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“What?” I say in confusion. “Did you work late and decide to come tomorrow instead?” That’s so like him. Work, work, work, and lose track of everything other than the issue immediately in front of him. It’s sort of cute, if annoying at times. Like these times.
“At all.” His tone is flat and cold.
“What do you mean? Is the project not going well?” It’s the only thing I can think of. Henry is basically a workaholic, and his work ethic is a good thing. Usually.
“Look, Janey... you’re uhm... great, but I’m super swamped and need to prioritize my own growth trajectory. You understand that. And you’re—”
I inhale sharply. “You don’t mean the vacation, do you? Are you...” Realization hits me like a wrecking ball. “Are you breaking up with me? For work?”
My stomach is somewhere in my ass right now. My nursing professors would say that’s not medically possible, but it’s exactly what I feel like at this moment.
“No, no. It’s not that. I just... you, me, we’re not...” He groans and moves around, and I hear the tell-tale squeak of the couch in his apartment. He’s not at the office. He’s at home, reclining back on the left-end chaise where he always sits, even though he knows I like the spot in the L-shaped corner where I can curl up by the window.
I’m not stupid. And I have experience reading between the lines to hear what he’s not saying. He never intended on coming, but he let me believe he was. He let me cook him a romantic–and definitely not poisoned–dinner and worry about his drive while he was chilling at home. He let me tell my whole family that he was coming to the wedding, knowing he wasn’t gonna come.
He’s stuttering through something about it not being our time yet, but I’m only half listening, too caught up in the swirling tornado in my mind of ‘no, no, no’ coupled with a high-pitched squealing noise.
“What are you talking about?” I ask when I realize I haven’t heard most of what he’s said. He laughs, actually snorts like that’s funny, and I’m confused for a second until it clicks. He’s laughing because that’s what he always comments when I go on a rambling tangent and he checks out mentally. Guess the shoe’s on the other foot this time. It doesn’t feel any better on this side.
I sober with the thought and ask more seriously, “What about the wedding?”
This can’t be happening. Not now, not to me. He’s making a fool out of me and setting me up for an even worse situation at the wedding. And he knows it.
I can feel tears prick my eyes, and I swallow thickly so Henry won’t hear how hurt I am.
No, not hurt. Scared. I’m scared of being with Henry... and ofnotbeing with him. Of the wedding and my family seeing me as a failure all over again. It’s all falling apart, but I can fix it. I have to fix it. At least throw some spit and duct tape on it to get through the next few days.
“I told you how important the wedding is for me, and you’re bailing on me now?” I don’t like the desperation in my voice, but I can’t seem to rein it in because I am desperate.
“That’s the problem, babe. Meeting your family is a big step, and I don’t think we’re ready for that,” Henry says in a cold but also placating voice. “Maybe when you get back, we can talk and figure something out. Go back to... I don’t know, dating?”
He genuinely sounds as if he thinks I’ll agree to that. Of course, I’ve given him no reason to think I would disagree. Not with anything. That’s me, Agreeable, Easygoing, Do Anything for Anyone Janey.
“Dating?” I echo hollowly. “We barely see each other now with all the time you’re putting into the McDermott project. And I understand that it’s a big opportunity for you, but—” I hear something other than the creaking couch in the background that stops me mid-sentence. I’m making excuses for him, but he’s not alone at his apartment. Pieces of a puzzle I didn’t even know I was completing fall into place one by one, and I realize the truth. “You’re sleeping with someone from the office.” The idea comes suddenly, falling off my tongue dully because I can’t find any more emotion in my rock-bottom pit. “That’s why we haven’t had sex in months.”
Every single late night, every single ‘too tired to come over’, every single time he heralded himself as a dedicated, loyal employee, he was with someone else. I can see it all so clearly when only a moment ago, I would’ve defended him. I want him to tell me I’m wrong so badly, but I already know the truth.
He tries anyway. “No, I’m not.”
The answer is reflexive, but I can hear the lie plain as day. He might as well have said that he’s a green Martian in a skin suit for as believable as that denial was. He’s not even trying to convince me, not really, probably assuming that I’ll put up with it because... well, because I’m Plainy Janey.
Yeah, he knows about my awful family too and the things they said and did to me when I was a kid. He thought some of it was funny and told me I was being too sensitive when I cried fresh tears about something that happened over a decade ago. And now, he’s using my own trauma against me. Worse, I’m doing it too.
Yeah, there’s a part of me that thinks I should let his infidelity go and be happy with what I have. Maybe that’s all I deserve.
“You had me fooled this whole time. I really thought...” I stop before I say that I thought this vacation was going to be a new level for our relationship. Not a ring situation, but just more than what we were before. Laughing bitterly, I instead say, “I bet you’ve been getting a real kick outta what a gullible idiot I am this whole time while I stupidly believed you. Believedinyou.”
“Janey.”
There’s a sixth sense you get as a nurse when a patient isn’t doing well. We call it ‘circling the drain’ because ‘imminent death’ is too blunt and tends to hurt more. So we couch it in euphemisms and coded language in an attempt to buffer the blunt impact of death. But the reality is there nonetheless, and we all know it.
That’s how this feels.
Henry and me, what we were and what I hoped we were becoming, is dying. Right here, right now, in this moment. I can’t pretend this didn’t happen. I might not deserve more, but I don’t deserve this. I’m cut to the core, and the lies unravel whatever stranglehold he had on my heart.
“No.” I wish I could say it was a firm, strong answer delivered with fire and brimstone. But that’s not who I am. It’s soft and quiet, but that doesn’t make it any less true. I’m crumbling to pieces, but I have deal breakers. This is one.
“Don’t be like that, babe,” Henry says, this time sounding legitimately into the conversation for the first time. “It’s nothing, just a way to let off steam when the pressure gets to be too much. It’s easy, no strings. Not like what we have.”
