“Is this because I bought Stephen a gift?”
“No.” He muttered something and tugged at his collar again. “I shouldn’t be doing this now. I didn’t plan to. I should have—”
“Is it because of Sophie leaving? I know it’s unsettling…”
Panic gripped her heart. Squeezed. Squeezed some more. Her lungs. She couldn’t breathe. She was going to pass out in her duck confit. She imagined the story appearing in the following day’s edition of the Woodbrook Post.
/> A local woman was asphyxiated when she fell face-first into her meal.
“It’s not because of Sophie. It’s us. Things haven’t been right for a while.”
There was something in David’s eyes she’d never seen before.
Pity. Yes, there was sadness, and also guilt, but it was the pity that tore her to shreds.
This was David. Her David—who had cried on their wedding day because he loved her so much, who had held her while their daughter fought her way into the world and been there for Grace through thick and thin. David, her best friend and the only person who truly knew her.
He would never want to see her hurt, let alone hurt her himself. Knowing that, she felt her panic turn to fear. He didn’t want to hurt her but he was doing it anyway—which meant this was serious. He’d decided he’d rather hurt her than stay with her.
“I don’t understand.” Surely if something hadn’t been right, she’d have known? She and David had been a team for as long as she could remember. Without him she would have fallen apart all those years ago. “What hasn’t been right, David?”
“Our lives have become…I don’t know. Boring.” His forehead glistened with sweat. “Predictable. I go to work in the same place, see the same people and I come home every day to—”
“To me.” It was all too easy to finish his sentence. “So what you’re really saying is that I’m predictable. I’m boring.” Her hands were shaking and she clasped them in her lap.
“It’s not you, Grace. It’s me.”
The fact that he was shouldering the blame didn’t help. “How can it be all you? I’m the one you’re married to and you’re unhappy—which means I’m doing something wrong.” And the problem was that she loved the fact that their life was predictable. “I grew up with unpredictability, David. Believe me, it’s overrated.”
“I know what you grew up with.”
Of course he did.
Was she boring? God, was it true?
It was true that she was a little obsessed about them being good parents to Sophie, but that was important to David, too.
He undid another button on his shirt and gestured to the waiter to bring more water. “Why is it so hot in here? I don’t feel too good… I can’t remember what I was saying…”
She didn’t feel too good, either. “You were telling me you want a divorce.”
She hadn’t believed that word would ever come up in a conversation between her and David, and she wished it hadn’t come up now, in a public place. At least two of the people in the bistro had children in her class—which was unfortunate, given the nature of this conversation.
Mommy says you’re getting divorced, Mrs. Parker, is that right?
“Grace—”
David took a sip of water and she noticed there was a tremor in his hand. He was looking pale and ill.
She was pretty sure that if she looked in the mirror she’d think the same about herself.
What about Sophie? She’d be devastated. What if she was too upset to go away for the summer? It was terrible, awful timing.
Monica would probably blame red meat. Too much testosterone.
“We can talk to someone, if you think that would help. Whatever it is that needs working on, we’ll work on it.”
“Fixing our marriage isn’t something you can add to your ‘To Do’ list, Grace.”