I turn on my heels, facing the door as the sound of someone coming up the stairs brings me back to today. Six years later, that night is just a distant memory.
The door to my bedroom opens wide, creaking as it does and revealing my father. I haven’t seen him like this in a long damn time.
His hair’s been gray for a while, but it’s just a bit too long and thinner. With the deep wrinkles around his eyes and only wearing a T-shirt and flannel pants, he looks older and frailer than I remember. Beaten down. Just a few years can change everything. Has it been that long since I really looked at him?
“You getting comfortable in here?” Pops asks me as he walks in and takes a look at the dresser. He runs a hand along it and then makes a face as he turns his hand over and sees the dust there. As he wipes his hand on the flannel pajamas he adds, “It’s about time you came back to clean your room.”
A rough chuckle barely makes its way up my chest.
“When are you moving out of this place?” I ask him jokingly.
“When I’m dead and gone,” my father answers me the same way he has for years now. Ever since Ma passed, I’ve wanted him to move. He won’t, though, and I can’t blame him.
“Good thing I’m not in a nursing home. Don’t think you’d like to crash there, would you?”
I give him a tight smile, feeling nothing but shame. I run my hand through my hair searching for some sort of an explanation, but I can’t lie to my father and I don’t want to tell him the truth. So I don’t say anything and stare past him instead.
The silence is thick between us until he speaks, glancing around the room rather than looking at me.
“I messed up before with your mother, you know. She kicked me out. I thought it was over.” My father flicks on the light and stalks slowly toward the bed, ignoring the fact that I just wanted to pass out and try to sleep. As if I’d be able to in this room.
“I was younger than you, though. By the time I was your age, we’d had you. I’d settled down and stopped being stupid.”
“What’d you do?” I ask my father out of genuine curiosity. I’d never seen anything but love from my parents. They never fought in front of me and the one time I came home early, catching them in the heat of a fight, they stopped immediately.
Later that night, when I was sitting in front of the TV, cross-legged and way too close, all I could hear was him apologizing in the kitchen. It’d been quiet all afternoon and night.
“I don’t want you to go to bed mad at me,” I heard him tell her.
It was the only fight I’d ever witnessed and I remember being scared that he’d done something that Ma wasn’t going to forgive.
But she did. I never asked back then, and I’m sure if I did he wouldn’t remember. This fight he’s talking about obviously isn’t that.
“What do you think I did?” he answers me. “We were young and stupid and had a bad fight over money or something. I got drunk, kissed a girl at a bar … went back to her place. I felt like shit about it and she smacked me right across the face too.” He smirks at the memory. “She beat the hell out of me. Kicked me out.” The smile falls and he shakes his head as he adds, “I deserved it.”
“I can’t imagine you ever doing that.”
“I loved your mother. I was angry at her over something stupid, I can’t even remember what.”
The silence stretches between us again as he struggles to come up with what to say next. “I proposed to her a few months after we got back together.” A huff of a laugh leaves him and he adds, “God rest her soul,” as he twists the wedding band around his ring finger. He’s never taken it off. For the same reason he’ll never leave this house.
He still needs her. Even if it’s just the memory of her.
“The point is, we all make mistakes,” he says and then squares his shoulders at me, raising both of his hands and shaking them, “when we’re young and allowed to be stupid.”
“I’m not that old,” I tell him half-heartedly, trying to play it all off. I know what he’s getting at, but I don’t need to be lectured. I’m well aware of how stupid I’ve been. He’s the one who has no idea how badly I’ve fucked up. “I’ll fix it, Pops.”
The silence drags on again and all I can think about is every position I’ve put myself in where not being faithful to my wife would have been the easy thing to do. I focus on that truth and not the night that still haunts me.
“What are you doing, Evan?” my father asks as I dump my bag on the bed. “You’ve fucked up more than you should have. You’re too old to be carrying on like this.”
My initial reaction is to bite back that he’s wrong. That he has no idea what’s going on. But it wouldn’t matter.
I nod my head and let the strap from the bag fall off my shoulder. “Yeah, I know.”
“You need to make this right,” he tells me, holding my gaze and pointing a finger at me.
I swallow thickly, knowing he’s right. But I haven’t got a clue how to make this better. I can’t take back what’s been done.
I’m fucked.
“Yeah, I know.”
Kat
Just get it over with,
Tell me that we’re done.
Leave me to this madness,
I accept that you have won.
You’ve broken me to pieces,
Left me numb and blind.
Made me only yours—
I’ve completely lost my mind.
“I need a distraction, that’s what I need.” I speak the words on my mind without realizing it. It gets the attention of both Maddie and Jules and that’s when I realize I’ve said anything at all. Cue swallowing down another sip of wine.
We’ve been here in Jules’s house helping her unpack for at least two hours now, and everyone’s been kind enough to not only not ask about what’s going on between Evan and me, but to not treat me like I’m some wounded animal either.
That’s what friends are for, although the girls do seem to be walking on eggshells around me. I’m grateful, but I need to talk and have someone sift through this mess and give me a straight answer as to what I should do.
I roll my eyes at the thought. I’m a grown woman. I should know what to do and make the decision with certainty. But I’ve never felt so uncertain in my life.
“A distraction?” Jules questions, a little more pep in her tone than she’s had all night.
“That makes sense,” Maddie says and nods her head as she takes out a picture frame, wrapped in thick brown packing paper. She’s careful with it as she removes the wrapping and exposes the pristine silver frame. “Distractions are a good thing,” she adds with a small nod. “Sometimes.”
I don’t know what photo is already nestled inside of the frame, but whatever it is, it makes her smile. I can only imagine it’s a wedding photo … I lift the glass to my lips again.
“I can’t go home to the townhouse with all his things and our things and every reminder of everything …” Pausing to take in a lungful of air, I try to steady myself then add, “Let alone go to sleep in the same bed we’ve had together for forever.”