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“We are talking about you,” Lydia said.
“Yes, but that doesn’t mean we can’t talk about you.”
“Yeah, but... Talk to Jackson. I didn’t talk to Mac.” Lydia felt something in her chest shift. A burden she hadn’t known was there, weighing her down. “When I was feeling lonely, when I was feeling upset, when I was feeling afraid. I didn’t know how to talk to him.”
It felt so good to say that out loud.
To admit that to her sister.
“You were with him from the time you were thirteen. You always seemed like you talked.”
“We did. About little things. And we acted like we were in the same relationship that we had begun when we were thirteen years old, and not the one that we needed to have as adults. As parents to two children. As two people who started going in different directions and didn’t know what to do with it. We needed to sit down and get on the same page. And we just didn’t.”
“Lydia, I had no idea that you and Mac had any problems.”
“I know. Which is not an accident. I can’t get into all of it now. I just can’t.” It was way too much, and right now, it was mixed in with Chase and the kiss, and she couldn’t separate it, and she really couldn’t deal with that just now. “But what I can tell you is keeping all this kind of stuff pushed down... It doesn’t help. Secrets are the ultimate fuel for resentment. They grow it. Feed it. Foster it. And it’s resentment that you can’t get past. When that person that you’re supposed to be in love with becomes a flashpoint for your anger. When kissing them feels like a chore instead of an expression of love. That’s what you can’t get past. Don’t ever let it get there.”
“What if I don’t like the answer to the questions? What if I don’t like the end result of the confrontation?”
“You might not. But if there’s something going on, then you have to face it. It won’t go away just because you ignore it. I guess that’s my point. Take it from me. The champion of trying to ignore things until they go away.”
And it occurred to her then that she was doing it again with Chase. Ignoring what had happened between them and hoping it would go away. Avoiding him and hoping it would go away. Not coping. Not facing it head-on. Just not doing anything.
“I know that,” Marianne said. The museum came into sight, and they were both conscious that they needed to change the subject soon. “I do know that. That we are going to have to talk about it. That I’m going to have to confront him.”
“And maybe it’s nothing.”
“Then he’ll get mad at me.”
“Is it really that bad to know that your wife thinks that you could sleep with someone else if you wanted to? I mean, jealousy is kind of a compliment, isn’t it?”
“Except when it comes to, you know, the trust that we are supposed to have in each other. And we never fight. Never.”
“Marriage is long and things change. And a whole lot of issues come from making assumptions. So it’s just better to not make them. It’s better to get them all out in the open. I assume. I have experience with the assumptions, and not so much with successfully resolving them by sharing.”
“We need to talk sometime,” Marianne said, pausing at the very bottom cement step of the museum. “Really talk.”
“Yeah,” Lydia said. “We do.” She swallowed hard. “Do you ever feel like your life is a book? And you just wish you could skip back a few pages to make some sense of where you’re at now?” She swallowed again. “I feel like I’m in the middle of the story, and I’m terrified of how it’s going to end. And I can’t even begin to make sense of all the things that have come before it.”
“Who’s writing the story?”
She laughed. “I have no idea.”
The kids exploded up the steps and through the front door of the museum, and Lydia winced. Because she could see Dana Groves sitting at the front desk, and she had a feeling that the older woman did not take kindly to kids running around like the museum was a gymnasium.
She hadn’t seen Ruby since their awkward Thanksgiving fight that hadn’t ended up being much of a fight and she didn’t know if it would be tense between them now.
But thankfully, Ruby appeared, smiling in greeting. Lydia was happy to let it go on that way. “I’m so glad you’re here,” she said. “Let me show you the new display.”
She shepherded her niece and nephews into the next room, where there was a brilliant display set up. A counter with a cash register, all manner of old-fashioned labels printed out and wrapped around tin cans, big flour sacks full of... Well, maybe it was really flour.
“Ruby,” Marianne said. “This is amazing.”
“It has been very popular,” Ruby said. “I’m thrilled that we were able to get it put together. There were some set pieces that I was able to borrow from the community theater. And the kids are just loving it.”
The kids had already gotten aprons, and Riley had grabbed a broom and was sweeping the floor.
“He doesn’t do that at home,” Lydia said.
