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NADIA
The air is silent and weighed down by a blanket of tension as Harry drives me across town. My regret and sorrow are so big, they balloon to fill every inch of space inside this car. Stopped at a traffic light, he gets lost in his thoughts.
“Green…” I whisper.
“What?” He gently shakes his head.
“It’s green. The light.”
He blinks, turning his attention back to the road. “Right. Green,” he murmurs. Then, he presses on the gas.
Minutes later, he pulls into my driveway and we both sit in silence some more. Eventually, he sighs heavily and unsnaps his seatbelt. “Let me walk you to the door.”
Nodding, I follow suit and I trail him up my front steps. We stand face to face in the shadows of the front porch and I just want to touch him. I want to reach out an wrap his arms around me. Normally, he’s so physically affectionate. Whenever I’m within touching distance, his hands always inevitably end up on me.
But not tonight.
I can’t blame him. And that hurts.
I hate making excuses for my actions but I need him to know that I never meant to betray him. I never meant for any of this to happen. “Please understand that I didn’t have a choice,” I start softly. “As much as I wanted to run straight to you and tell you everything the minute I found out you were being traded, I couldn’t. It would have been a breach of lawyer-client privilege.”
That’s the nature of ethical obligations. That’s how it works. It’s bigger than me. It’s bigger than Harry.
“I tried to find a way out. A way to fix things without you getting hurt. I failed. I just couldn’t—”
“ You couldn’t breach lawyer-client privilege.” He drops his head and nods at the ground. “I understand that. I understand that your hands were tied. I understand that it was out of your control.” His eyes finally lift and the pain in them could knock out my knees like a hammer. “But you breached the trust in our marriage andthatstill hurts.”
Hearing him say that is a blow to the chest. I hate this so much. I hate that I hurt him.
“I’m sorry…” is all I can say, my voice hoarse from the emotions squeezing my windpipe.
“I am, too.” He pushes a heavy exhale from his lungs. “Look—I’m upset. Really fucking upset. But I still take my responsibility in all this. Because you warned me that something like this could happen. That was a big part of the reason you didn’t want to be with me in the first place. I jumped into this knowing fully well that it could turn into a mess. So I guess that, really, I’m upset with myself. I’m upset at the circumstances. I’m upset at…” his words trail off. “I…I don’t know.”
“Do you regret us?” I find the courage to ask. “Do you regret that we got together?”
Harry searches my face. “I…I could never. I can’t bring myself to regret one minute we ever shared together.”
My heart feels a spark of hope for the first time all day.
I blink back a wayward tear. “So, what happens now? Where do we go from here?”
Please tell me you still love me. Please tell me our marriage isn’t over.
The irony isn’t lost on me. I came into this relationship convinced that he’s the one who couldn’t be trusted. Now, here we are—I’m the one who betrayed his trust. And I feel like garbage over it.
His eyes refuse to meet mine as his head wags from left to right. “I’m confused, Nadia. I just lost something that means a lot to me. Now, I’ll have to leave my family behind. My grandmother. Move to the other side of the country. I…I need some time to think. I need some space.”
I feel like I might crumble right here on this porch. Somehow, I hold myself together and nod. “Okay.”
Harry hesitates for a long while. Then his arms come around me and his lips press to my forehead for a moment that ends too soon. This man who knows my soul inside and out suddenly feels like a stranger. I’ve never felt more alone in this world.
I don’t want to let him go.
I sag against his chest and grip the front of his sweatshirt, begging myself not to cry. Wishing I could climb inside his heart. Physically become a part of him. So he wouldn’t have a choice. So he could never leave me.
But all too soon, his arms slip away and he jogs back to his car. Our eyes meet through his windshield in the dark.
He’s the one who looks away.
