, and they had taken it out back at their foster parents’ place and sat cross-legged in the barn, the summer heat oppressive, the air thick around them.
He had put his hands on one side of the divining tool, and she had put hers on the other.
They had messed around with a few questions, but nothing had happened. She’d felt embarrassed and a little vulnerable asking what she really wanted to know with Sam, intense and very Sam, sitting across from her.
She’d gotten the board because she wanted . . .
This was one of the better foster homes she’d ever lived in. Sam was the best foster brother—she’d been in the same household with him a couple of times. It was a small town, and the kids like them shot around like pinballs, sometimes landing in the same place together more than once.
She liked him. She liked this place. It was a ranch, and there was a lot of open space.
She could breathe here and think. Mark and Tabitha were nice people who seemed to care about the kids they took in.
They didn’t proselytize to them, and they weren’t crazy strict.
If she could have picked a family, it might have been something like this.
It made her wonder if she’d ever have one.
“Will I ever find love?”
It moved then. Y. E. S.
“You’re moving it,” she said, her heart hammering hard.
“No, I’m not,” he said.
She was suddenly angry. Which happened more than she’d like. She’d be fine, totally fine, and then her whole face and body would get hot, and she’d lose control of her heart, her hands, her mouth. She leaned forward and punched Sam on the shoulder.
“Sam, don’t mess around with me. Don’t mess with this.”
“I’m not. I don’t give a fuck if anybody ever loves you, Nora.” He stood up and brushed his jeans off. “You’re too big of a pain in the ass anyway.”
He kicked the board and walked away.
She could still see it. She’d been sure she and Sam wouldn’t be friends after that. But they were. They stayed in that same house for six more months, and they’d been friends for twenty years since.
But she’d been pissed off at him for a week after that.
They could say anything to each other, though. That was what this many years of friendship got you. That and an on-call electrician.
“So, when he gets back, everything is going to be like it was?”
“I don’t know,” she said.
She didn’t even like to admit it to herself.
But he’d asked, and she found she couldn’t keep putting on that same brave face.
“You weren’t having any other problems?”
“I don’t want to talk about it. I just . . . When I can talk to him, then I can talk about it, but I’m not going to talk about it with you.”
He tilted his chin upward, his jaw tight. “Okay. I was just asking. Because I’m your friend.”
“I know.”
He was. Always. But he wasn’t her friend in the way the board-game friends were. The people who came over, couples, who had dinner with them at their house. He was distinctly her friend, and not Ben’s.
“Good night, Nora.”
“Sam, I’m sorry. This is . . . It has been a hard few weeks.”
“Yeah. It sounds like it. I wish you would’ve told me.”
“I told you tonight. Because it was when I could.”
That softened his face, but only slightly.
Life had carved that man out of rock. He had to be, or he wouldn’t have survived.
“Good night,” he said.
“Good night.”
He went out the front door, and she closed it behind him, securing it. Locking everything up.
Did she really think everything would go back to the way it had always been?
Did she?
She was smarter than that. This house was Ben’s.
He was the one with the money. She wouldn’t be able to afford much of anything if she was left with only her writing salary.
She wanted her marriage to work. She wanted to get back together with him.
That was what she wanted.
But she’d been through too much and knew too much about the cost of depending on people to let go of that nagging doubt inside her.
To let go of her survival instincts. Well, she had done that. She’d let herself get complacent. She had been lulled into a sense of security.
Because she had thought she’d found love, just like the Ouija board had promised. Which was dumb.
That whole day had been dumb, and she had known it then, but somehow, later, she had turned it into something meaningful. Had held it up against herself like a talisman.
Like it was a beacon of hope.
She had let it make her stupid.
Maybe she should take the job.
God knew having a little bit of extra money would be helpful.
She felt depressed, though. It felt like giving up.
It felt like quitting. It felt like losing faith in him.
In them. She had never wanted to be divorced.
She didn’t want to be part of a broken family.
She was already part of a broken family.
People who split up and left each other and didn’t even bother to . . .
She went upstairs to her bedroom, which felt alarmingly empty. When she looked around the house and actually saw it, instead of letting the familiarity make it nearly invisible, she realized how little of it was hers.
It looked like his dentist’s office. Bright white with a plethora of neutrals. Her office was like a little goblin horde. Her corner desk had lots of plants, a Himalayan salt lamp, lavender bunches hanging from the wall. She had paints in the corner, and paintings in various stages of completion.
She liked knickknacks. She liked color.
But it was only in her corner of the house.
Like a playroom.
It hadn’t felt that way until now. Until he wasn’t here. Until he didn’t occupy the space with her.
Now, the room might as well be a hotel room.
Just with a lot of her stuff in it.
She lay down across the bed, sideways, not bothering to get under the covers. She didn’t realize she had drifted off until she felt pressure on her chest. Her neck. She felt like she couldn’t breathe.
She couldn’t breathe.
An image of Alexandra in the car minutes before her accident passed through her mind.
She sat up, feeling like she had just run a marathon.
No. She wasn’t Alexandra.
She wasn’t Alexandra.
She wasn’t Alexandra.