Page 26 of That's Not a Thing

I inhaled a sharp breath and held it, a technique I had learned during college for tamping down unwanted emotions, and I scanned the room for Wesley. I finally caught sight of him, sitting on one of those low shiva chairs, a foreshortened leather seat that hovered just a few inches above the floor. His legs were folded awkwardly in front of the little chair, and he was deep in conversation with a man who looked to be about the same age as his father. Hisdeceasedfather, I reminded myself with a shudder.

For the first time since he’d heard the news, Wesley actually looked alert, like he was invested in whatever they were discussing. As I approached and he caught sight of me, he suddenly sat up straighter and his eyes flashed with purpose. He said something quietly to the man beside him and then rose to meet me, walking to where I stood.

“Come with me,” he said, starting toward the wide stairwell in the center of the house. I followed, relieved that he seemed to be welcoming me back into the fold.

We went into his childhood bedroom, the winter sunshine sharp as it pushed through the windows, the luminosity at odds with the cold air in the room. As he closed the door and turned toward me, I saw the set of his jaw, the vein pulsing in his neck, and I realized I had read him all wrong.

“Everyone was asking where you were yesterday.” A reprimand, accusatory.

“You told me to leave. I did what you asked.” I immediately regretted my defensive tone, knowing I had struck the wrong chord. I couldn’t find my footing with this angry, sallow version of Wesley.

“Well, maybe I don’t know what the fuck I want right now. Did you think of that?” He pounded his fist twice against the wooden footboard of his old sleigh bed, like he was still busy parsing his thoughts.

“Well, I’m back now,” I said, walking toward him, reaching for his hand before he started using any real force on his childhood furniture.

I felt him relax a little at the physical contact, like he remembered who he was, or whowewere. He pulled me closer and kissed the top of my head. “That was my uncle Marty I was talking to,” he told me.

I nodded, reluctant to break the calm by saying something that might set him off again. I leaned into the smooth simplicity of his white dress shirt, the scent of his deodorant strong and reassuring. We were quiet for a moment—taking each other in, I thought.

Wesley finally broke the silence. “I’m going to stay with him for ... I’m not sure how long. A while.”

“Who?”

“Marty,” he said again, stepping away from me, the air suddenly cool again, biting. I wondered if anyone had turned the heat on upstairs, if he had slept in this cold air the night before, alone.

“Your uncle Marty? As in your mom’s brother Marty? England Marty? What do you mean?”

“Well, it’s not like we’re still getting married in three weeks. I can’t go dance and celebrate at a party right after I put my parents in the ground. Especially not when it was our fucking wedding plans that put them there. Jesus!” His hands shot up to his head, his fists clenching as though he wanted to rip his hair from the roots.

“Wes.” I sank down into the black leather chair by his desk. I spoke slowly, hoping to calm him, to help him realize he wasn’t making sense. “I know we have to move the wedding, but why are you going to England? What does one have to do with the other?”

Wesley just stared back at me, his expression strange and harsh.

“Look,” I continued into the silence, repeating myself, “I know the wedding plans have to change or whatever, but why are you going on a trip to England? How does that move anything forward?”

He rubbed his hands over his face as I began to shiver in the cold room. “It’s like I already said,” he finally answered, sounding less impassioned now. “I just need some time to deal with everything. I know in my head that this wasn’t your fault, that you and your family didn’t kill my parents, but every time I’m in the room with you, all I feel is rage and blame seeping out of me. I need to get away from you to get past it. I need you to let me go.” He stepped toward me, stroked my hair. “I’m going to leave as soon as shiva ends.”

He didn’t say how long he was planning to stay away, whether it would be two weeks or two months. All I knew was that everything I said seemed to be making him angrier, so I swallowed a sob and held back my words. I tried not to think of all the plans we had made—the glittering wedding, the honeymoon in Vermont, the twinkle lights and chiffon that were supposed to drape the ceiling of the event space, the sparkly life I had thought I was about to begin with this man who was suddenly a stranger. I stared at the striped comforter on Wesley’s old bed, finding no comfort at all. I heard him let out a deep sigh, and a moment later he turned and left the room.

FIVE DAYS LATER,he was gone. He called from the airport to say good-bye. He said he would be in touch in a few days, once he was settled at his uncle’s. I cried myself to sleep every night that first week, and the week after that.

On what was supposed to be our wedding day, I finally got an email from him. His uncle had a connection at some elite cooking school near Southampton. He was going to take some classes there. His uncle would pay. It was a genuine opportunity for him to study under this particular British chef. And it was better than coming home and seeing me, which was the same, he said, as staring his parents’ death in the face.

This isn’t what your parents would want, I wrote him back.Please come back. Let me help you heal. Please.

I wrote him every day after that. Pathetic, long, pleading emails. Some were heartfelt petitions for forgiveness, while others were simply journal-style recaps of what I had done that day. One feeble attempt after another, trying to remind him who I was, why he had loved me.

He never wrote back. I tried calling, but it seemed like his cell phone wasn’t working on the other side of the Atlantic. I knew I could probably look up his uncle, Marty Scheiner, maybe find a phone number, but it was clear Wesley didn’t want to speak to me. So what could I do? I gave him time.

After a month went by and I hadn’t heard from him again, I began to question whether he would ever come home. My mother visited me at my little studio apartment and tried to lull me out for meals that I couldn’t eat. When we reached the three-month mark after his departure, I finally slid my engagement ring off my finger and put it back into its green velvet box. Because of all the weight I had lost, it was constantly slipping off anyway. I gave it to my mother and asked her to hold on to it in case Wesley ever wanted it back, in case he ever returned and asked to put it back on my finger.

Three months turned into six. When six months stretched into a year, I finally realized that we were truly over, that he was never coming back, that maybe we were never meant to be.

Chapter Thirteen

February 2017

As Aaron and I emerge from the thick yellow lighting of the church kitchen and back into the crowd of people milling about on Broadway, I gulp in the crisp winter air as though I had been suffocating inside the building. He starts walking in the direction of the subway and I follow numbly, still trying to digest the information Wesley told me moments ago.