Chương 15
“I wasn’t trying to lie just now. I forgot.”
He watched her.
“Trust makes small mistakes feel different now.”
“I know.”
“That’s not fair to either of us.”
“No.”
Daniel rubbed his hands together.
“Why that apartment?”
Rachel looked at the wall.
“It was cheaper.”
“That’s all?”
“Yes.”
“No school reason?”
“No.”
“No plan to move farther?”
“No.”
He nodded.
Rachel studied him.
“You believe me?”
“I’m choosing to.”
“That sounds horrible.”
“It feels horrible.”
She laughed softly.
Daniel continued.
“I also found pictures from the week before my mother died.”
Rachel waited.
He looked at his hands.
“I looked terrible.”
“You did.”
“I thought I was holding it together.”
“You weren’t.”
He nodded.
“There’s one of me sleeping at the kitchen table.”
Rachel remembered.
“I took that because Noah wanted proof you snored.”
Daniel looked up.
“I don’t snore.”
Rachel stared at him.
He smiled.
“Fine.”
She almost smiled too.
Daniel’s expression changed.
“I was not easy to live with.”
Rachel said nothing.
“I keep trying to decide whether that sentence matters.”
“It matters.”
“It doesn’t excuse you.”
“No.”
“It doesn’t make us equal.”
“No.”
“Then why does it matter?”
Rachel looked at him.
“Because if we stay married, I don’t want to go back to the marriage where I did those things.”
Daniel absorbed that.
He looked toward the dresser.
His mother’s necklace sat inside a small locked jewelry case. Both he and Rachel knew the code.
“Do you want to stay married?”
Rachel stared at the blanket.
“I want to find out if I want to.”
Daniel nodded slowly.
“That’s a terrible answer.”
“I know.”
He almost smiled.
She looked at him.
“What about you?”
Daniel looked toward the hallway.
He could hear Noah arguing with Emily about whose turn it was to choose a book.
“I want the answer to be yes.”
Rachel’s eyes filled.
“That’s not the same as yes.”
“No.”
“Why?”
Daniel thought about it.
“Because right now part of me wants to stay because leaving would scare the kids. Part of me wants to stay because I still love you. Part of me wants to leave because every time I see that necklace I feel stupid.”
“You weren’t stupid.”
“I trusted you.”
“That isn’t stupid.”
“It feels stupid.”
Rachel’s mouth tightened.
Daniel continued.
“And part of me wants to punish you by leaving before you can decide whether you want me.”
Rachel looked at him.
There it was.
Ugly.
Not noble.
True.
Rachel said, “Thank you for saying that.”
“I don’t want credit.”
“I’m not giving you credit.”
“Good.”
“I think part of me wants you to leave so I can stop waiting for you to decide whether I’m forgivable.”
Daniel looked at her.
“That’s ugly too.”
“Yes.”
They sat with it.
No speeches.
No embrace.
No sudden understanding.
A child laughed in the hallway.
A toilet flushed.
The air-conditioning turned on.
Rachel rubbed a loose thread on the comforter.
Daniel watched headlights from a passing car move across the ceiling.
Finally he said, “We should sleep.”
Rachel nodded.
Daniel stood.
At the doorway she said, “You can sleep here if you want.”
He turned.
Rachel added quickly, “Sleep. That’s all.”
Daniel looked at the bed.
Then at her.
“Not yet.”
Her face registered disappointment and relief at the same time.
“Okay.”
He returned to the sofa.
A week after the photograph broke, Daniel came home to find Rachel sitting on the living room floor with Emily.
The family picture was back on the console.
New glass.
Same frame.
Emily was building something from cardboard.
Daniel loosened his tie.
“What is that?”
Emily held up a crooked structure covered in silver duct tape.
“A house.”
Daniel looked toward Noah.
His son was at the dining table doing homework.
“Where did she get the tape?”
Noah did not look up.
“Legal channels.”
Daniel smiled.
Rachel glanced at him.
The smile between them still arrived cautiously.
He crossed the room.
Emily held up the cardboard house.
“It has a basement.”
Rachel froze for half a second.
Daniel noticed.
Emily did not.
“No secrets in this one,” Emily said.
Daniel crouched beside her.
“Good rule.”
Rachel looked at him.
He looked back.
Neither pretended the rule had always existed.
Later, after the children slept, Rachel placed the blue notebook on the kitchen island.
Daniel stopped.
“What’s that?”
“You know what it is.”
“Yes.”
Rachel rested one hand on the cover.
“I want to show you one page.”
“Why?”
“Because I think it matters.”
Daniel waited.
Rachel opened near the middle.
The page contained no financial plan.
No apartment listing.
Just a date from ten months earlier and three sentences.
Daniel looked at Rachel.
“You want me to read it?”
“Yes.”
He lowered his eyes.
I don’t want to leave him.
I want to stop disappearing inside this marriage.
I don’t know if those are the same problem.
Daniel read it twice.
He looked up.
Rachel’s face was frightened in a quiet way.
“When did you write this?”
“The night after the funeral.”
He touched nothing.
“You said you stopped planning after she died.”
“I did.”
“This was after.”
“This wasn’t a plan.”
Daniel looked at the words again.
Rachel closed the notebook.
“That’s all I wanted you to see.”
“Why?”
“Because you asked if I want to stay.”
Daniel waited.
Rachel’s fingers tightened around the blue cover.
“I still don’t know.”
He nodded.
“But I think I know what I don’t want.”
“What?”
“I don’t want to disappear.”
Daniel leaned against the counter.
“You shouldn’t.”
“You say that now.”
“Yes.”
Rachel looked at him.
“I need you to understand that you don’t get to fix this by becoming agreeable for two weeks.”
“I know.”
“You don’t get to ask permission before every sentence until I tell you you’re cured.”
“I know.”
“You’re already starting to do it.”
Daniel frowned.
“Do what?”
“Monitor yourself so hard that I have to monitor you monitoring yourself.”
May you like
He stared at her.
“That is the most exhausting thing anyone has ever said to me.”
