The emptiness of that awful week with Leo had been the wake-up call I’d needed. I was coming to terms with the reality that my marriage was dead.
The trip to see him had been a desperate act by a desperate woman, and when it turned out to be a bigger failure than I could ever have imagined, I realised that he was actually right. I still couldn’t understand why, but there was no doubt that he was more committed to that job than he was to anything else – even a future with me, and even his physical safety.
When Leo did return from Istanbul, we shuffled around the house as if we were room-mates rather than spouses. We were each careful to stay out of the other’s way, and we spoke to one another with an artificial level of politeness. But beyond the practicalities, we did not talk. I didn’t want to be the one to bring up the subject of a separation – not yet anyway – but I had decided that when Leo did, I would calmly agree. I even called the management at my apartment building and had them cancel future holiday bookings and arranged for some things to be moved out of storage to prepare my apartment for my return, but beyond that, I made no plans.
For several weeks, we stayed in a polite but emotionless limbo. But then my period failed to show, and all hell broke loose.
40
Leo – September 2015
I decide to surprise Molly a few days later, and I arrange for Tracy to come later in the day than she usually does. I skip my swim to rest all morning, and then just before Molly is due home, I greet Tracy.
‘I hope she doesn’t faint,’ Tracy remarks, as she’s setting me up in the supportive harness. ‘She is pregnant, after all. You should have warned her.’
‘I wanted to surprise her.’
‘Well, she’ll certainty get that,’ Tracy chuckles. A few minutes later, we hear the elevator doors, and Molly calls out, ‘Hey, Leo! Are you here?’
‘Yep,’ I call back, and Molly follows the sound of my voice into the open living area where I have been training. Her eyes widen as she sees Tracy, and she gives us both a curious smile.
‘What’s this?’
‘It’s a surprise.’
‘Oh,’ she says, and I see confusion cross her face. I glance at Tracy.
‘Ready?’ I ask, and Tracy nods, so I put my hands on the standing frame and take a deep breath, and I rise. Once upon a time, I could run ten kilometres with less effort than it takes me to make two steps now – but I do it – I lift my left foot, and as I shuffle it forward, I whisper under my breath heel, and then I lower it slowly, and whisper again toe. My hands shake as I force the frame forward, and then I repeat the motion with the other foot.
After two steps, I am completely shattered and Tracy moves the chair behind me to catch me just as I collapse back into it. I am exhausted from this process in a way that still seems impossible – but I did it, and I raise my eyes to Molly, expecting to see excitement and joy and pride on her face.
Instead, I see a level of disappointment and fear that she cannot hide. This is not a micro-expression that I could have misread – this is a long, frozen moment that leaves me in no doubt at all what she thinks about my progress.
The wave of triumphant buzz I had been riding disappears in an instant as our eyes lock. I have felt like this before – disappointed by her, and disappointed in her – every time something wonderful happened with a story and she dismissed it or refused to even discuss it with me. My chest feels strangely tight.
‘I… um… I should go, Leo,’ Tracy says hesitantly. I nod, and she leans towards me and starts to unclip the harness.
‘Leave it,’ I say abruptly, and she scurries from the room as if the tension emanating from Molly and me might injure her somehow. I do not look away from my wife, not for a second. I am inexplicably furious with her, and I recognise that I am familiar with that emotion too.
This is the missing piece to the jigsaw puzzle of our life, that thing that I have not understood at all since I woke from the coma – it is the central piece upon which all of the other parts to us hang. She has said that our relationship broke down because I worked too much but I suddenly understand that for me the point of failure was actually Molly’s stubborn, selfish refusal to support me. This brutally disappointing moment feels just like the dullness of her tone when I’d call her to tell her about some amazing development in a story, and the almost bored way she’d ask me every single fucking time I had to leave, do you have to go?
After everything we have been through, I cannot believe that today I have stood before her – against all odds, after so much excruciating work – and that she cannot even bring herself to be happy for me.
‘Are you going to say something?’ I prompt.