The last secret_ a novel - Mary McGarry Morris [79]
“Ken!” she whispers, pausing on the step, stunned. “Don't you know how uncomfortable I'd feel? Think about it.”
“Well that's your problem, then, isn't it?” he says, with a hateful-ness she hasn't heard before.
“No!” she hisses, trying to be quiet. The children are in their rooms but still awake. “It's yours, because you did this. You're the one! You did this to me!”
Trembling, he starts back down the stairs. “I don't know how the hell much more of this I can take,” he shouts.
“What does that mean? What're you saying? What're you, threatening me?” she demands, following him. He stalks outside, slamming the door in her face.
Drew charges into the kitchen in his boxers and T-shirt.
“Let him go!” he explodes, fists clenched. “If that's what he wants, the bastard. No-good son of a bitch. Let him go live with them, his other family. Who the fuck cares!”
She feels dizzy. Moments ago, such peace, to this. Her chest hurts. Her head is pounding. His other family.
By the time Ken returns, an hour later, a tearful, shivering Chloe has finally left Nora's room, where she's been begging her mother not to break up their family. Daddy is sorry for his mistakes; she knows, because he told her so himself.
“When?” Nora asked, stunned. “When did he tell you that?”
“I don't know, a while ago.”
“No, Chloe. When? You tell me when! Exactly when.”
“Last summer. I think.” Chloe cringed with the guilt of her secret.
“Last summer? He told you? He … what? Just came out with it?”
“I asked him. I had a feeling. So I asked him.”
What about me? You knew for months and never said anything. Why? Your own mother, why didn't you tell me? she wanted to ask, but couldn't, seeing her daughter's misery.
“He wants us to still be a family, that's all he cares about, Mom, please. Please,” Chloe sobbed.
Her daughter's message is clear, keeping them whole is up to Nora. It all rests on her. All her responsibility and, somehow, her fault should the marriage end. So, even they knew before she did, her own children, conspirators in their silence, their conflicted loyalty. And that, for her, is unforgivable. His last betrayal. The rupture is complete. Deadening, and oddly painless. Ken doesn't come upstairs. He sleeps in the study. She hears Drew's door open, the creak of floorboards. She slips out of bed and listens from the top of the stairs. She can barely hear them. Ken seems to be repeating a litany of denials.
“I don't believe you,” Drew keeps saying. Then, finally: “You're a liar!”
You all are, she realizes. Every one of you.
They're too loose, Nora thinks, turning the rings on her finger. Hard to keep weight on without an appetite.
“The baby's better,” the young woman says, coming into the conference room and sitting down. “One of those GI things.”
Nora looks up blankly. And then remembers. Their last visit ended when one of the staff knocked on the door with Alice's feverish child in her arms. Father Grewley is worried about Alice. Something's going on with her, he said in his call.
“That's good,” Nora says. She can't remember if it's a boy or girl. Like so much else, pointless to ask, and besides, as if entering a confessional, the young woman needs no prodding. She knows why she's here, to recount what misery has brought her to Sojourn House. If she wants their help, this is the price she pays, the shocking, painful truth, no secrets, no privacy or pride, her story repeated so many times now, the facts by rote, to caseworkers, therapists, mentors, volunteers, potential donors, that it might as well be someone else's. Emotionless. Worn down until there's nothing left, Nora thinks, twirling her rings easily over the first knuckle, then down again. She shouldn't wear them like this, she's going to lose them, as if it matters, as if anyone cares.
“Every time, it was money,” the young woman says, and Nora glances up. Is that a dig? She means her, doesn't she, the platinum-set diamond rings, the cashmere sweater set, and alligator purse. Of course she does. She's thinking how she could pay two or three months' rent with what