Heart of the Matter - Emily Giffin [114]
And now I’m about to find out; I am watching myself again.
I discover that I do not cry. I do not shout. I do not fall apart or crack at all. I keep my voice low, thinking of my children upstairs in the playroom, knowing that this will be a day that they will someday ask about, wondering what I will tell them. I think of my mother—then my father—then my mother again. I think of the fights I overheard and the ones I never knew about. Then I stand, straight and tall, and tell him to leave.
“Please,” he says, a word that doesn’t soften me, but rather, fills me with hate. Hate that gives me strength. This is not the way it’s supposed to be, I think. Hate is not supposed to make you strong. But that is what it is doing.
“Go,” I say just as it occurs to me that I would rather be the one to leave, that I want to be alone, out of this house. That if I stay, maybe my strength will expire. Maybe I’ll collapse on the kitchen floor and won’t be able to microwave the chicken nuggets or sit through the Charlie Brown Christmas special with the kids that I’ve promised they can watch. That the sight of Linus, encircling that scrawny tree with his blue blanket, will be too much for me to bear.
“Get out now,” I say.
“Tessa,” he says.
“Now,” I say. “I can’t stand to look at you.”
Then I step away from him, backing up slowly, as if keeping a close eye on my enemy. The only enemy I’ve ever had. I watch him put his scarf back on, throwing it over his neck, as I flash back to the day we met on the subway, the day I knew that marrying Ryan—sweet, simple Ryan—was a mistake. And the irony of that, the irony of thinking I was saved by Nick, slashes through me, along with profound regret. Regret for every single thing about our life together. Our first date, our wedding day, our move to Boston, our home and everything in it, down to the dustiest can of lentil soup in the back of our cupboard.
Then, for a fleeting second, I even regret our children—a thought that fills me with intense guilt and grief and even more hatred for the person I once loved more than anyone. I silently take it back, frantically telling God that I didn’t mean it, that Ruby and Frank are the only right decisions I’ve ever made. The only things I have left.
“I’m sorry,” he says, looking bereaved, wilted, lost. “I will do anything to fix this.”
“There is nothing you can do,” I say. “This cannot be fixed.”
“Tessa—it is over with her . . .”
“It is over with us, Nick,” I say. “There is no us . . . Now get out.”
38
Valerie
She starts to hail a cab back to work, but decides to walk instead, hoping that the cold will numb her heart right along with the rest of her. But by the time her office building is in sight, she knows that the strategy hasn’t worked, not even close. She considers going back inside, if only to turn off her computer and retrieve her briefcase full of documents she needs for an early morning meeting, but she can’t bear the thought of seeing anyone, certain that they would be able to see right through her, somehow tell that her heart had just been broken. Poor Valerie, they will say to one another, the news making its rapid rounds among partners and associates alike. She just can’t seem to catch a break.
So she heads for her car, parked on the fourth floor of the parking garage, listening to the echo of her boots on the cement floor. Her gloveless fingers are so stiff that she has difficulty unlocking her door, and wonders if she could actually have frostbite. It is the sort of question she would have posed to Nick only days ago—how do you know if you’re frostbitten?—not just because it’s a vaguely medical inquiry, but because she had begun to discuss nearly everything with him, down to the smallest minutiae of her day. And the thought that she will never be able to call him again—for reasons big or small—takes her breath away.
She shivers, then slides into her car and starts the engine, staring ahead at the dingy cinder-block wall, coming in and out of focus. After a while, she stops blinking back the tears, her vision growing more