10. Sutton
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Sutton
The bourbon sat on the nightstand where I had left it an hour ago, untouched.
I couldn’t drink it. I couldn’t do anything except sit on the edge of the bed and replay the moment she slapped me. The crack of her palm.
My cheek still burned. I pressed my fingers to the spot and felt the heat there, hours later. She had put her whole body into it, and I had let her, because I knew I deserved worse.
She had waited for me. She had stood in a church in a wedding dress, looking at the door, and I hadn’t walked through it.
The memory came before I could stop it. Not the wedding I missed. The night before all of that. The night, a year and a half ago, when I lost her the first time, the night she ended our marriage.
We were in the car, driving back from my mother’s birthday dinner. I had shown up two hours late. Walked in during dessert. Kissed my mother’s cheek and made a joke about traffic and pretended not to see the look on Charlotte’s face.
She hadn’t spoken since we left. Her hands were folded in her lap. Her face was turned toward the window.
“Your mother thinks I have the patience of a saint, and that most women would have given up on you by now.”
I kept my eyes on the road. My hands tightened on the steering wheel.
“She asked me how long I was planning to wait for you to grow up,” Charlotte continued. “You’ve never been the type to commit to anything that wasn’t work. After all, your father was the same way, and she spent twenty years hoping he would change before she realized he never would.”
“That’s just how she talks,” I said. “She says things like that to everyone. It doesn’t mean anything.”
“It means something to me.” Charlotte turned to look at me.
Her eyes were dry, but there was something in them I hadn’t seen before.
“I sat at that table for two hours tonight, Sutton. Two hours of your cousins asking where you were, your father making excuses, your mother refilling my wine glass and giving me that look. The one that says she feels sorry for me.”
“I got held up,” I said. “The meeting ran longer than I expected, and then there was traffic on the bridge. I told you I would be late.”
“You told me you would be thirty minutes late.” Her voice was steady, but I could hear the effort it took to keep it that way.
“I should have called,” I said. “I know that. But you’re acting like I did it on purpose, like I wanted to leave you sitting there alone.”
“I know you didn’t do it on purpose.” She shook her head slowly. “That’s almost worse. You didn’t think about it at all.”
“Laura asked me tonight if I ever get lonely.” Charlotte’s hands twisted in her lap.
“She asked it like she already knew the answer. And I wanted to tell her no, I wanted to tell her that you and I are happy, that we’re building something together.
But I couldn’t say it, because it would have been a lie. ”
“So you’re upset because my mother asked you a question,” I said. The frustration was building in my chest. “Because she made some comment about commitment, and now suddenly our entire relationship is a problem.”
“Our relationship has been a problem for a long time.” Charlotte’s voice dropped.
“I’ve just been pretending it wasn’t. I’ve been telling myself that if I waited long enough, if I was patient enough, if I made myself small enough to fit into whatever space you had left over, eventually things would change. Eventually you would see me.”
“I do see you,” I said.
“You see someone who doesn’t complain. You see the version of me I created so I wouldn’t lose you. But that’s not who I am. That’s not who I want to be.”
“Then tell me who you want to be,” I said. “Tell me what you need, and I’ll give it to you.”
“I need you to want to be here.” Her voice cracked. “I need you to choose me without me having to beg for it.”
“I can learn,” I said.
“I want to believe you. I’m so desperate not to be alone that I’ve convinced myself crumbs are enough.”
“I give you more than crumbs,” I said.
“You give me whatever’s left over.” Her voice rose. “You give me the scraps, and I’ve been so grateful for them that I forgot I deserve more than that. I forgot that I’m allowed to want someone who actually shows up.”
We were approaching our house. The familiar street, the familiar lights. I pulled up to the curb and put the car in park.
Neither of us moved.
“I want a divorce, Sutton,” she said finally. Her hand was on the door handle, but she wasn’t opening it. “I can’t do this anymore. I can’t stay married to someone who’s never here.”
“So you’re just going to leave,” I said. The anger was rising in my chest, mixing with something that felt dangerously close to panic. “You’re going to walk away because my mother said some things and you had a bad night.”
She opened the door. The dome light came on. “I’m ending it because I love you too much to let our marriage turn into something ugly. I want out before I hate you, Sutton. Please let me do that.”
She stepped out of the car.
I should have gone after her. I knew that, even then. I should have gotten out and followed her inside and told her I would do whatever it took.
But the anger was still burning in my chest. The injustice of it. My mother’s words in her mouth, deciding my fate. The way she had already made up her mind before we even got in the car.
I watched her walk up the steps to our house. Her shoulders were shaking. She let herself in and the door closed behind her.
She didn’t look back.
I sat there with my hands on the wheel, waiting for her to come back out. Waiting for her to realize she was wrong. Waiting for this to be another fight our marriage would survive.
She had asked me to let her go. And I had. Not because she wanted me to. She had wanted me to fight. She had wanted me to prove my mother wrong. She had wanted me to get out of that car and show her that she mattered more than my pride. That our marriage had a fighting chance.
But I hadn’t. Because my anger felt more justified than my fear. Because admitting she was right would have meant admitting I was the man my mother said I was.
And I was. I had proved it that night. I had proved it every night since.
But not this time.
Three in the morning. Charlotte was somewhere in this town, and I finally understood that she had given me one last chance in that car, and I had let it slip away because holding on was harder than letting go.
I picked up the bourbon. Held it for a long moment. Set it back down.
I was done letting go.