I’d love to read about Cinderella negotiating her taxes or Belle debating on whose turn it is to make dinner because you each have to work late. And forget about the big-ticket items, like when you decide as a couple to never have children, and then he knocks up his assistant. On purpose. Because they’re in love.
My eyes narrow, and he gulps.
For a split second, I wonder if he’s remembering that moment too, in the kitchen, when he told me. I’d spent my day in the garden, and when I came inside, sweating but smiling, he just blurted out, “I want a divorce,” followed by, “I’m in a relationship with Poppy.”
I can feel the deep breath I take as I stare at him, and the memory takes over.
“What? What are you talking about…Poppy, your assistant? You’re sleeping with her?”
“Don’t make this harder on yourself by asking silly questions.”
I shake my head, feeling as if up is down and down is sideways. The feeling of the floor falling out from under you isn’t easy to describe, but it’s as shocking as one could imagine.
“You’re having an affair? With…”
“Poppy.”
I hear myself laugh, but I don’t feel it.
“Don’t look at me like that,” he admonishes. “It’s not fair. You act as if I cheated on you.”
I grip the counter behind me, feeling my nails scrape over the concrete he insisted upon. Why do I suddenly feel out of breath?
“Jeffrey,” I level. “Sleeping with another person while married is the exact definition of cheating.”
His head draws back as if I’ve offended him.
“Unbelievable. You’re villainizing me because you can’t understand the nuance. This is why we were never going to work, Margot. We’ve wasted twenty years, and I deserve to be happy. I’m in love with Poppy, so I never cheated on you. How could I? You stopped being my person six months ago—”
I stopped…I stopped being his person. I didn’t stop anything. He’s still speaking, but I’m not really hearing anything until “—I went where my heart called. And honestly, I guess I’d rather you hear it from me, but…we’re pregnant.”
All I remember after that moment is the sound of the faucet and how it kept dripping. That night, after he left, I took the whole sink apart. We’d both complained about it for months and had been meaning to call someone to fix it.
But in that moment, I needed to do it. It had to be fixed.
Somewhere around 2:00 a.m., I dried myself off from the tears and the water before settling into what I now know was the third stage of grief—anger.
Because that’s what I was doing, grieving. Our marriage was dead. It had been murdered by the price of a partially balding, Porsche-driving, middle-aged man’s insecurities. Small men cheat, and that’s not a reference to dick size.
It’s funny, of all the tools lying around that kitchen floor, anger was the most helpful. Because it helped me go about dismantling his whole life.
After all,I deserved to be happy, to quote my husband.
Happy with half his money, assets, and retirement fund. At least that was the plan before the lawyers decided we neededmostof his money, assets, and retirement fund.
He should really thank me because nowPoppycan prove she loves him for his smile, not his money, like she swore in the first place.
I’ll never get over the fact that she’s named after a probiotic soda that makes you shit your pants if you have too many. On the upside, a few years together should feel like chronic IBS.
I grin, still staring into his eyes, finally answering my sister.
“Yes, pinched up is exactly what his face looks like.”
Jeffrey’s brows draw together before he gets to signing, but I lick my lips, letting his annoyance wash over me like I’m a pig in shit.
I will say, there was a voice inside my head this morning who told me to make room for the possibility of more grief, should I feel it. And still I’m prepared, but I don’t feel any.
We’ve spent a year nitpicking every piece of salt owned between us. I also spent six months in twice-weekly therapy sessions, which is why I’m at the seventh stage of grief—acceptance.
