Chapter 29
Mid-October
It’s all starting to crumble.
The more Rob and I try to hang on and tell each other everything is fine, the quicker it seems to turn to dust.
He texted me earlier today.
Hey baby. Sorry I didn’t see you for breakfast. I remembered what day it is, so I wanted to say I hope you’re having an okay day and not feeling too sad. Let’s order in tonight and watch a movie — your pick. Love you. R x
That was sweet. I look at my reply.
Thanks honey. It’s always a crappy day without David, but I appreciate you thinking of me and remembering the anniversary of his death while you’re so busy at work.
I know Hawaii wasn’t all bad, it was our first wedding after all, even if I don’t remember, so we should celebrate.
Takeout sounds good, maybe Malaysian food?
I’ll pick a movie that D would have appreciated. See you later tonight Jx
I lean against the barrier of our terrace, unafraid of the eighteen-story drop, staring over the city but seeing only my brother’s laughing face.
Where is he? London, or somewhere more exotic? Is she with him — Other Josie? Has she become as entrenched in my old life as I have in hers?
Would she trade with me, if she had the chance? With David back in her life, after losing him, would she trade him to have her husband back? If she’s met up with the Rob in her timeline, too, she has them both. Perhaps she’s laughing at me, figuring I got the raw end of the deal.
It doesn’t feel like that, though. The nightmares keep coming, Other Josie visiting me almost every night, imploring me to give her life back to her. Like she’d do anything to be back with Rob. Even lose David again.
I stand on the terrace a long time, the westerly sun still high and warm on my skin, thinking of all the people below who would do anything to have a life like mine.
One of the many aspects of my guilt is the sense of disgust at my own ingratitude, my inability to embrace all I’ve been given.
Who gets thrust into a life of love and luxury and gets depressed?
I try to shake it off, and with one last look at the view, go into the master bedroom through the door at the end of the terrace. Opening the media cabinet, I turn on the huge TV, browsing for movies to watch after dinner. I add six to the playlist as the apartment door closes with a thunk.
“Hey,” I hear Rob call.
“Hey,” I call back, going out to the kitchen. Rob is unpacking boxes of Malaysian takeout, which I have little appetite for. “This good?”
“Great, thanks. Want a drink? I’m on G&Ts.”
“A beer, thanks.”
I pop a beer and hand it over while he spoons cod and rice into shallow dishes. He kisses me on the side of my head, absently.
“How are you doing?”
“Okay. Not amazing. I was distracted at work today, thinking about David — and I totally forgot a 3 p.m. meeting with Hans and the Luxury Listing producers, I didn’t show up, so Hans had a go at me about that.
It’s more than today, though — my brain sucks on these meds.
I’m going to have to stop, or switch again. I’m useless.”
We take the plates to the dining table.
“That sucks, baby, I’m sorry. Talk to Dr. Weiner, I guess.” That’s his name for Dr. Weinstein.
“I will. How was your breakfast meeting? Will you get the hotel job?”
“We got it, already! The meeting was awesome, but we weren’t expecting to hear back for a week. Then they called back this afternoon! Such a relief.”
“That’s amazing, honey.” I lift my glass to him. He’s brilliant. “They decided that quick, huh? They must’ve loved you guys. When will it start?”
“After we’ve completed the Tribeca lofts, early next year. We should slide straight into the new project. Oh, Hans has a buyer for 701 at Tribeca. He tell you?”
I shake my head. “He was too busy asking me where the hell I was at 3 p.m. The answer being sobbing about my dead brother in the washroom.”
Rob puts down his fork, hesitates, then looks me in the eye. “Josie, I’m sorry about David, and I understand it’s hard today. But can we not make this about you and your issues right now? I’m trying to celebrate a major achievement here.”
I nod. He’s right. “I’m sorry. This is a good day for you. You deserve your moment.” I raise my glass to his again. “Congratulations, my love.” I lean across the corner of the table, and go to kiss him on the cheek, but he turns and meets my lips with his. He tastes of fish and beer.
After dinner, the mood is amicable but fragile, and I’m glad to move into the bedroom for the movie. As I dim the lights and turn on the big screen, he settles down in his armchair, giving me the chaise as usual.
“I made a playlist,” I tell him, tucking a leg underneath me. “I wasn’t sure which you’d seen. Any of these and I’m happy.”
I start scrolling through.
“Australia? That’s the only Baz Luhrmann I haven’t seen.”
He shakes his head. “That thing’s more than three hours long.”
“Fair enough. What about a foreign film, one of the Oscar winners? This one is supposed to be incredible: The Lives of Others — fancy it?”
“Nah. Josie and I saw it a few years ago and . . .”
The air in the room freezes.
“What did you say?”
In the light of the TV, Rob is staring at the screen, the beer suspended halfway to his lips. He lets out a slow, steady breath, clearly working out how to recover. He puts the beer down and turns to me.
“You know what I mean — the old Josie. The old you, before your accident. You get what I mean.”
I shake my head. “Rob. You’ve never spoken about her as a separate person from me. Ever. You know you haven’t. You’ve always believed I’m her, I’m your wife, your original wife, just . . . with different memories. Haven’t you?”
He’s silent for a moment, pressing his lips together. His tell.
“Josie. What do you want me to say? I got nothing. I have no idea what the fuck to think about any of it. What difference does it make?”
“What difference? Are you kidding me?”
The magnitude of this moment is dawning on me.
“I’m now discovering you think of me as an entirely different person to the woman you originally married — a woman who, what, disappeared on the day of my accident?
And yet you proposed to me, and married me!
And, what? You don’t think of me as your first wife? I’m your second wife? I’m Josie 2.0?”
He gets up and paces across the room. Even in the low light, the fire in his eyes is back. Only I can make him angry like this.
“Yes. Okay? YES. Is that what you want to hear? Fuuucckkk . . . Why shouldn’t I believe it?
It’s what you believe. Isn’t it? You don’t think you’re the same person — you think the original Josie is somewhere living your life, as you’re living hers.
Why shouldn’t I think so too? You’ve spent the past year proving to me you’re not the same person, that you’re a different Josie. Why act surprised now? Really, why?”
He’s glaring at me, demanding an answer.
I hesitate, trying to get the words right.
“Because even though I always felt I was betraying her by marrying you, I didn’t know you felt that way too.
But now . . . you can’t tell me you don’t feel you’ve betrayed her by being with me.
If you think of her as separate from me, then for as long as you’ve believed that, you’ve realized you’re being unfaithful.
And you’ve never shared that with me. Not once. ”
“Oh, it’s worse than that. Much worse.” Rob’s even madder now, but I’m beginning to realize he’s as angry at himself as he is at me. Probably more so. “I know you’re a different woman, and I married you anyways. I’m a bigamist.”
He starts at the sound of the word escaping his lips. It hangs in the air, making me nauseated, the cod dangerously close to coming back up again. He’s only saying what I’ve thought myself, many times — but hearing it out loud is shocking.
Rob presses on. He’s on a roll.
“You know what else? I never even grieved the loss of the first Josie. The loss of my wife. Not really. Because I believed, foolishly, stupidly, it would be better with you.”
Rob presses the heels of his hands to his face, and it’s a moment before I realize he is sobbing. His knees buckle, and he collapses to the floor by the chaise. I lean forward and half-catch him in my arms as he crumples at my feet, his head on my thigh.
He’s speaking in gasps now. “And the thing is, we would’ve gotten through it, she and I .
. . our issues, the loss of David, her pain after Hawaii.
We were still okay, deep down. But then you switched places with her and I .
. . abandoned her.” It’s almost a wail, and he finally loses it completely, the build-up of grief coming out after staying stoic all this time.
I hold him in my arms a long time, letting him get it out, sobbing myself, fat tears dripping off my chin. I hold him and hold him.
When the sobs subside, he looks up at me. “It’s not you I’m angry with.” A new tear forms, glinting in the low light.
“I know. I know.” I stroke his black tousled hair. I want to kiss him. Instead I ask, “How long have you felt this way?”
He shrugs. “Honestly, I pretty much believed you from the outset. I knew you were telling your truth, about your old life, but we had agreed you were still the same person, right? That you’d somehow slipped into a different timeline, but not switched.
But you were so different in a lot of ways, and I kept dreaming about the old Josie trying to reach me — I never told you about that. ”
“What? No, you didn’t.”
“I guess I had the strong sense of you being a separate person from early on. But I suppressed it. I distracted myself by falling in love again with this new, seemingly improved Josie. Then we had our incredible weekend on Orcas Island when we got together — and sure, I pretended to myself it was us getting back together, but it felt like getting together for the first time. It was all so great after that — my proposal, our wedding.”
He rubs his eyes, his long lashes clumped with moisture. “Then in Venice, when you said you’d been there before with your Mum . . . That was a gut punch. I knew then, truly knew, I’d remarried a woman who wasn’t my wife.”
He searches my face, but he’s seeing something else.
“It was so freaky with the masks, at the ball. Like, you could’ve been either of my two wives at that moment.
And I knew you felt it too. I was messed up about it, but it turned me on so much, too.
” He winces. “What a cliché I am — turned on by the idea of two identical wives.”
I kiss the top of his head. “None of this is your fault.”
Rob kneels, gathering himself together, taking my face in his hands. “It’s not yours either. You tried to be everything for me. You’ve been trying so hard to live her life, to be her, that it’s so obvious you aren’t.”
He kisses me, the taste of our streaming tears salty on my tongue. He kisses me harder, leaning me back on the chaise, kissing my neck, burying his face in my cleavage, undoing my shirt buttons.
We silently, tearfully make love under the light of the big-screen TV, the words The Lives of Others lit up above our heads.