“It’s not—” He pauses, his hands balling into fists. “I know that’s a long time, but it doesn’t mean as much as you think it would. We don’t live together. We hardly see each other. We lived together for the first couple of years, tried to make it work,but realized we needed to live separate lives. I live here and he lives in California.”
That sparks a memory.
“California… so you were with him recently?” I ask, fighting back the bile in my throat.
I hold my breath as I wait for his response. I already know what it’s going to be by the look in his eyes.
“Yes. Sort of. I only saw him for like ten minutes. Franklin has no interest in having a husband.”
“Then why are you still married?”
He huffs a laugh.
“That’s the million-dollar question. One I can’t begin to dig into because I don’t know. I don’t know why I’ve stayed with him this entire time when all he’s done is try to change me and hide me. But more specifically, right now? He’s opening a chain of high-class restaurants and doesn’t want negative attention brought to him by divorcing. I think maybe when we first married, he wanted it, but that didn’t last long.”
“So, you’re separated?”
“Technically, I guess, but neither of us have said that. I’ve been trying for years to fix our marriage. I never gave up on it, but he gave up on it a long time ago, and I didn’t want to see it. The signs are all there. As I look back, I see how much energy I put into him and get nothing in return.”
“What does that mean, exactly?” I ask carefully.
“I’m not happy with him. We shouldn’t be married. It means a lot of things, most of which I haven’t figured out yet.”
“Did you sleep with him when you were in California?”
“No,” he says firmly, slashing his hand through the air. “I can’t remember the last time Franklin and I slept together. Years. More than five, probably. But I’ve hooked up with people over the years. He has, too. It’s like this unspoken thing between us,and—” He sighs. “Speaking this all out loud to you only makes me realize how dumb I am.”
“This is really fucked up, JJ.”
“I know,” he says, his voice softer as he comes to sit beside me. “That’s why I never talked about it. I hate feeling like a failure and like I’m stupid. And pathetic.”
“You’re none of those things,” I say slowly. “You just… want your husband to love you. I mean, you married him for a reason, right?”
“Exactly,” he says, but there isn’t much effort put behind it. I hear in his tone that he isn’t lying. He’s tired of this marriage. “I did, and that’s what I held on to for so long, even though in the back of my mind, I knew we changed. We aren’t the same people, and we should have split a very long time ago. My brother has been trying to get me to see it from the beginning, but I didn’t want to listen.”
I nod, looking at the floor, needing a minute to think about all of this. I saw the signs that JJ had something going on from the first night I met him, but I never imagined it would be this much. It’s a lot. More than I agreed to when I agreed to simple.
“It always felt like you were doing it on purpose,” I finally say, my voice quiet.
“Doing what?”
“Pulling away. Refusing to let yourself be happy.”
He winces just slightly, barely noticeable.
“I’ve never felt like I deserved to be happy. Not after letting my mother die.”
“JJ… no.” I turn to face him, my heart hurting for him. I want to hug him. Squeeze him. Drill into his head that it wasn’t his fault. “No, you can’t think like that. You didn’t let your mother die. You were just a kid. Your father sounds like a fucking maniac, and anyone in their right mind would have done exactly what you did.”
“I just…” He takes a deep breath. “I can never get the look on her face out of my head. The fear and strength. She tried so hard to be strong for us, to act like everything was going to be okay, but we all knew. Even Hollis, who was only seven. He knew something was very wrong, and Nash and I, we just… we couldn’t stop him.” He shakes his head, his eyes welling with tears, but they don’t spill. “Franklin is the only person in my life that I shared that experience with, so I just felt like…”
“Like there was some kind of connection between you two? Something only you two had?”
“I guess, yeah. Something like that. It was too much work to tell someone else, to relive everything that happened to me. And Franklin didn’t use it against me in obvious ways, but I think he did it subtly. I didn’t want to be vulnerable, because Franklin has been hurting me for so long and it felt like opening up would open me up to more pain.”
I take a deep breath and let it out slowly. My head is starting to hurt, and I could use a nap, but at the same time, I don’t want him to leave. I don’t really want to talk anymore either. I’m just so tired. And confused.
“I’m sorry you’ve been dealing with this. But I really wish you would have been honest with me from the beginning.”
