9. Grant
GRANT
I was sitting in the living room. I’d been sitting there for twenty minutes. Maybe longer. The house had nine thousand square feet and I could feel every one of them.
Delia’s half of the closet was emptied out. Not completely. She’d left things. Summer dresses. A coat she didn’t wear anymore. The gaps were worse than if she’d cleared it entirely.
I had the ring in my pocket. I’d been carrying it since Monday.
The house was quiet. I wasn’t doing anything. I wasn’t fixing anything. I was just sitting there.
I stood up. I walked into the kitchen. The table was the same one we’d eaten breakfast at for seven years. I put both hands flat on the surface.
I said it out loud.
“The centennial.”
My voice sounded strange in the empty room.
“I was standing right there. She said Delia’s name and I didn’t turn around.”
I pushed off the table. I walked to the window. The yard was dark.
“Thursday,” I said. “I told her I’d be there and I wasn’t.”
I could see my own reflection in the glass. I looked like hell.
“The message. She sent me her whole heart in under a hundred words and I sent back four lines with Corinne’s name in it.”
I turned away from the window.
“The folder. She found a folder of houses I had someone put together without asking her. On her own savings.”
I said it again. All of it. The centennial. Thursday. The four lines. The houses. I said it to the room because there was nobody else to say it to and I needed to hear it said.
I’d told myself I was fixing it. I’d told myself I was solving the problem. But I’d been the problem for seven years and I’d called it efficiency.
The doorbell rang.
I looked at my watch. It was nearly ten. I wasn’t expecting anyone. I went to the door and opened it.
Corinne was standing on the porch.
She wasn’t wearing bronze. She wasn’t wearing the blazer. She had on jeans and a sweater and her hair was down. I’d never seen her hair down. She looked like someone I didn’t know.
“Grant,” she said. “I’m sorry to just show up.”
I didn’t say anything. I was too surprised to say anything.
“Can I come in?”
I stepped back. It was manners. It wasn’t a decision. She walked past me into the house.
I closed the door. I didn’t move away from it.
“Is everything all right?” I said.
She turned to look at me. Her face was warm. Concerned.
“I was going to ask you the same thing,” she said. “You’ve seemed off this week. And then the message.”
“What message?”
“Routing Memphis through Marcus.” She took a step closer. “That’s not like you.”
I stayed where I was.
“I needed to clear my calendar,” I said. “I told you that in the message.”
“I know.” She tilted her head. “But it’s not just Memphis, is it? You’ve been different. Since Monday.”
“I’m handling it.”
“Grant.” Her voice was soft. “The close needs you. I need you.”
I looked at her. I could feel the ring in my pocket.
“Route Memphis through Marcus for the next two weeks,” I said. “I need to clear my calendar. That’s the boundary.”
She didn’t move. She didn’t step back. She just stood there looking at me.
“All right,” she said. “If that’s what you need.”
She didn’t leave. She walked further into the room. She looked around. Taking it in. The house. My wife’s house.
“This is a beautiful home,” she said.
I didn’t answer.
She turned back to me. The warmth was still there. The concern.
“How’s Delia?” she said.
“She’s fine.”
“I’m glad.” Corinne smiled. “She’s lovely, Grant. Really. I meant that when I said it.”
I didn’t say anything.
“It can’t have been easy,” she said. “Being married to a woman like that. In a life like yours.”
I heard it.
I heard the sweetness and I heard the blade inside it. I’d never heard it before in my life.
“What are you doing?” I said.
“I’m saying she’s lovely.” Her voice was still warm.
Still kind. “But I also know what it’s like to live the life you live.
The hours. The pressure. The decisions that don’t wait.
And I know she doesn’t understand that world.
She can’t. It’s not her fault. But you need someone who speaks the language you speak. ”
She took another step toward me.
“You need someone who knows what a signature means,” she said. “Someone who understands what you’ve built. What you carry. She’ll never understand that, Grant. She’ll never be able to give you that.”
I was looking at something I’d never seen before. The professional persona was gone. The polish was still there but it was wrapped around something cold.
“She was always going to leave,” Corinne said.
I stared at her.
“That’s not jealousy,” she said. “It’s just true. The marriage was badly built. You had to know that. I think you did know it. And I’m the first person honest enough to say it out loud.”
She was close now. Close enough to touch me.
“I’m not trying to hurt you,” she said. “I’m trying to help you see it clearly. She couldn’t stay in your life, Grant. Not the real one. And now she’s made the choice and you’re free.”
She reached for me. She put her hands on my chest.
I took her by the wrists.
I pushed her away from me. I held her there at the length of my arms. I’m a large man. I didn’t hurt her. There was nothing gentle about it either.
I felt sick.
“You need to leave,” I said.
She looked at me. Her face didn’t change.
“Grant.”
“Now,” I said.
I let go of her wrists. I stepped back. I wanted her out of my house. I wanted her out of the room my wife should have been standing in.
“I love my wife,” I said.
Corinne didn’t move.
“I loved her before we were married,” I said.
“I loved her when I didn’t have any reason to think she’d marry me.
She was trying to save the Ashbury. She was fighting the city and the developers and she was doing it alone.
I went to the rink one morning. Early. Before anyone else was there.
I sat in the stands and I watched her skate for an hour. ”
I could see it. I could see her. The ice. The empty building. The way she moved.
“There was no audience,” I said. “Nothing to sell. Nothing to win. She was just skating because that’s who she is. And I sat there and watched her and I didn’t move. I didn’t check my phone. I didn’t think about anything else. I just sat still.”
My voice cracked.
“I want to be the man who could sit still,” I said. “I want to get back to him. And I love her. I love my wife.”
I said it to Corinne because she was the last person on earth who wanted to hear it. I said it because it was the only thing that mattered.
Corinne’s face changed. Not much. Just enough.
“I see,” she said.
She walked past me to the door. She let herself out. She didn’t say anything else.
I stood there. Then I walked to my office. I sat down at the desk. I opened my laptop.
I wrote the email to Marcus. I copied legal. Corinne Sayer’s access to Falkner was revoked effective immediately. Her role on the account was ended on my side. Every remaining fund contact went through Marcus. No exceptions.
I didn’t write it to her. I wrote it to Marcus. Irreversible and instant.
I sent it. I closed the laptop.
Then it came back. All of it.
The folder she’d put together at 4:41 in the morning. For reference only. I’d thought it was efficient. It was an invasion.
The email about the build specs. The one I hadn’t asked for. I’d thought she was being thorough. She was inserting herself into my marriage.
And the phone call.
She’d called me. She’d said she was worried the rink comment had landed wrong.
That she’d called it a passion project. And I’d reassured her.
I’d told her Delia was tougher than that.
I’d agreed it was nine employees and a municipal lease.
I’d defended my wife by diminishing her work.
And then I’d thanked Corinne for being thoughtful.
She’d fired the shot and then she’d called to see if it landed.
And I’d thanked her.
At the centennial I’d been standing three feet from Delia. I’d heard Corinne say her name. I’d heard the tone. I must have heard the tone. And I’d done nothing. I hadn’t turned around. I hadn’t stepped toward my wife. I’d just stood there.
I’d stood there while someone took a shot at the woman I loved and I’d done nothing.
My legs went out.
I hit the floor. My back hit the desk. I couldn’t breathe.
I pulled my knees up. I put my head down. The air wouldn’t come.
I’d let her in. I’d let Corinne into every corner of my life and I’d called it work. I’d stood next to my wife and heard the blade and I’d done nothing. And Delia had watched me do nothing. She’d watched me choose nothing. She’d watched me choose Corinne.
I pressed the heels of my hands into my eyes.
I couldn’t breathe.
The ring was still in my pocket.
Delia was gone.
And I’d done it to myself.