Schism
For the better part of a week I had been trying to figure out when and how to tell her. The guilt had been wearing away at me. I agonized through a meal at her parents’ home eating an obligatory amount and no more. She had commented on how little I had been eating lately and the thought came to mind to tell her then but I thought better of the spectacle that was sure to erupt.
It was in the evening after an untouched meal that she pressed out of me, or rather pressed me through, what had been weighing on me. I was washing the dishes at the time, as we were in the process of getting a new dishwasher, and she berated me with a slew of complaints culminating in a stern warning that I had better propose to her soon.
I dried my hands on the hand towel that hung below the sink and said that I had been seeing another woman. She dropped back into a chair at the kitchen table as I walked on into my study and shut the door.
Sitting down at my desk I folded open my laptop. The screen came alive and the last bit of work I had open was up. I stared at it for a few moments but my mind was in a stalled state.
She burst in with a frantic look and came to me direct. She was standing over me now and there was little left to do but tolerate the vulgar scene that needed to happen.
“Who is she?”
“Just a woman I met.”
“What’s her name?”
“It’s really not important.”
“Fuck that ‘it’s not important’. I want to know the home wrecker’s name.”
“She’s not the home wrecker. I am.”
“Whatever. Where did you meet her?”
A lie “At a bar.”
“Some drunken whore then.”
A stretch of silence.
“Did you have sex with her?”
“Yes.”
“Well, I hope it was real fucking good because she wasn’t worth it.”
More silence.
“Was it more than once?”
“Yes.”
“I bet she did all sorts of disgusting things with you. That’s why you liked her because she’s a filthy whore that would do whatever you want. What did you do with her?”
“You don’t want to know that.”
“I want to know every detail.”
“No you don’t.”
More silence.
“Well, what’s going to happen then?”
“I’m going to be out of the house for the next few days. I will expect that you’ll be moved out when I get back” I stood up and shut my laptop.
“Two years and this is how it ends?”
“There is money in an envelop in the drawer below the microwave. Use it to hire some movers.”
I left the room and grabbed the bag that had been packed for over a month and stowed away in the back of the closet. She grabbed the sleeve of my University jacket as I reached the front door to leave.
“Where are you going?” Her eyes raw and wet.
“New York, San Francisco, out of the country. I’m not sure yet.”
“You’re going to her.”
It hung for a moment, then I turned and left.
Getting into the black Mercedes, I saw her slumped down on her knees with the front door open, her face in her hands, a curtain of hair closing around the sides. The cold from the outside was getting to her now and her breath puffed out as she blew heavy sobs. I pressed the button to start the car and it hummed quietly. The cold leather creaked from the slide of my jacket as I turned to back out of the driveway. I gave one last look before I pulled away and she sat in the same pose.
