the nonprofit she was passionate about. My income allowed her to basically work for free, which made her much happier than being a corporate lawyer.
But now, she wasn’t happy anymore.
Six weeks had come and gone, and the woman I loved had become a ghost.
She didn’t lean on me for support.
She wanted nothing to do with me.
We hadn’t had sex since before her father passed away, and while sex wasn’t important right now, I missed the intimacy. I missed loving my wife and feeling her love me back.
I went to my brother’s place after work because I didn’t want to go home. She would be there, but I would be greeted with a dry kiss, disingenuous questions about my day, and then we would eat dinner in silence.
I sat with him at the dining table with my beer in front of me, wearing my blue scrubs because I had been at the hospital doing paperwork and patient rounds. My fingers gripped the base of my beer bottle, and I stared at the liquid inside.
Derek watched me, his arms folded on the table, a quiet sigh coming from his lips every now and then. Emerson took Lizzie and the boys to her parents’ so we could have some privacy.
“She won’t even look at me.” I kept my eyes on the beer.
“She’s depressed. It has nothing to do with you.”
“Well, I’m depressed too.” I tapped the beer against the table and lifted my gaze to look at him. “I lost him too. It’s like she resents me, like I murdered him or something.”
“That’s not what she thinks—”
“Seems like it.”
“How would we be if we lost Dad?” Derek asked gently. “I don’t think I’d be any better in six weeks.”
“I understand that. I just…we should get through this together. But instead, she’s pushed me away. I’m devastated too. I loved that man too. And losing my wife isn’t making it any better.”
“You aren’t losing her,” he said simply. “But…maybe suggest couples therapy. It would be good for both of you, especially right now. It can help you guys deal with the grief of it all. I’m not a fan of therapy either, but when I saw Dr. Collins, it did help.”
I wasn’t a go-to-therapy kind of guy, but I would try anything at this point.
“And people handle grief in different ways. Your job right now is to give your wife whatever she needs. And if space is what she needs, you have to give it to her. I know that’s difficult because it’s the opposite of what you need right now, but that’s what it means to be a husband—to put your wife’s needs above your own.”
I stepped into the penthouse and immediately noticed the difference.
The smell of dinner didn’t waft from the kitchen, music didn’t play over the speakers, the TV wasn’t on, most of the lights were off…like no one was home. I didn’t even shut the door behind myself before I stepped farther into the room.
Because I saw her standing there.
Her bags on the couch.
Her arms crossed over her chest.
Her eyes on the floor.
My body immediately started to shut down, to grow angry and afraid at the same time. What I’d feared had come to pass. My instinct had been right this entire time. I could feel the energy radiating from her body day in and day out. “No.”
She lifted her chin and looked at me, her eyes puffy and red like she’d already had a good cry before I came home. She kept her arms over her chest, totally cut off from me, like there was no negotiation.
“Let’s talk. I’ve wanted to talk this entire time, but I knew I needed to wait until you were ready. If you’re ready now, let’s do it. Let’s go to couples therapy. But this conversation does not end with you taking your shit and walking out—”
“You promised me.” The tears escaped her body with a jolt and cascaded down her cheeks, and her hand immediately covered her face to stifle her reaction. “You promised me he would be okay…and now he’s dead.”
There was no way to describe the pain I felt at the implication of her words. “I did everything I possibly could, Catherine. Please don’t say you blame me for what happened.”
She stilled her emotion and dropped her hand. “You never said what happened—”
“Because I don’t fucking know what happened. I made no errors. His heart just wasn’t strong enough. It was his time. No other surgeon in the world would have