Page 10 of August
Myra looked around the kitchen and replied, “I don’t want to get in the way of your family dinner. I–”
“The kids came back today to drop their stuff off. They went out. As much as I think they hate being away from their friends right before going off to college, they like the nightlifeof New Orleans better than that small town we came from. So, they’ll probably show back up around eleven or midnight. If they’re any later than that, they’ll message me. I know they seem like they’re spoiled, and I suppose they are to a certain extent, but they were much better when I was still with their dad or after we were separated and divorced but I still lived there.”
“You lived with him after the divorce?”
“It’s a long story, but yes,” Elisa said with a smile. “We met in college, and I got pregnant. He wanted to do the right thing, even though it wasn’t the nineteen-fifties, and his family wanted us to get married, so we did. I dropped out and raised the kids while he continued in pre-med and then medical school. His parents, around that time, moved out of their house and retired to a smaller place in Arizona, so they gave us theirs.” She shrugged. “We’ve lived there since, and when we separated, I moved into the guest house once we told the kids. I stayed longer than I’d planned because I wanted them to at least graduate with their school friends, and I’d gotten full custody. He didn’t fight me for that because there wasn’t much of a point; they were almost eighteen. It was more just a paperwork thing. Anyway, an even longer story is that he started bringing women home, things got very awkward, and I couldn’t stay any longer.”
“He brought women home while you were still living there?” Myra asked.
“Yes. And, honestly, I’m not at all jealous because he’s moving on.I’mthe one who asked for the separation and divorce. It was more about the fact that hegotto move on already when I was the one who wanted to. While he was off becoming a doctor and building his practice, I was the primary caregiver for the kids. I’m not even sure he knows that Adele hates broccoli or that Archie got a D in Spanish his junior year, so we had to hire a full-time tutor to help him get that grade up during the soccer season, or he would’ve been kicked off the team.”
“I’m sorry,” Myra said. “I don’t have kids, obviously, butI went through a divorce. It wasn’t exactly the same thing, but it wasn’t fun, either.”
“Your ex didn’t parade women around you, essentially bragging that he’d just slept with them while you were sleeping in the guest house out back?” she asked, trying to lighten the mood, but Myra’s serious expression told Elisa she had made a mistake.
“Actually, she cheated on me. No parade, though.”
Elisa had caught the pronoun in that sentence but tried not to react to it because any reaction would likely be read the wrong way by Myra, so after a few seconds, she nodded.
“I’m sorry to hear that,” she said. “I don’t understand why people get married just to cheat.”
“Me neither,” Myra replied. “I thought things were good. We had a decent life together. I had no idea that she had this other person she was with at least a night or two each week.”
“She wasn’t home?”
“She was when we first got together, but she got a promotion that required her to travel around a lot, so she usually stayed in a hotel here or there. I thought that was what she was doing, at least. I didn’t know that she was sleeping with a co-worker who traveled with her sometimes. Her boss, technically.”
“What?” Elisa asked, sitting up more in her chair.
“Yeah, her married boss who had a husband and three kids of her own at home. They started up one night and just never stopped. They’re still together now. When I found out, I was in this state of disbelief. We had both known exactly what we wanted when we met. We each had careers. Those were important. I wanted to own my own company one day. Neither of us wanted kids, but if gay marriage ever became legal, we wanted to get married. We did, and I thought things were good, but she got promoted, met her, and that was it. She stayed with me for some reason.”
“Why didn’t she just–” Elisa stopped herself.
“Leave?” Myra guessed what she had wanted to ask.
“Yeah.”
“I don’t know. I asked her, but she didn’t really have a reason. I can guess that it was more because she didn’t know what would happen with them. They worked together, and one or both of them could’ve gotten fired. The woman she was with was married, too, and a parent. There was a chance she wouldn’t have left her husband, so if my ex couldn’t have her full-time, at least she had her part-time and me at home waiting for her, thinking we were still in love.”
“God, I’m sorry, Myra. I mean, I know my ex-husband cheated on me during our marriage, but I’m not sure I ever really cared about it. At first, it was just a hunch, but–”
“I didn’t even have a hunch,” Myra interjected. “I was sitting at home, waiting for her to tell me all about her day, and then, it was all just out there that she’s been with someone else for years, and it’s over with us, and she’s telling me she changed her mind and she’s going to be a stepmom now and move to New Jersey for their new life together. It was all so sudden and not at all at the same time.”
“I’m sorry,” Elisa repeated. Then, she placed a hand on top of Myra’s own on the table and gave it a squeeze. “I have wine. It’s the expensive kind, too. I took it from the wine rack when I left. He didn’t even notice.” She winked at Myra.
Myra laughed and said, “Another time.”
“You don’t have to keep saying that if you don’t want–”
“No, I do,” Myra interrupted quickly. “I just need to get you the rest of this estimate for the roof and check the schedule to see who I can get out here to do the work. Plus, I owe my friend, Melinda, a new blueprint for some changes to the work she needs done.”
“Are you sure you should be doing this work forme? You sound very busy, and I wouldn’t mind if you put me off to someone else that you’d recommend.”
“No, it’s fine. I can do it. It won’t take that long.”
Myra went to stand, which meant that her hand had disappeared from Elisa’s.
Elisa looked up at her and said, “Okay. Well, I’ll walk you out.”
