Page 159 of The Vacation Mix-Up
“This once sat proudly on my finger,” he says, popping open the lid and staring at the gold band. “A symbol of my love and devotion. A decorative promise. And while I kept my end of that bargain, so to speak, Krystal did not.”
I wince at the pain in his voice. “I’m sorry, Riley.”
“You and me both.” He snaps the box shut. “But as I said the other night, it’s for the best.”
Not wanting to say what I’m about to say, because it could spell the end of what he and I have started, I say it anyway. “Are you sure about that?”
His eyes meet mine, soft and sincere. “Yes. Absolutely. I did everything I could to save my marriage, but when all was said and done, there was nothing left to save.”
Nodding, I drag Mr. Snuffles onto my lap and hug him to me.
“When we lost Imogen, Krystal crumbled. And while I crumbled too, I knew her pain was different. A mother’s always is. Her bond with our daughter was on a separate level from mine. I understood that. It was tethered deep in her womb, and I could never compare my own grief with hers. I didn’t even try.” He looks down at the box again and rotates it in his hand. “So, I shielded her from my pain… to an extent, of course. She didn’t need to deal with it on top of her own. I worked as much as I could so that she didn’t have to, so she could grieve without any added stress. And I did whatever was within my power to help her heal the parts of her that could be healed. When she shut herself off from the world, I let her but kept her safe. When she blamed me, I took it.”
“Why would she blame you?” I ask, my voice timid.
“Deep down, I don’t think she did, but she had to blame someone at the time. And if that someone was me, then so beit.”
Patting my hand over Mr. Snuffles’s ears, my heart breaks for Riley having to endure that while drowning in his own grief. “God, that must’ve been so hard for you.”
“It was. But her wellbeing was my priority, so I made her see our doctor, because she was fading away to nothing. She was a shell of her former self and incredibly bitter. She hated the world and everyone in it, and I meaneveryone.She would verbally attack not only me but also Mom and Roni. Even Poppy. And Poppy was just a toddler.”
I stop patting and frown. “That’s awful.”
He scoffs. “Yeah, and I could no longer stand for it when she screamed at Poppy and asked why she was here and Imogen wasn’t, and when she slapped Roni for being a mother when she couldn’t be.”
“Jesus.” I press Mr. Snuffles to my chest. “Sounds like she was in unbearable pain, and the only way she could deal with it was to lash out.”
“She was. And that’s exactly what she did.” He closes his eyes and takes a moment before opening them and staring at me as if desperate for me to know what happened wasn’t his fault. “Our lives became toxic, Riles, for her, me, and our families. The Krystal who was lashing out wasn’t the Krystal I loved and married. Before Imogen, she was never aggressive and hurtful. Sure, she was a little self-indulgent and never shied away from a discussion she was passionate about, but she was always sweet and kind about it. She never attacked. Was never vicious.” He squeezes the velvet box. “I insisted she see a shrink to properly deal with her grief. And it helped at first, but then… something just snapped. And while her bitterness eased and she stopped blaming everyone around her, she also stopped beingher.” He draws in a deep breath, holds it, then lets it out again. “She became someone else. A new Krystal. Determined. Ambitious. But… withdrawn.”
Hanging on every word he’s saying, I place Mr. Snuffles beside me and inch closer to the edge of the mattress.
“I knew something was still wrong, but I was so relieved that she was eating again and leaving the house to do the things she loved. She would meet up with friends for coffee and dinners, and she applied for a position in a high-profile law firm in Manhattan. I didn’t like the idea, because it meant we’d spend less time together, but it was what she wanted, so I was happy for her. If this new change would bring her back to me, then it was a change I was willing to adapt to, to support and encourage.”
“Of course,” I say, agreeing with him.
“Things were okay in the beginning. She would talk about her cases, and she was constantly shopping for new clothes and taking care of her appearance, which she’d always donebefore. It was just… different this time around. Her clothes, hair, and makeup were more—” He clenches his jaw. “—provocative, you know?”
I nod but wince.
“Don’t get me wrong, Riles. I loved that she was empowering herself by looking and feeling a certain way. She had every right to, and it’s not my place as a man to say otherwise.” He smiles at me. “Trust me, Mom and Roni have made that very clear for as long as I can remember. They’ve drilled into me that how a woman looks is none of a man’s business.”
I smile back, impressed with his answer and the strong female influences in his life.
“So, I wasn’t mad or insecure about thenewconfidenther. I was just unsettled for reasons I later found out were valid.”
Biting my fingernail, because I know where this is headed, I want to go to him and offer comfort with my embrace, to show him I care about his pain. To show himhe’snot alone. But I stay where I am, instead giving him space to say everything he needs to say, because verbalizing your pain is vital in letting it go. I know this from my own experience, having kept my pain internalized. And while it felt the safer option to do so, all it did was allow it togrow, watered by tears and compartmentalized trauma. I don’t want that for Riley; he’s been through enough.
To successfully say goodbye, we must thread our thoughts into spoken words and then set them free. We must talk, confide, confess. Muted pain is our enemy. To give it a voice is the only way we can truly move on.
“What happened next?” I ask, prompting him to continue.
“She was rarely home, and when she was, she wasn’t. She never asked about the business or the family. Never suggested we go anywhere or spend time together. She just switched off from me and the life we once had, as if it had never existed. We stopped being intimate, stopped holding hands and kissing each other goodnight. We stopped being us. I was devastated but also numb, knowing we were done and that there was nothing else I could do to change it. And when I tried one last time, she finally put me out of my misery and was honest about everything she’d been doing with Finn.” A sarcastic laugh passes his lips. “Well, her honesty didn’t put me out of my misery, of course. It caused more. Much, much more.”
“You didn’t deserve that. At all. But… grief changes people. And while I certainly don’t condone what Krystal did, the grief you shared changed you both in different ways.”
He stands, walks to the closed balcony door, and stares out across the sea, the velvet box clutched in his hand. “You’re right. Grief does change you, and I was so fucking angry about that. But what I didn’t understand until this cruise is how change, whether you want it or not, is inevitable. I thought we controlled the change if we really wanted to, but it’s not the change we control. It’s how we go about it. Krystal’s change—her growth, recovery, transformation… whatever you want to call it—wasn’t within her control. What was though, was her decision to hurt me during the process, and while I respect her for surviving the hardest thing she would ever endure, I’ll never forgive her forhowshe survived it. And she knows that.”
I get up from the bed and stand by his side. “Do you still talk to one another?”
