Chapter 8: What We Carry Together
Sandra Okafor left her card on the coffee table and showed herself out.
Robert closed the door.
He stood with his back to it for a moment.
"Claire."
"I know."
"That's not a small thing.
What she just told us."
"I know, Robert."
He came and sat beside me on the sofa.
Not across from me.
Beside me.
Close enough that his arm was against mine.
"How are you feeling?"
I looked at the folder in my lap.
The hospital's letterhead.
The careful, formal language of people who knew they had done something wrong.
"I keep thinking about her," I said.
"The other woman.
She's out there right now finding out that the good news she's been living with wasn't true."
"I know."
"She probably told people.
Or didn't tell people.
She probably made her own decisions about her own life based on what they told her." I set the folder on the cushion beside me.
"And now someone is sitting across from her the way Sandra Okafor just sat across from me."
Robert was quiet.
"It's not your fault," he said.
"I know it's not.
But it doesn't stop me thinking about her."
He put his hand over mine.
We sat like that for a while.
The kitchen smelled like overcooked pasta.
Somewhere upstairs, Mark had music playing.
"What do you want to do?" Robert said.
"About the hospital.
About the legal side of it."
"I don't know yet.
I want to think about it."
"Okay."
"I don't want to decide tonight."
"Okay."
I leaned my head against his shoulder.
He didn't move.
"Robert.
I'm sorry I didn't tell you."
"I know."
"I really did think I was protecting you."
"I know that too." His arm came around me.
"But I want you to hear this, and I want you to actually hear it, not just nod and move on."
"Okay."
"You are not a burden.
Telling me something hard is not putting it on me.
That's not how this works." His voice was steady.
"I married you.
All of you.
The parts that are fine and the parts that aren't.
I don't want the edited version."
My eyes were wet.
"I've been giving everyone the edited version for a long time," I said.
"I know.
I let you." He paused.
"That's on both of us."
Ellie appeared in the doorway.
She looked at us on the sofa and her expression flickered — something between relief and uncertainty.
"Dinner's ready," she said.
"Dad's pasta is actually okay.
I was wrong."
"High praise," Robert said.
She almost smiled.
Then: "Mom, are you okay?"
I looked at my daughter.
Sixteen years old.
Standing in the doorway in her socks, trying to read the room the same way I'd been reading rooms since I was nine.
"Come here," I said.
She crossed the room and sat on the other side of me.
I put my arm around her.
"I'm okay," I said.
"And I'm going to start telling you when I'm not."
She leaned into me.
Said nothing.
That was enough.
Mark appeared behind her.
He stood in the doorway with his hands in his pockets, looking at the three of us on the sofa.
"Is this a family meeting?" he said.
"Because the pasta's getting cold."
"It's not a meeting," Robert said.
"Come sit down."
Mark came and sat on the arm of the sofa beside his father.
He was trying to look unbothered and failing.
"Dad told us," he said.
"About the hospital thing."
"I know."
"That's messed up."
"Mark—" Robert started.
"No, I mean — that the hospital did that.
That's messed up." He looked at me.
"And I'm sorry I said you were in a mood.
That time you didn't make dinner."
I looked at my son.
Seventeen years old.
Apologizing in the only way he knew how.
"Thank you," I said.
"That means a lot."
He nodded.
Looked away.
Looked back.
"Can we eat now?"
May you like
We ate Robert's pasta at the kitchen table, all four of us.
It was slightly overcooked and under-salted and nobody complained.
