Things with Trent have been unnecessarily tense, and I know it’s all focused around the possibility of running into David. He’s even told me that he doesn’t understand why he’s hyped up about it because he clearly won, whatever I’m worth as a prize, but he’s amped up all the same.

  Right now, I’m just trying to get through the day without throwing up and not looking at the clock every five minutes. So far, I’m failing on the latter. Every time I swear an eternity has gone by, but as though time is mocking me, it’s been no more than six minutes every single time.

  I should be busying myself with something productive, like cleaning the house. But I despise cleaning on an atomic level. All emails and reports are caught up for being class mom and PTA member. Sports haven’t started yet. I have nothing to do but sit and wait and stare at the clock.

  Trent and I are already packed. I did that last night in anticipation of needing it to be done.

  So instead, I sit at my kitchen island and tap my fingernails against it incessantly, my foot bouncing nonstop. Normally at ten in the morning a cup of coffee is welcome, but I’m afraid it’ll just amp me up even more instead of having the calming effect it often does.

  I’m about to give up on my self-appointed stance of not cleaning, when the door swings open and Trent walks in.

  Momentarily I’m struck still as a cool wisp of shock coils up my spine, but then I shake the feeling away and jump to attention.

  “Hi! What are you doing home so early?”

  He lifts and puts his briefcase on the table, shrugging off his sports coat. “Figured I’d come calm you down since you’re surely ready to blast off from your anxiety.”

  I clasp my hands together and bend my left leg at the knee. “My hero.”

  “So, I’m assuming you’ve been high-strung and staring at the clock for hours?”

  “Pretty much.”

  His head droops as he chuckles and runs a hand through his hair, tousling it even more than the messy way he styles it. Which of course makes him look even sexier than he normally does.

  I give myself a quick glance and take in my oversized pullover and yoga pants. Not exactly screaming sexy.

  “I’m going to change. I’ll be down to entertain you in a few.” He leans forward and pecks my cheek as he undoes his tie.

  Quickly I dart into the downstairs bathroom and try to liven my curls up a little bit, give them some bounce or give myself something that looks remotely attractive. I can’t run upstairs and change without him noticing me and effectively asking what the hell I’m doing.

  Part of me wonders what the hell I am doing. Am I going to initiate for once? Unlikely. Somehow, even after all this time, I still get stuck in my head about him turning me down, even though he’s assured me he never would. But sex seems like a great way to pass some time. And it may just relax me enough that I’ll be able to cope until it’s time to leave. Plus, the kids aren’t home to interrupt anything.

  The issue I’m experiencing being high-strung right now is how Trent’s been behaving. He just seems distant and disinterested. It’s hard to get him to talk to me and look at me the same way right now, and I don’t understand any of it. Nothing’s even happened yet and he’s acting like I had a whole affair with David. Who I still have no idea if he’s even going to the reunion.

  Trent comes down and finds me sitting on the couch, chewing my cuticles. Somehow even in athletic pants and a t-shirt, he looks so attractive. We’re basically wearing the same thing, and he’s so much sexier than I am.

  He flops onto the cushion next to me and puts an arm behind my neck, pulling me against him and kissing the top of my head. “It’s going to be fine, Les.”

  I push against his chest to meet his eye. “You’re one to talk considering how you’ve been the past week and a half.”

  His brow scrunches and his head jerks back. “How I’ve been? And how is that?”

  “Don’t act like you don’t know. You’ve admitted to being on edge about the whole reunion and David being there.”

  He flinches at the mention of David’s name, and I fight an eyeroll. “On edge sure. But that’s it.”

  I sit up straight and pull my legs beneath me. “Are you serious? Your whole attitude has been short and frustrated and just…tense. Over what? The possibility that an ex-boyfriend of mine is going to be at the high school reunion?”

  “I don’t like the guy,” he says through gritted teeth. “You can’t blame me for not wanting to be around a guy who slept with my wife.”

  “And whose fault is that, Trent? For one, you broke up with me long before I dated David. And secondly, it was a long time ago. It’s not like I had an affair with him or we were together even remotely close to now. It was over ten years ago at this point.”

  “It doesn’t matter, Leslie. I’m going to have to see this guy and know that he’s seen you naked, he knows what you look like under him, and what you sound like. Yeah, it’s my fucking fault, I’m well aware of that fact, but that doesn’t change the fact that I hate it.” He’s clearly frustrated, and I don't know what to do or say but I’m suddenly wishing he didn’t come home early.

  He takes my hand in his and pulls it into his lap. “Leslie, I love you. So incredibly much. You’re the most perfect woman, and I love our life together. But I have regrets and the fact that David exists as anything more than a human on this planet and ex-classmate, is one of them. Especially because he follows you and comments on your social media. Maybe I’m reading too much into it, but to me that means he’s still into you. And I’m not okay with that.”

  I yank my hand from his. “I’m not perfect, Trent. Stop calling me that, you know I don’t like it.”

  His chin drops to his chest with a heavy sigh. “That’s what you took away from what I said? Really? I’m trying to share my feelings with you and you’re getting stuck on a word?” Hurt hangs from his words, and it drives a shard of glass straight through my heart.

  But before I can say anything he stands. I reach for him, hoping to convince him to stay but I know it’s pointless. “I’m sorry. You know that word irks me.”

  “You’ve always been perfect, Leslie. You’re the only one who doesn’t see it. But maybe it’s time to accept it. I’m going to get a workout in before the kids come home.” Without another word he disappears into the basement to utilize his home gym. I’m sure he’ll be down there for at least two hours, even if he’s not working out the whole time.

  Right now, he just wants to be away from me, and I can’t say that I blame him because I’m being an atrocious wife. I didn’t even take his feelings into consideration, I just jumped on the word. And that’s not fair or right. Sometimes it’s hard to remember that Trent has feelings when he spends so much time wrangling mine.

  I end up sitting on the couch staring at the wall and picking my lip for who knows how long. It’s not until the basement door shuts and pulls me from my stupor that I jump and taste iron on my tongue. Great, my lip must be bleeding.

  But Trent doesn’t stop in the living room to see me, he doesn’t say that he’s done. Instead, he makes a beeline for the stairs and heads straight up. Within two minutes I hear the shower turn on and know he’s going to be at least another thirty minutes while he washes away his workout and probably a bit of my attitude.

  This is going to make for an extra-long weekend. Maybe adding some alcohol will help us loosen up a bit and let go of the baggage we’re clearly carrying.

  Is it too early to crack open the wine?

  Chapter 20

  It’s about a ninety-minute drive to Brighton. Not terribly far, but not close either. Enough that the quiet of the car is starting to wear on me and it’s only been twenty minutes.

  I try to occupy myself by looking out the window at the passing scenery, fiddling with the hem of my shirt, anything to take my mind off the suffocating silence, but I can’t.

  “So, are you just not going to talk to me this weekend? It’s going to make things kind of awkward.” The words blurt out and not kindly. In fact, they’re pretty accusatory when I haven’t spoken either.

  With a raised eyebrow, Trent looks over at me as he rests his right wrist on the steering wheel and perches his chin on his other hand. “You can talk too, ya know. Or am I supposed to carry the conversation as well?”

  “Why are we arguing? I don’t even understand what’s going on here.”

  “Who said we’re arguing?” Is he playing dumb or is he just blind to the obvious?

  “If we’re not arguing, what are we doing?”

  He’s silent for a minute, staring straight ahead, and I wonder if I’m going to even be graced with a response when he opens his mouth before closing it again. “We’re just both tense about this weekend.”

  “We didn’t have to come. I didn’t want to go.” The argument seems moot at this point since we’re almost halfway there.

  “It’ll be good for you, Les. Don’t you see that? You live in this world where you worry too much about what other people think of you. Seeing these schmucks from high school and how not well they’re doing is going to be refreshing for you.”

  “All I’m going to see is how I don’t measure up. What do I have to be proud of?” I wince and my eyes flutter shut the moment they’re out of my mouth. “Trent…I—”

  “What do you have to be proud of? How about your three beautiful children for starters. I promise you there will be people at the reunion who would be happy to have one child, let alone three.” The words come out angrily, and he has every right to be mad.

  I link my fingers in my lap and look down at them. “You know that’s not what I meant.”

  “Do I? Leslie, sometimes it feels like you hate your life, our life. That me and the kids are just a burden holding you back from some other greatness.” His words sting against my skin and burn through my body.

  How could he possibly think that? Being a stay-at-home mother is exhausting to the truest extent of the word, but I love it. Even if there are moments that I don’t, moments where I’d give anything to be anywhere else, I love being home with my kids and watching them grow. And I love being home when Trent gets back from work. I appreciate how hard he works so I can stay home.

  Do I not show that enough? Do I not express my gratitude and love of my life?

  “That’s not fair. I love you and the kids so much. I love our life.”

  “You don’t show it. If anything, you seem irritated by everything by the time I get home. You don’t want to spend time with us that much anymore. You’re too busy with the PTA and class mom stuff and you’re opening your wine earlier and earlier.” He turns to look over at me every few seconds as he speaks, his mouth finishing in a firm line.

  I glance down at my fingers as they weave together in my lap. His words hit hard. “You know this time of year is busy. There’s so much to do for all the classes and the PTA and getting things set for summer. It’s not fair to use that against me when I’m trying to organize and set things up for what I’ve signed up for.”

  He takes my hand in his and squeezes. “But, Les. You hate doing the PTA and being class mom. Why do you take it on every year if you despise it so much?”

  “I don’t hate it.” But even I don’t believe the words as they come out of my mouth. Because I’ve never enjoyed being on the PTA or being the class mom. Sure, it has its benefits like getting to see the kids in school and get a feel for their class environment. But I don’t enjoy doing it, or the stress it brings me.

  “I have to do something with my time, Trent. What else am I supposed to do? What else will make me successful? I was voted most likely to succeed, my parents always expected more and more of me, and what have I succeeded at besides creating a family? Which I can really only take half the credit for.”

  “You’re an amazing mother. You can be that. You can find a part-time job, volunteer, go back to school. You can do anything you want, Les. Hell, I don’t give a shit if you sit around on your perfect ass and read books all day. I want you to be happy in your life and happy with us.”

  “I am. It’s just busy this time of year. The stress is getting to me.”

  “I’d believe that if it was only recently, but it’s not. It’s been going on longer than that, and I’ve been quiet about it because I was chalking it up to stress. But I don’t know, for some reason it just felt right to finally bring it up. This is going to be something that hopefully opens your eyes to see what’s really going in your life.”

  “Is this why you’ve been so frustrated with me lately?”

  “Part of it could be. It’s hard to feel like you don’t appreciate your life when I work hard for us and so you can stay home with the kids and not have to worry about going to work every day. Because those three adore you more than you realize. But in all honesty, I’m not at all looking forward to the prospect of David being there.” He says the name with so much disdain it almost makes me laugh.

  “I know you don’t like him, or that I was with him, but it was such a long time ago and he may not be there.”

  “What I don’t like is that he still seems to want to have a connection with you. And sometimes I wonder if you do too. If that’s the life you feel like you missed out on or wonder what it’d be like had you stayed with David.”

  “That was never a possibility.”

  His silence says more than his words could. And what it screams is that he doesn’t believe me when I tell him I didn’t love David. Or at the very least that I didn’t love him enough to stay with him.

  I can’t begin to imagine the demons and scenarios running through his head. The blame he puts on himself for our breakup is more than it should be.

  We found our way back to each other, and while it was certainly a possibility that we wouldn’t, I never would have stayed with David. I know in his mind David is just the face of that possibility of us not being together which is something he struggles with, despite the fact that we’ve been together for so long.

  But combined with how he thinks I feel about life, maybe he thinks I wish I never came back to him in the first place.

  How my life would be different with somebody else, I can’t tell you. I’d always wanted to have a family, so that aspect wouldn’t be all that different except I obviously wouldn’t have the kids I have now.

  He needs to let this go. “Listen to me when I tell you that there is zero chance I would have stayed with David. I broke up with him before school even ended. And it had nothing to do with the fact that I figured I might see you at Stanford, especially because you broke up with me. I had assumed that meant you were done and off living a grand college life without me.”

  “It could have been anybody, Leslie. I was a damn fool, and I’ll never forgive myself for it.”

  “But you have to because things worked out how they’re supposed to. We’re together, we have those three beautiful children you reminded me about earlier. You have to let go of this feeling that had you not broken up with things would be something different. Especially because I wasn’t with anybody when we got back together. I was single and enjoying that life.”

  Silence surrounds us again but it’s far less uncomfortable than it was last time.

  If only Trent knew how things really went down, maybe he’d forgive himself.

  Chapter 21

  Ten Years Ago

  The conversation I’ve been avoiding for weeks finally feels like it can’t be put off any longer.

  “David, we need to talk.”

  He slowly shuts his locker and looks at me with that intense gaze I’ve come to enjoy. “That can’t be good.”

  I hug my books tighter to my chest. “Not now, though.”

  “So, you’re going to drop a bomb on me in the middle of the day? What’s this all about, Les?” He moves to stand in front of me and pushes his hips into mine while he tips my chin up so I can meet his eyes.

  “Just something we need to talk about.” I won’t show my hand. He can’t know this is going to be the end or he’ll avoid me.

  His jaw ticks, and he exhales heavily through his nose as he drops my face and takes a step back. “Okay. I’ll drive you home after school and we can talk then. Yeah?”

  “Sounds fine.”

  He leans in and gives me a small peck on the lips. “I’ll see you later,” he whispers the words against my mouth.

  It’s been so different dating David out in the open instead of when I dated Trent in private. We can kiss and hold hands in the hallway. He drives me home or picks me up most days of the week. There’s no sneaking around or not telling people that we’re together like there was with Trent.

  In so many ways it’s freeing. But something about it just isn’t right. And that’s what I need to tell him today.

  We’ve been together for seven months, but we won’t see eight.

  The clock ticks by mockingly slow for the rest of the day, causing my anxiety to do nothing but heighten.

  I don’t realize how high strung I am until I’m at my locker gathering my things for the day and David wraps an arm around my waist, making me jump and bump my head on his chin.

  As I shut my locker, he sighs heavily and throws an arm around my shoulder, tugging me into his side and kissing the top of my head.

  I’m going to crush him.

  We drive back to my house in an anxiety filled silence. Not that it takes long. Thankfully.

  But when we get there, he parks on the road and shuts off the car, his hand immediately finding his mouth. “You’re breaking up with me, aren’t you?”

  “I’m sorry, David.”

  “Why? Is it because of Stanford? Because Trent’s there and you’re still in love with him?” The words come out angrily and sting against the wounds that never fully healed from when Trent left.

  “No, David. It’s not that.” Entirely. I’d be a liar if I said part of me wasn’t hoping to see Trent that first week at Stanford and have him throw himself at me because he missed me. But that’s not likely to be reality and I’ve accepted that fact. Mostly.

 

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