“No, I'm not. I'm telling you that I love you, and I want to stay married to you, but if that's not reciprocal, if you don't want to be married to me anymore, you can leave anytime you want to.”
“Why are you saying that?” he asked suspiciously. What did she know? What had someone told her? Was she a mind reader? Or had she been listening to gossip about Daphne?
“I'm saying that because I'm beginning to feel like you hate me.”
“I don't hate you,” he said sadly, and then he looked at her cautiously, afraid to say too much, but he knew he had to be honest. “I just don't know what I feel anymore. I'm angry about what happened to us. It's like lightning struck us two months ago, and nothing's been the same since.” They were the same words Brock had used only that week about his sister. Lightning. “I'm angry, I'm scared, I'm sad. You don't seem the same to me anymore. Neither do I. And I can't stand all this constant talk of sickness and treatment.” They hardly ever talked about it, but just the reality of it was too much for him, and Alex knew that.
“I think I remind you of your mother now,” Alex said honestly, “and that's too much for you to deal with. Maybe you're afraid I'm going to die and abandon you the way she did.” She had tears in her eyes when she said it, but it didn't bring him any closer. “I'm afraid of that, too. But I'm doing everything I can to keep that from happening.”
“Maybe you're right. Maybe it's all a lot more complicated than it appears. But I think it's a lot simpler. I think we've both changed, something snapped between us.”
“And? Now what?”
“That's what I haven't figured out yet.”
“Let me know when you do. Do you want to see a therapist with me?” she asked. “Lots of people going through what I am see therapists, ours isn't the first marriage that's been on the line because of one partner or the other having cancer.”
“Christ, why do you have to blame it all on that?” Just her saying the word seemed to make him nervous. “What does that have to do with it?”
“That's when everything started, Sam. Everything was fine before that.”
“Maybe not. Maybe this just brought it to a head. Maybe three years of sex on schedule and hormones and trying to have another baby did us in.” It had never seemed to bother him before, but anything was possible.
“Do you want counseling?” she asked again, but he shook his head in answer.
“No, I don't.” All he wanted now was Daphne. That was his cure, his escape, his freedom. “I want to work this out myself.”
“I don't think you can, Sam. I don't think either of us can. Are you moving out?” she asked nervously, afraid he might, but seeing no other answer.
“I don't think we should do that to Annabelle, particularly before Christmas, and her birthday.” Alex wanted to scream “what about me?” But she didn't. “What I want is more freedom. I think we should go our own ways, without owing each other any explanations. Let's talk about it again in a couple of months, maybe after Annabelle's birthday.”
“What'll we say to her?” Alex felt devastated, but tried not to show it.
“That's up to you. As long as we're both living here, I doubt if she'll even notice.”
“Don't be so sure. She asked me today why we shout at each other all the time now. She knows, Sam. She's not stupid.”
“Then it's up to us to behave better in front of her,” he said in a voice filled with reproach that made her want to hit him. He was no longer the man she married and loved. But for Annabelle's sake she had to make the new arrangement work.
“I think this is going to be harder than you think,” Alex said honestly as she looked at him across their bedroom. After nearly seventeen years of marriage, it was going to be impossible to live together like roommates.
“It'll be as easy as we make it. Besides, I have a lot of traveling to do in the next few months.”
“Your business seems to be changing dramatically,” she commented, trying not to think of their shattered personal life, “what's that all about?”
“Simon has really opened things up for us.”
“I still think you should be leery of him, Sam. Maybe your instincts were correct right from the