Figuring I might need to be involved in both of those activities before Nicholas goes to bed, I follow Claire down to the kitchen. I sit at the counter and leaf through the day’s mail as she bustles around, opening the refrigerator and cabinets.
I focus on opening a bill, trying not to be bothered by the fact that another woman is busy in our kitchen. A woman who isn’t my wife.
“Ta da.”
Claire sets a menagerie of snacks in front of me. There’s an owl made out of a large cracker, with raisin eyes and wings created with sliced almonds. Next to the owl is a fruit kabob caterpillar, and a ladybug made from half of a red apple.
I can’t help laughing. “This is great. No wonder the kids love you.”
She smiles, her cheeks flushing. “Thanks. They’re really awesome kids, though I’m not surprised considering who they have as a father.”
A twinge of discomfort goes through me. I make an effort to suppress it, even as I remember Archer’s remark about Claire back in December.
I’d been wary around college-aged women after a grad student started a false sexual harassment claim against me before I became a tenured professor, but nothing potentially dangerous or damaging has happened since.
Just the opposite in fact, especially with Jessica, who has now become one of my most valued colleagues, and the number of intelligent young women who are involved with the World Heritage Center.
But that doesn’t mean I’ve forgotten. And it doesn’t mean I don’t still have to reject unwanted female attention and advances, no matter how much I talk about “my wife Liv.”
But this? We hired Claire because Liv has cancer. Claire is the nanny to our two young children. Seeing anything different in that is flat-out wrong.
Then again, I’ve been around enough to know nothing is off-limits to some people. And Archer was right. The world can be a fucked-up place.
I take a few bites of the cracker and pick up the apple ladybug. “Thanks, but I’ve gotta get back to work.”
“Take the plate with you,” Claire says. “The milk too. After all, it does a body good.”
Without responding, I return to my office. I don’t care what Claire thinks of me, as long as she’s good with the kids and Liv likes her. And God willing we won’t need her help for much longer.
I pick up a loop of string resting on my desk. After idly making a few patterns, I take Liv’s wedding ring out of my pocket and slip it onto the string. I weave a circle around it right in the center.
I spread the loop out between my fingers and look at the two patterns hugging Liv’s ring. After knotting the ends, I slip it onto my wrist. The ring slides under my wrist, right up against my pulse.
And that’s where it will stay.
I reach over to turn off my computer, shutting down the website open on the screen. My brain is so packed with facts and statistics about breast cancer that sometimes I have a hard time applying anything I read to Liv.
I still can’t believe this is happening to her. And despite all rational thoughts, I still hate that other people are touching my wife’s breasts, cutting into her, poisoning her. While I just stand there and watch. And burn.
I’ve always been able to take action. To succeed. When I was a kid, my father made it clear that failure wasn’t an option, not for the son of Justice West, not when my brother had made it his life’s work to be a lost cause, not when I had to uphold the West family image.
So I didn’t fail. Some things came easily to me, others took work, but I did it. Always believed I’d get the scholarship, make the team, win the trophy. I didn’t often think “I can’t” because I knew I could. Even when I first met Liv, I knew I’d get past her defenses one day. That I’d make her mine. I knew I needed her.
But I didn’t realize until now I’d taken it for granted that Liv would always be there. I didn’t realize how badly I need to grow old with her. I need to see her dark hair turn silver, to watch the laugh lines deepen around her eyes.
I need to sit with her as we watch Nicholas and Bella play soccer and perform in music recitals, as they graduate from high school and go off to college. I need her to