Page 99 of The Husband Hour
“How do you figure?”
She bit her lip. “He wouldn’t have been in Iraq that day if I had moved back to his post with him. He would never have asked to redeploy so soon.”
“Lauren,” he said slowly, “if anything, he failed you. Again and again. When did he ever put you first? You bought into this notion that he was special—hell, so did I. But guess what—he wasn’t. He was just a man, a man who made mistakes, who hurt people, and who ultimately lost his life. He was gifted, but he was flawed. And the system is flawed, and for Rory—and for others, no doubt—the combination was lethal. But nowhere in this whole story do I see your culpability.”
She covered her eyes with her hands, tears wetting her palms. “I could have made a difference in how things turned out if I hadn’t been so damn passive. I let the NHL make the calls about his health, I let Emerson influence him, and I let him decide to join the military when really it should have been our decision as a couple. I let every external factor set the course. Because I wasn’t strong enough to set it myself.”
“I disagree. I don’t think it had anything to do with lack of strength. I think it took a lot of strength to keep putting your own needs, your gut instincts, aside. Because you didn’t want to get in the way of the great Rory Kincaid, because all you heard from his family was that you were a distraction, all you heard from coaches was that he was special and he was destined for greatness, and all you heard from him was that he needed to excel and dominate or he couldn’t be happy. You two were living by different codes. They were impossible to reconcile. But your code was unconditional love, and you were true to that until it became dangerous. If you’d been with another type of person, you would have gotten back what you were giving. You would have been happy.” He took her by the shoulders, turned her toward him. His face was emotional, the neutral listener gone. “And Lauren, I’m sorry to say, but you’re fucking crazy for not giving yourself a chance to experience that.”
“Experience what?” she said bitterly. “What, exactly, am I supposed to experience now?”
He stared at her for a beat, his hands moving from her shoulders to her face.
And he kissed her.
Beth tucked Ethan into bed, telling him that Aunt Lauren would read to him tomorrow night, for sure.
“Is she out with Mommy?” he asked.
No, Beth highly doubted that. “Maybe,” she said. “I’m sure they’ll be home soon. But it’s bedtime for you. You’ll see them in the morning.”
She kissed him on the forehead and slipped out of the room. What an exhausting day. The last mile of driving on Black Horse Pike, she could barely keep her eyes open. But Ethan, overstimulated from a day running around Center City, Philadelphia, with her, had been a nonstop chatterbox. She probably should have stuck with her plan to stay overnight, but she felt compelled to drive back to the shore at the last minute.
A breeze blew into the kitchen through a window she’d left open. It was a beautiful night. She opened a bottle of white wine and poured a glass. She leaned against the counter and sipped slowly.
The day after Nora had mentioned selling everything, even the four walls, she realized she and Howard were looking at the business problem completely wrong. Their options weren’t only to keep it going or sell it; they could sublease the space. With just one day in Philly exploring this option, she’d put out some feelers and had leads on potential tenants. Nothing concrete, but it was a start.
Howard had completely missed it. It wasn’t like him. Howard thought he was being practical and strategic during the store crisis, but the truth was, the loss of the family business was more than just a financial blow. It was an emotional one, and that’s why he made big mistakes in the end. Why he was still making a big mistake.
“Mom? Why are you standing here in the dark?”
Beth looked up, startled. Had Lauren been home after all?
“Did you just get home?”
“Yeah. I was…out. I thought you were staying in Philly overnight.”
Beth explained it wasn’t worth it; she wanted to wake up in her own bed. She didn’t bother telling her about the store and the sublease. It was clear from the distracted look on Lauren’s face that there were more important things to discuss.
“Are you okay?” Beth asked gently. There had been a time when Lauren was as transparent as a glass of water. But she had closed herself off after her marriage, and even more after Rory’s death.
“I’m just confused,” Lauren said, but in a way that was surprisingly light. In that moment, Beth noticed that there was a brightness about her, an energy that she hadn’t seen in her in a long time.
“About what?”
Lauren opened the fridge, then closed it. She leaned against the counter facing Beth.
“My life. What it’s supposed to be now. Who I’m supposed to be now.”
Beth nodded. She’d been waiting for years for her daughter to come to her. She wondered if her sense of being pulled back to the shore that night had less to do with the need to sleep under her own roof and more with the universe making sure she was in the right place for this conversation.
She put down her wineglass. “Your relationship with Rory was a major part of your life. But your life is going to continue past that point. It already has, whether you realize it or not. You need to stop fighting so hard against it.”
“I can’t.”
“Can’t? Or won’t? Lauren, I know you’re trying to do the right thing, to be strong. But it’s like that fable, the oak and the reed? Remember from when you were little?”
“I don’t know. Vaguely.”
