My hand shakes for a moment when I reach for it.No good can come from this, Audra, my inner voice warns.I know,I yell back petulantly.
Both Pete's laptop and phone are gone, either with the police or… who knows where. But Pete was techno-obsessed. All hisdevices were Apple, and all of them were synced to each other. I know all the passwords, codes, and PIN numbers by heart.
Whatever I expected to find, there is nothing there. I browse through his emails, texts, and calendar. The only thing the calendar yields is the place, date and time of Pete's vasectomy. Everything else is open as a book. Meetings, appointments, birthdays, the usual.
"Oh, fuck you, Pete." I throw the tablet in with the rest of his stuff in the box. Even his pillow is in there. In the end, there is no trace of Pete left in this house. Not that I want to live here. Eventually, I'll have to come back for Mom's and my stuff, but this was… cathartic.
More boxes arrive right on cue. Apparently, Gabe is not only watching me, but reading my mind as well.
I call Mom, tell her I'll be back tonight, and that I'm thinking about selling the house.
"Perfect. I like it here. Do you think Gabe will let me use more than one room?"
I don't respond, because what is there to say? The moment I bring up finding a new place, she'll just get all bent out of shape, and I'm not ready for that conversation, especially not over the phone.
I've barely come to terms with the idea of giving Gabe and me a chance. Talking to Jenna and Violet helped. Hearing that Jenna, too, jumped from widowhood to remarriage, not giving a damn what other people thought… it opened something in me.
In a way, my mom was right. What do I care what other people say or think? The only people who matter are Gabe and me. My mom is important to me, of course, but I already know where she stands on this. Then there are Kelly and Maggie. I love them, and I want their approval and friendship, as I have from the moment I met them, but do I need it? No. Neither doesit really matter what my friend Annette thinks. My only friend. How pathetic is that? And why have I never thought about this?
What happened to my life? I used to have lots of friends. They came easy to me. People liked me. Now? Annette is my only claim to friendship outside of family.
I can see myself getting closer with Jenna, not just because of what we have in common, but because she is a very warm and interesting person that I'd love to get to know better. Same with Violet, even if she is on the East Coast. More than all that, though, I can see myself getting closer to Gabe, a lot closer. Not because of the sex or the money, although they help, but because, despite the fact that he's a cold-blooded killer that some people might call a sociopath, he's shown me more consideration in the short time I've known him than Pete did in six years.
It would be so easy for him to force me to stay with him; he could easily pick me up or send his men. The fact that he hasn't, that he's grudgingly giving me the space I need right now, tells me a lot about the man he is.
I don't think he'd ever lie to me the way Pete did. It wasn't just the lie; it was the omission, the way his decision affected both our lives. I don't think I would have married him had he told me that he would get a vasectomy. I wanted—want—kids. I've always seen myself with a bunch of them in the future, something Pete knew. During the first couple of years, when we… when I was still hopeful, he even talked about his plans to take our kids to soccer practice. To throw a baseball with our son, to attend our daughter's dance recital, and that wasafterhe got the vasectomy. How fucked up is that?
I realize that Mom has been talking the entire time, not noticing that my mind had drifted.
"How could he do that?" I ask Mom quietly.
Mom stops, thrown off by my interruption. "Do what?"
"That lie," I whisper. "All of it. The doctors. The vasectomy. Why wouldn't he tell me?"
My voice cracks. Because that's the part I can't get past. Not the decision. The lie. The fact that the man I thought I knew and loved… deceived me like that.
"How could he sit there," I continue, my throat tightening, "and watch me cry every time I got my period?" My hands are starting to shake. "How could he saylet's try again—" my voice breaks completely, "—when he knew?—"
I can't finish it. I don't have the air. I don't have the strength. Mom exhales, like this is all very simple to her.
"Men," she shares her wisdom, "are unreliable creatures."
I stare at the phone.
"That's it?" I ask, incredulous. "That's all you have to say?"
"What do you want me to say?" she counters. "That he was perfect? He wasn't. He lied to you. Big deal."
Big deal?
"He made a decision about my life," I spell it out for her since she doesn't seem to want to get it. "About my body."
"And he did it because he thought it was best," she shrugs. "Men do that."
I shake my head slowly. "No. That's not?—"
"He was weak," she cuts in. "That's the problem."
