Unexpectedly, Milo - Matthew Dicks [116]
“So you’re separated from you wife, huh? How did that happen?”
“Excuse me?” Milo asked. “How did it happen?”
“I’m not asking which moving company you chose, Milo. I’m wondering what happened to the marriage. What’s the problem?”
“Oh,” Milo said, startled by the question. “I guess it’s a lot of things. It’s hard to say that there’s just one problem.”
“Really? I don’t know about that.”
“What do you mean? You don’t believe me?”
“It’s not that I don’t believe you. It’s just that I think you’ve probably got it wrong.”
“How would you know?” Milo asked, finding himself both angry at Emma’s statement and curious about her possible explanation.
“I just do. I’ve had plenty of friends who have gone through divorce, and the one thing that I’ve learned is that most divorces can be distilled down to a single problem. The list of possible problems is long, but in the end, it can usually be summed up in one word.”
“Well, I don’t know if I agree with you. And even if I did, I wouldn’t know what word to choose,” Milo said, already hunting for one as he spoke.
“Okay, let me try,” Emma said with a level of enthusiasm that made Milo uncomfortable. “Did you cheat on your wife?”
“No.”
“Did she cheat on you?”
The question brought up images of Thick-Neck Phil sitting in his Jeep, eyes hidden behind sunglasses, but again Milo answered in the negative.
“Who asked for the divorce?”
“We’re not divorced,” Milo shot back. “We’re separated.” Even though he was wavering between trying to hold on to his marriage and giving up entirely (with giving up having taken a commanding lead), he found himself suddenly and inexplicably defensive when confronted with Emma’s assumption that he and Christine had already divorced.
“Sorry. Separated, then. Who asked for the separation?”
“Christine did, but when I left, she was upset. She didn’t expect me to find an apartment and sign a lease.”
“What did she expect?”
“She was looking for a break. A couple weeks apart. But I guess she did too good a job convincing me that we needed to make a clean split, because I went full-on with my plans when all she wanted me to do was take a sleeping bag over to a friend’s house for a while.”
“Not a lot of communication going on between the two of you, huh?”
“I guess not,” Milo admitted. “It had gotten … I don’t know. Abrasive between us. Like sandpaper on sandpaper.”
“But she brought up the separation first. Right?”
“Yes.” Even though Milo wasn’t comfortable with the personal nature of Emma’s questions, he knew that the conversation was keeping his mind off of other things. Things he was trying not to think about.
“And you would’ve never left if she hadn’t brought it up first. Right?”
“Yes.”
“Okay,” Emma said in a now we’re getting somewhere tone. “So your wife had the problem, then. Was it money?”
“No. I mean, we’re not rich, but we were doing fine, and we never fought about money if that’s what you mean.”
“Did she abuse drugs or alcohol?”
“No.”
“Did you?”
“Would you be driving to Connecticut with me if you thought I did?” Milo asked, jumping at the opportunity to break her rhythm.
“Good point. Was she bored?”
“What do you mean, was she bored?”
“The fact that you didn’t answer no probably means that she was. Did you guys run out of things to talk about? Did life get too routine for her? Did she start changing her behavior in any way?”
Yes, yes, yes! Milo wanted to scream. Yes, we ran out of things to say, but only because she stopped trying. Yes, she changed her behavior. She started exercising as if it were a religion. She started going to happy hour on Thursdays and Fridays and staying out later than normal. Now she’s hanging out with Thick-Neck Phil from work and riding around in Jeep convertibles. Yes! Yes! Yes!
Instead, Milo said, “Yes. There were changes in her behavior.”
“New hobbies? New clothes? New friends? Staying out late?”
“Some of those things,” Milo admitted, wondering how this woman could possibly be reading his mind.