Page 99 of A Better World

“Thank you,” he said, and then the ugly smile was gone. He was Russell again. It was over. She could convince herself it was over and okay and he wasn’t, very obviously, lying.

“Thank you. I’m sorry I did that to your screen. I know that was out of line.”

She realized that his eyes were wet, too. When had he started crying? “It’s fine. Just don’t do it again.”

“I know you’re working your ass off and it feels like I’m undermining you. But I have to understand what’s happening. I have to know. For my sanity. Your help means a lot. Thank you.”

“You’re my wife,” he said, his voice gruff. “I’m always on your side.”

They were sitting closer now. She leaned into him.

“We’ve been in different places lately,” she said, though, now that she thought about it, they’d more often been out of synchronicity during their marriage than in it.

“I’m really tired, Linda. I’m tired all the time.” Her sympathy returned. This was Russell, her earnest, dependable husband with whom she hadn’t always agreed, but whom she’d always respected.

“Can I do anything?”

“Make nice with ActHollow?”

“Okay,” she said. “I can do that. Russell? Can you do something?”

He let out a sigh that seemed to indicatenot one more thing.

“Can you talk to the kids?”

“About this?” he asked.

“No. Not this. I just think you should talk to them. Josie’s feeling lonely. And Hip… this thing with Cathy’s getting serious.”

“Sex?” His demeanor changed, and he seemed quietly proud.

“If it hasn’t happened yet, it’s coming. I don’t mean to be the typical bitch-in-law type, but the more I know her, the more it feels to me like Cathy’s selfish. She likes him because she thinks he’s got no other options. She can push him around.”

“I hope that’s not true,” Russell said, finally putting the laptop on the night table.

“Yeah. And if he’s intimate with her, it’s very important he do it right. He’s a good kid. I believe in him. But he needs to be told explicitly how it all works. How to make sure everything’s consensual, to the letter of the law, for his own sake.”

“He’d never do anything untoward. That’s not him, Linnie. Not ever.”

“Yeah. But it needs to be said. Everything needs to be said. Would you talk to him? Not just say you’ll talk to him, but actually talk to him?”

“Okay. Yeah,” he said, sounding tired. It was, after all, three in the morning. An ungodly hour for a surprise confrontation with your spouse.

“Don’t you want to?”

“Yeah. I just feel like you’ll do it better.”

“Why?”

“You all talk the same. You make the same jokes. They’re like mini-Lindas. I don’t know what I have to add to that.”

“You’re their dad,” she said. “They only have one in the world. Honestly, just for your scarcity, I think they like you better.”

Russell didn’t answer for a bit. Blinked up at the ceiling. A tear fell. “They’ll really listen to me?” In the time she’d known Russell, they’d had many missed connections. It’s easy, when that happens, to assume the worst—she was a cog in his life, interchangeable. The kids were accessories. He resented her, had been afraid she’d leave him, and so had sat on her career, forcing her dependency. Though these interpretations were, on some level, true, they were the cruelest iterations of the truth. It was just as possible that he wanted to help but had no idea how to do it, or even how to ask for instructions and admit the deficiency.

On a few lucky occasions, like now, they talked enough to pierce through all the nonsense and arrive at the truth: he loved her. He wanted good things for her and for their family. She loved him. She wanted good things for him. That didn’t mean they agreed with one another on the means to acquire those things.

“Yeah,” she said. “They’ll especially listen to you.”

---