Myhome.
Not our home.
I broke down into sobs as two trucks revved to life and sped off down the road, taking my husband away forever.
24KINTSUGI ONLY WORKS IF YOU ARE A VASE
So.That sucked.
I want to tell you I handled that situation well. Lifted my head high and congratulated myself on standing by my self-worth. Cut those toxic people out of your life, Bastian, yeah! Go you! The Sadlers never liked you anyway, and you would have spent a lifetime fighting for respect from your in-laws. No one needs that! Leave them behind and find yourself a man who’ll trust you like he ought to!
That didn’t happen. I spent that night curled up on the couch, sobbing until I had no voice and my eyes stung so badly I had to fumble through my medicine cabinet for eye drops. I cried until I had no tears left, until I had noemotionleft. Numbness spread over my battered self like a salty, tearful balm.
A shard of my self-preservation instinct protested that I should call and talk to someone. Who would I talk to, shard of self-preservation? The person I wanted to call, Jiaying, was now off-limits to me. She came as a benefit of marriage to Jackson, and now that we weren’t-
My tear ducts found a few tears they’d missed. My eyes hated them for it. They’d swollen part of the way closed by then. I managed a cold, damp washcloth through the sobs.
That was one of the cruelest cuts. Laramie had left me isolated. I had no house phone. My cell phone had died, and I had no replacement. How would I call anyone, even if I had a person to call?
At some point, I fell asleep on my couch. I awoke early to a dry and crusty washcloth over my face. My eyes felt like I’d used genuine Sahara sand instead of store-brand eyedrops.
And then? I got on with my life. I didn’t have any other choice. Looking like cud that had processed through all four stomachs of a cow, feeling like that was a very optimistic evaluation of my status, I went to teach kids about the mistakes smart people have made in the past.
Yeah. A little on the nose, that.
In my defense, I did intend to go down to Mail Call Mates that day after school. I got an email from the principal after lunch asking me to come by after my last class, though, so I had to wait around. A fight between students pushed that back, since the principal had to chew them out, deal with their parents, and process a very inconvenient end-of-year suspension before he could see me.
I waited hours for him to tell me that he’d “had a word” with Dana. She had informed him she “didn’t realize” I’d seen her as “intruding”, and she was, of course, “very sorry” and also “quite concerned” about my “allegations”. She wondered if I would “pose a threat” to her and asked me to “keep my distance” or she would “take steps to protect herself”. And that it would “be” “best” “if” “I” “respected” “her” “request”, and then my mental quotation key broke.
If I wanted to insist on a note left in her file, one would be left in mine. Perhaps we should consider it a misunderstanding and let it go? Another clear delineation of the rules of engagement. A note in my file would hurt me more than one hurt her. I was too worn down to fight it. Demoralized, I let it go.
By the time I finished with that sham of a process, and gnawed my way through going-home traffic, Mail Call Mates had switched over to their barebones evening staff. A kind receptionist informed me Elaine Prise had left a note that she wanted to handle my case herself, but she had gone home for the day. Could I return tomorrow?
Why not. It wasn’t as if I had a husband at home waiting for me. I had all the time in the world, now, instead of the depressing countdown that would have readTwo Nights Until Deployment. My initiation of our divorce proceedings could wait one more night.
* * *
“Unfaithfulness is very difficult to move past. It shatters trust as little else does,” Elaine Prise said, as I sat in her office the next night. “Even when you were not the unfaithful partner, the distrust lingers. You may be interested to know that disloyalty is a leading cause of failed marriages, according to our internal studies.”
“Yay, I’m a statistic,” I said, far more sharply than I meant to. I took a deep breath. “Sorry. It’s been a long couple days. You don’t need me to take it out on you.”
I’d caught her just before she left for the day. The end of a school year never fails to throw bushels of education-related caltrops in your path. Parents who want to know if Little Johnny has any chance to pass my class, even though he spent half the year ditching and tried to write an essay on “The Round-Earth Movement’s Propaganda Machine” for his final paper. (Yikes.) Students who want help with their notes for the final. Teachers who come in “just to talk” which means they want to pry about why you look like the Rhinos of Hell trampled you.
Elaine sighed. “I amso sorryfor what happened with you and Jackson. It’s probably cold comfort to say that it sounds like he might have been willing to fight for you, if not for his brother’s influence.”
“There is no microwave in existence that can defrost that comfort.”
“Alas.” Her gaze was as empathetic as I’d seen it. “And there’s no chance he might come around? We could wait to see if he changes his mind.”
I let my gaze drop to my hands in my lap. More specifically, to the band on my left ring finger, which I couldn’t bring myself to remove. “I made him a promise, Elaine. We both knew he was taking a chance on me. The man who’d never been with another man, and who’d signed up for a wife, not a husband. I swore that if he had too many doubts, I would put in to dissolve the marriage without an argument. He called that promise in. I’m going to follow up with what I promised to do.”
“I understand.” A clatter of keys sounded as she typed on her keyboard. “When was he due to ship out?”
“Tomorrow.” It didn’t surprise me to hear she knew about the secret launch. The only curiosity I had was if she’d heard it from the military, in order to facilitate matches, or if she’d learned of it another way entirely. “It would have been our last night together.”
She made a soft sound of sympathy. “A terrible shame,” she murmured. Her voice rose again. “I don’t see any indication in your shared file that Mister Sadler has initiated the dissolution of your marriage, or even signaled that a dissolution is impending.”
“He’s probably waiting for me to start it. He’s got a lot on his mind right now.”