He had been scared.
I asked him one final time for his phone.
Again, he refused.
That night, I slept in another room.
Over the following days, Rob insisted that the kiss had been a single mistake.
He apologized, begged me not to throw away our marriage, and promised nothing else had happened.
But I could not get past the lies.
He had lied about Claire.
He had lied about the kiss.
He had let me believe my tattoo was destroying our marriage when he knew exactly what was really threatening it.
Worst of all, when the truth got too close, he had attacked something deeply meaningful to me and tried to make me feel ashamed of it.
Eventually, I filed for divorce.
It was not an easy decision.
There were years of memories between us, and ending a marriage did not suddenly make those years meaningless.
Natalie noticed the changes, too.
One day, she climbed beside me and looked unusually serious.
“Nana, are you sad?”
“A little,” I admitted.
“Because Grandpa isn’t here?”
I swallowed.
“Some things are changing, sweetheart.”
Her face fell.
“I don’t like changing.”
“Neither do I sometimes.”
She leaned against me quietly.
Then, her eyes drifted toward my arm.
