“Where are you going to live?” she asked, sounding as frantic as she felt.
“I don't know yet,” he said, avoiding her eyes again. “We'll have plenty of time to figure that out. I'll move to a hotel tomorrow,” he said quietly, and it suddenly occurred to her that not only was this happening, but it was happening now, not at some distant date in the future. He was going to move out in the morning. “I'll sleep in the guest room tonight,” he said, moving toward the bathroom to gather up his things, and instinctively she reached out and grabbed his arm.
“I don't want you to,” she said loudly. “I don't want Wim to know what's happening if he sees you in there.” And there was more to it than that. She wanted him next to her, for one last night. It had never dawned on her that night when she dressed for their dinner party that this was going to be the last day and night of their marriage. She wondered if he knew he was going to tell her that night. She felt like a fool now remembering how worried she had been about him when he looked tired as he came in. This was obviously what had been eating at him, not the merger.
“Are you sure you don't mind my sleeping here?” he asked, looking worried. He wondered if she was going to do something insane, like try to kill herself or him, but he could see in her eyes that she wouldn't. She was heartbroken, but not unbalanced. “I can go back to the city now, if you prefer.” To Rachel. To his new life. Away from her forever. It was the last thing she wanted, as Paris looked at him and shook her head.
“I want you to stay.” Forever. For better or worse, until death do us part, just like you promised twenty-four years ago. She couldn't help but wonder how he could throw their life away and forget those vows. Easily, apparently. For a thirty-one-year-old woman and two little boys. It was as though the years he had shared with Paris had vanished in the blink of an eye.
He nodded and went to put his pajamas on, as she sat in the chair and stared into space. And when he came back, he got into bed, lay there stiffly, and then turned off his light. And then after a long moment, he spoke without looking at her, or reaching out. She could hardly hear his voice as she blew her nose.
“I'm sorry, Paris…I never thought this would happen…. I'll do anything I can to make this easier for you. I just didn't know what else to do.” He sounded helpless and forlorn as he lay in their bed for the last time.
“You can still give her up. Will you at least think about it?” she said, loving him so much she was not afraid to beg. Getting rid of Rachel was her only hope.
There was a long silence from the bed, and finally he answered her. “No, I won't. It's too late for that. There's no turning back now.”
“Is she pregnant?” Paris asked, sounding horrified. She hadn't even thought of that. But even if she was, Paris would rather suffer the indignity of an illegitimate child of his than lose him entirely. It had happened to other men before, and their marriages managed to survive. If he wanted it to, theirs could as well. But he didn't want to preserve their marriage. That much was obvious to her.
“No, she's not pregnant. I just think I'm doing the right thing for me, maybe for both of us. I love you, but I don't feel about us the way I used to. You deserve more than that. You need to find someone who loves you the way I once did.”
“That's a rotten thing to say. What am I supposed to do? Put out ads? You're just tossing me out there, like a fish you're throwing back, and telling me to find someone else. How convenient for you. I've been married to you for more than half my life. I love you. I would have stayed married to you till I died. What am I supposed to do?” Just thinking about what he was doing to her filled her with terror and despair. She had never felt so frightened in her entire life. Her life as she had known it had ended, and the future seemed fraught with terror and danger and misery. The last thing she wanted was to find someone else. All she wanted was him. They were married. To her, that was sacred. And apparently less so to him.
“You're beautiful, and intelligent, and a good person. You're a wonderful woman, Paris, and a good wife. Some man is going to be lucky to have you. I'm just not the right one anymore. Something changed.… I don't know what it is, or why … but I know it did. I can't be here anymore.” She sat and stared at him for a long time, and then slowly got up out of her chair, and went to stand next to him, on his side of the bed, and sobbing quietly, she sank to her knees, and bowed her head on the bed. He lay there in bed, staring up at the ceiling, afraid to look at her, as tears rolled out of the corners of his eyes and onto his pillow, and gently he stroked her hair. For all its tender agony, and all the ancient feelings it evoked in both of them, they both knew that it was the last moment of its kind they would ever share.
Chapter 2
The next morning dawned in utter splendor with an insultingly brilliant blue sky and bright sun. Paris wanted it to be rainy and gloomy outside, as she turned over in bed and remembered what had happened the night before. And as soon as she did, she began to cry and looked over to find Peter, but he was already in the bathroom, shaving. And she put on a bathrobe and went downstairs to make coffee for both of them. She felt as though she had been trapped in some surreal tragic movie the night before, and maybe if she talked to him coherently in the bright light of day, everything would change. But she needed coffee first. As though she had been beaten, every inch of her ached. She hadn't bothered to comb her hair or brush her teeth, and her carefully applied makeup from the night before was streaked below her eyes and on her face. Wim looked up in surprise as she walked in. He was eating toast and drinking orange juice, and he frowned when he saw his mother. He had never seen her look that way before, and wondered if she'd had too much to drink at the party and was hung over, or maybe she was sick.
“You okay, Mom?”
“I'm fine. Just tired,” she said, pouring a glass of orange juice for his father, maybe for the last time ever, with the same sense of unreality she had had the night before. Maybe this was just a bad patch they were going through. It had to be that. He couldn't mean he wanted a divorce, could he? She was suddenly reminded of a friend who had lost her husband to a heart attack on the tennis court the year before. She had said that for the first six months after he died, she kept expecting him to walk through the door and laugh at her, and tell her it was all a joke and he was just kidding. Paris fully expected Peter to recant everything he had said the night before. Rachel and her sons would then vanish politely into the mists, and she and Peter would go on with their life as before. It was temporary insanity, that was all, but when Peter walked into the kitchen fully dressed and looking grim, she knew it wasn't a joke after all. Wim noticed how serious he looked too.
“Are you going to the office, Dad?” he asked, as Paris handed Peter the glass of orange juice, and he took it from her with a stern expression. He was hardening himself for the ugly scene he expected when Wim left, and he wasn't far wrong. She was planning to beg him to give up Rachel and come home. There was no sense of humiliation with their shared life on the line. And it was a strain for both of them to have Wim in their midst, sharing their final moments. Wim sensed that something was wrong, and wondered if they'd had an argument, although that was rare for them, and a minute later, taking his toast with him, he went back to his room.