Page 85 of Green
Her voice was cracking and she couldn’t even stand up straight. She covered her face. I. Did. Not. Understand. This. Woman. I used to. I thought I did.What the hell happened?
“Hey,” I said, reaching out for her. It killed me to see her like this.
She shrugged my hand away, wiped her eyes and said, “I’ll sleep on the sofa in the family room. You stay here.”
“No. I’ll take the sofa.”
“No, my parents get up early and there’s no avoiding them if you’re in there.”
“Do you even want me to stay?”
She didn’t answer, just stared at the floor. That was all I needed to know.
“Okay. I’ll go.”
“If you don’t mind, it would probably be…”
“Yeah. I’ll go.” Fortunately, I hadn’t really unpacked my bag. “Do they have Lyft or Uber here? I’ll just call a cab.”
She nodded.
She sat on the doorstep with me, waiting for the cab to come pick me up. Neither of us said anything, because what else was there to say at that point? I had blown it in a way that Andrew never had—with my fist, in public, in front of her parents. I would send them an anniversary card when I got home, and write something like: “If only I knew the secret to staying married for so long…” Or something.
When the cab pulled up, we stood up and I looked at her, waiting to see if she was going to give me a goodbye hug. She didn’t. I turned to walk down the path.
“See you back in L.A., I guess.”
“Just don’t…”
I looked back at her. “Don’t what?”
Under the dim porch light, I could still see her green eyes glistening with tears. “Don’t forget to feed the birds.”
I nodded my head. Sure. I would feed the birds. “Don’t forget to tell Andrew to go fuck himself.”
“Don’t worry, I won’t.”
“Will you apologize to your parents for me? I’ll send them a card.”
“Don’t worry about that either. They’re pretty understanding.”
“Gemma?”
She looked up.
“I wish we really could have started over.”
“Yeah. Me too.”
