CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Pulling into the driveway that afternoon, I noticed the lack of a mystery car in front of my house. Sean had gone. That was good.
I ate something and then went to take a nap, arranging all my pillows to support my back and my belly. I could imagine Jonas calling it my nest. The fact that my four-month belly needed support was a testament to just how out of whack your lower back can get when it’s trying to expand.
I woke up to see the orange sunlight slanting through my windows. The sun was going down and I hadn’t eaten dinner. I should do that. I’d been functioning that way a lot over the past two months. I would remind myself that this was the time of day that I usually showered, or ate, or checked the mail. And then I would force myself to go through the motions of doing that thing.
So I got up and went out to the kitchen.
Sean was there—cooking.
I wasn’t sure how he had gotten in. Had I not locked the front door? And why was he here now? He’d been gone when I got home from work. I’d assumed he’d be gone for good after the way I’d welcomed him.
He glanced up and gave me a tentative smile, one I didn’t return because I was too busy trying to make sense of this situation.
“Are you feeling any better?” he asked.
I tilted my head, examining him for several seconds. “Why are you still here?”
“You didn’t tell me to go.”
“It was implied.”
He shrugged, and stirred. “I try not to rely on implication too much. Are you hungry?”
I didn’t answer.
“If you’re angry, you can just say so,” he said. And it was in that same clear tone he had used before. No sarcasm. No bite. Just matter-of-fact. Like confessing all your deep-rooted feelings was easy.
I didn’t answer.
He stirred a little more, looking up at me to see if I would say anything. I didn’t.
“Congratulations on the baby,” he said with a tentative smile.
“Thanks. I always wanted to have a fatherless child.” What was wrong with me? What was it about Sean’s presence that turned me into this nasty person?
He blinked. “I was a fatherless child.”
“And I was motherless. Neither of us stood a chance.”
He set the spoon down, carefully, deliberately, then turned to face me fully. “Stood a chance at what?”
I didn’t know. The truth was that I was just being belligerent. I was angry—so angry—for all the ways he’d hurt me.
But while that was true, I was also rational enough to consider that maybe it wasn’t all about the way he had hurt me. Maybe it was about Jonas dying. Probably. I didn’t know. I just knew that I hurt. Because of Sean. Because of Jonas. There was so much pain.
And pain.
And painpainpainpainpain.
And I couldn’t separate one pain from the other. I couldn’t dissect the pain of losing Jonas from the leftover pain from years of Sean using me. Not while I was busy drowning in it.
When I remained silent and stone-faced, he picked the spoon back up and pushed the scrambled eggs onto two plates. Each one already had cut-up avocado on them. “I’ll be honest,” he said. “I don’t know how to make much, but hopefully you can stomach this.” He pushed a plate across the counter to me.
It smelled good, but I couldn’t seem to pick up the fork.
“Or I’m happy to go pick something up for you. Or order something,” he offered.
I needed to eat now, otherwise I would end up feeling sick again. This food was ready and waiting, and though the raging, vicious part of me wanted to throw it back at him, my better self prevailed, and I picked up the fork and started to eat.
The breath that he let out was audible, but I ignored it. I should have said thank you, but I didn’t, because my world was suddenly upside down and backwards.
We ate in silence, which he didn’t try to fill. When I stood to put my plate in the sink, he finally spoke.
“So, I was hoping maybe I could stay for a while, help out.”
I breathed methodically as I watched the water run over my plate. Sean wanted to stay. Help out. He wanted to continue to be here in my space, encroaching and seeing all the things I didn’t want him to see.
I couldn’t. I just couldn’t.
If I could just hold it together for a bit, if I could stuff down all of my messy feelings and show him that I could act like a normal human being, then maybe he’d leave and I could stop feeling all of the—everything. So I took a steady breath and tried to make my voice sound normal and measured. “Listen. That’s a nice thought. And it was really sweet of you to come all this way, but”—I set the dish down and turned to look at him—“I can’t have you here in my house. It’s too much. I can’t handle—” I held my hand out, palm forward, indicating all of him”—this right now. So, thank you. Really, I mean that.” I crossed close to him. “I know I’ve been mad and I’ve said quite a few not-nice things. But that’s just because…”
“I know,” he said without the slightest hint of offense.
“Anyway.” I reached out and wrapped my arms around him in a very quick hug. “Thank you, but”—I swiped at a tear that escaped—”I need you to go.” Because if he didn’t, I was genuinely afraid of the nastiness that would come out of me. I went to my room, hoping that he would respect my wishes and go. That’s what I wanted. It was for the best.
It was.
I heard a fair amount of movement and shuffling coming from the main part of the house for about fifteen minutes.
And then…nothing. I waited another fifteen minutes and when the quiet continued, I opened my door and slipped out. There was no sign of Sean or his things.
“Good,” I said to myself. “That’s good.” I went around, cleaning imaginary spots in my kitchen before finally sitting down to watch a movie.
That night as I lay in my bed, an awful loneliness set in. It was different from the numb survival loneliness I had gotten used to. This loneliness stemmed from knowing that I had sent someone away who cared for me. Despite all Sean’s flaws, I did know that.
I called Naomi the next morning. When I told her Sean had come, there were several stunned moments of silence before she just said, “Wow.”
And then she chewed me out for sending him away, but I was adamant. I didn’t need added drama in my life right now. And Sean…was drama.
The next few days dragged by as I did my best to sink back into my numbness. It was a challenge. Sean had cracked me open and all my inconvenient feelings continued to leak out, expanding and morphing, making themselves known.
Out of desperation to prove that I was okay, I asked Gemma to take her lunch hour and go out to eat with me. Gemma and I had both been working at the music conservatory for several years now. She was one of the few people who had not only come to Jonas’s funeral but had tried to keep tabs on me since then. We weren’t really close, but I considered her a friend. We both had a tendency to bring lunch and eat in our offices, but after a moment of stunned surprise, she readily agreed.
See? I thought. I’m fine.
Five days after Sean left, I came home to find a moving truck parked outside my duplex. I hadn’t even noticed the for-sale sign going down on the unit attached to mine.