Forty-seven. That is the number that keeps circling my brain like a vulture. Forty-seven times he told me he was stuck at the office. Forty-seven times I sat in church pews or choir risers, thinking I was a good wife because I gave him space to be a provider.
I really thought we had something steady after thirty years. I suppose it was steady, if you define steady by the way a clock ticks right before it breaks.
The check engine light came on last Tuesday. It was just a little orange glow, but it made me nervous. Robert is the one who handles the car maintenance, but he was gone, just like he always is on Tuesdays and Thursdays. I needed to run to the pharmacy, and I didn’t want to break down on the highway. I figured I would just pull up the navigation system on the dashboard to see if the computer had logged any mechanical alerts. I know, I know. I should have just called him. But I was tired. It was late, and I just wanted to see if the car was safe to drive in the morning.
I tapped the screen. I started scrolling through the recent history. It was just an innocent look at where we had been. I saw the grocery store, the dentist, the post office. Then I saw it. A residential address on Maple Ridge Drive. I blinked. I had never heard of that street. I kept scrolling. It was there again. And again. And again. I started counting, and my throat went dry. Every single Tuesday for eight months. Every single Thursday for eight months.
Tuesday is my Bible study night. Thursday is choir practice. I have been leaving the house at five forty-five to make sure I am on time.
Robert always kisses my forehead. He says, “Have a good time, honey.” He says, “Don’t rush back.” I used to think he was being sweet. I used to think he wanted me to enjoy my time with the girls. Now I see that he was just making sure the driveway was clear. He wanted to make sure I was gone so he could pull out of our garage and drive ten miles across town.
The GPS logs were so precise it made me want to scream. It showed the car arriving at Maple Ridge Drive at exactly six-fifteen every single time. It showed the car sitting there, idling in the dark, until nine-twenty. That gave him exactly ten minutes to get home before I pulled into the driveway at nine-thirty. He was timing it. He was timing his life around my schedule.
I sat in the driveway for a long time. The house was silent. The only sound was the hum of the cooling fan under the hood. I felt like I was losing my mind, but I was also perfectly clear.
I have always been a practical woman. My mother taught me that if you want to know the truth, you don’t ask the person who is lying to you. You look at the evidence. I grabbed my camera from the backseat and started taking pictures of the screen. I photographed every single date. I captured the arrival times. I got the departure times.
I went inside and turned on the office printer. The ink smelled like ozone and cold plastic. I printed every page. I watched the paper slide out, one by one. Each one felt like a stone dropping into my stomach. When I was done, I had a stack of paper nearly an inch thick. I sat at the kitchen table and looked up the address on my laptop. It didn’t take long to find out who lived there. Her name is Diana Holt. I had never heard the name before, but when I searched her history, I found her on a company directory for Robert’s firm. She was an assistant in his department. I remembered him mentioning a project back in January. “It’s a big push,” he said. “The new assistant is really helping me out.” I remember saying, “That’s good, dear.” I feel like such a fool.
I didn’t sleep at all. I walked through the house, touching things. I touched the photo of us from our tenth anniversary. I looked at the quilt on the couch that we bought together in Wisconsin. It all felt like a movie set.
It felt like I was playing a character in a life that didn’t exist. I kept thinking about how he would walk through the door at nine-thirty. I kept thinking about what he would say. “How was the study, dear?” “Did you learn anything good?”
He came home at nine-thirty. I was sitting in the dark in the living room. I didn’t turn on a lamp. I wanted to see him walk in. I wanted to see if his face looked the same. He walked in, humming a little tune. He looked tired, but he had a little smile on his lips. “Hey there,” he said. “Why are you sitting in the dark?” I stood up. My legs felt like lead. “I had to check the car,” I said. His smile didn’t falter. “Is something wrong with the car?” he asked. “I don’t know,” I said. “You tell me.”
He looked confused. “What are you talking about?” he said. I walked over to the table and dropped the stack of papers. They made a loud, sharp slap against the wood. He looked down at the pile.
He didn’t pick it up. He just looked at the top page. His face didn’t go white. He didn’t scream. He just let out a long, slow breath. “I can explain,” he said. That was the most painful thing he could have said. It wasn’t “I’m sorry.” It wasn’t “I messed up.” It was just a cold, practiced excuse.
“Don’t,” I said. I felt the air leave my lungs. “Just don’t.” He looked at me, and for the first time in thirty years, I saw a stranger. I saw a man I had fed, a man I had nursed through the flu, a man I had prayed for every single Sunday morning. “It’s not what you think,” he started. I cut him off. “I don’t care what it is,” I said. “I know where you were.”
He didn’t move. He just stood there. “We need to talk about this,” he said. I shook my head. I looked at the photos of us on the wall. They looked like pictures of ghosts. I realized then that I didn’t want to talk. I didn’t want to hear about his stress or his work or whatever lie he had cooked up for Diana. I just wanted to be quiet.
I walked past him and went to the bedroom. I didn’t pack a bag. I didn’t take any money. I just lay down on the bed, staring at the ceiling fan. I can hear him out there. He is pacing. He is calling my name softly.
He is trying to fix it. But some things aren’t broken. Some things were just never real to begin with.
I am lying here, and the house feels like it is shrinking. I know I have to leave. I know I have to call a lawyer in the morning. But for right now, I am just listening to the sound of my own heart. It is the only thing in this house that is still true. I wonder if he is still looking at the papers. I wonder if he is counting the forty-seven nights like I am. I don’t think he ever cared about the count. He just cared about the Tuesday and the Thursday.
I don’t know where I am going to go when the sun comes up. I have a sister in Ohio, but that is a long way to drive. My car is still sitting in the driveway with the check engine light on. I suppose that light was the kindest thing that ever happened to me. It showed me exactly where I stood.
He just knocked on the door. “Can I come in?” he asked. I didn’t answer. I just closed my eyes and listened to the silence. It is a very loud silence. I don’t think I can ever go back to the woman I was yesterday.
I think I am going to stay here in the dark for a little while longer.
