“Before I blow out the candles, I’d like to ask you all something.”
Everyone fell silent.
He looked at me.
There was something in his expression that I had never seen before.
Fear.
“Could you leave us alone for a few minutes?”
Our oldest son laughed.
“Dad, what did you do that you need a private conversation?”
Everyone laughed.
Everyone except me.
A few minutes later, George and I were alone in the room.
He sat down on the couch and clasped his hands together. I sat across from him.
“George, what’s going on?”
For a long moment, he said nothing. Then he finally looked at me.
“Mary, the time has come for you to know why I really married you.”
Those words went through me like ice.
“What are you talking about?”
“What I’m about to tell you, I should have told you fifty-four years ago.”
I stared at him, trying to imagine what I was about to hear.
English Translation
My mind immediately went to the worst possibilities. Maybe he had never really loved me. Maybe there had been another woman.
Maybe our entire marriage had been built on money, duty, or some arrangement I knew nothing about.
