“I know that too,” I said.
“So what are you going to do?”
“I told him I need time.”
“That’s fair.”
“I’m not even sure what I’m deciding.
Whether I still want the divorce.
Whether I can trust him again.
Whether I can be in the same room as Diane without—” I stopped.
“Without what?”
“Without feeling like everything I thought was real might have been managed.”
Tessa was quiet for a moment.
“Some of it was managed,” she said.
“That’s true.
But some of it was also just — your life.
Your marriage.
The parts that were real were real.”
I didn’t answer right away.
A car pulled out of the parking lot.
Someone’s phone rang nearby.
The ordinary sounds of an ordinary Thursday.
“He said he was afraid,” I said.
“That if he told me what his mother had done, I’d leave anyway.
And he’d rather lose me to a misunderstanding.”
Tessa made a face.
“That’s both very sweet and very stupid.”
“Yes.”
“Very Nathan, honestly.”
Despite everything, I almost smiled.
“Yeah,” I said.
“It is.”
Tessa put her hand over mine on the bench.
“You don’t have to decide anything today,” she said.
“You just have to get through today.”
