The Ex (4 page)
Any compunction I’d ever had about showing “weakness” in front of her faded in the face of my misery. “Don’t…go,” I managed between sobs.
“I’m not going anywhere.”
If someone had told me I would ever be relying on Valerie in a moment of extreme vulnerability, I would have thrown something at them. If they had said she would put her arms around me in a cradling hug, I would have started something on fire. But it was happening, and I was so grateful for her compassion, even after all the times I’d been a complete bitch to her.
When I calmed down, my face was hot, and my eyes sore from crying. Valerie went to the sink and rewet the cloth with cool water then came back to wash my face. I let her, even though I felt like a child.
Maybe that was where the mothering feeling was coming from. Emma was the same age as me, so Valerie was literally old enough to be my mom. There must have been some kind of transference going on between us, a confusion of our roles.
We were supposed to hate each other, weren’t we?
“I take it Neil has something of a problem, then?” There was a gentle scolding in Valerie’s tone, but it wasn’t directed at me. She sounded put out at him. When I nodded, miserable, she asked, “How long has this been going on?”
“I don’t know.” Just sitting there, I couldn’t put my finger on it. It might have been easier to imagine a time when Neil
hadn’t
responded to a bad situation by reaching for the booze. “It seems like…a very long time.”
It had been. Neil had been on pills when he’d returned home from seeing his mother in London after her stroke. He’d said he took them to cope with flying, and I’m sure that was a part of it. But there had also been…
“Oh my god.” I put my head in my hands, resting my elbows on the island. “It’s been every single time. Any time anything has been difficult or bad…”
“Then, it sounds like he’s back to where he was when Emma was little.”
I blinked at her. “What do you mean?”
Valerie took the now room-temperature tea towel and refreshed it under the faucet as she spoke over the sound of the water. “Neil has always had a bit of a problem. He wouldn’t have told you, because he doesn’t admit it. Not to Rudy, not to me, and he’s hidden it from Emma. But I don’t think he believes he has a problem.”
“I wish…” I almost started blubbering again. “Valerie, did you not tell me about this because…”
She paled, and shocked hurt lined her face. “No. I never told you because I didn’t know it was happening again. Even if I had, it wouldn’t have been my place to interfere.”
“So, this whole time…” I almost choked. “This whole time, I’ve been living with some version of Neil that’s, what? Just the result of some low-level recurring addiction?”
“Neil
is a low-level recurring addiction,” Valerie said, her mouth pulled down in a frown. “I could slap him for this.”
I had to admit, that took me by surprise. I would have thought Valerie would be happy that Neil and I were having problems. “Why are you helping me?”
“I’m not a monster, Sophie. You’re in pain. What was I to do, say ‘ta!’ and leave?” She turned and faced the cupboards. “Where will I find a glass in here?”
I pointed down the row of glass-fronted cabinets. Valerie got a tall cut-crystal tumbler and took a bottled water from the fridge. She poured it for me and slid it across the island, continuing, “You haven’t been living with some alternate version of Neil. He wasn’t drinking during his chemotherapy, was he?”
I shook my head and sipped my water.
“I don’t think he’s going to sober up and fall out of love with you. Honestly, I don’t know if he
can
sober up, but I know he can’t fall out of love with you. Still, this was extremely unfair. I know Rose has just died, and I know you wouldn’t look askance at him having a drink or two to blur the edges, but pharmaceutical interaction isn’t a proper response to grief.”
My chest hurt as words I didn’t want to say poured out. “I’m so stupid. I should have known. I’m supposed to know everything about him… I thought I did.”
“This isn’t your fault, Sophie. Neil is very good at making people see what he wants them to see.” A wistful note in her tone made me wonder if she was referring to their long-ago relationship. “But you’re also very good at calling him out for his bullshit.”
“I’m not sure I can do that. Not right now.” Not when his mother had just died. It seemed too cruel at a time like this.
“Not right now,” Valerie agreed. “When you return to New York, perhaps? Though I do think you have a right to object to this particular incident as soon as he’s coherent enough to listen.”
“Yeah. I’ll… Maybe I’ll call our therapist.” And shit. Now, she knew about that.
Thankfully, she was still in Kind Valerie mode. She nodded and assured me, “This will all come out all right, Sophie. You’re a smart girl, and you love each other. The two of you will work it out.”
Why did that actually make me feel better?
“I’m going to go,” she continued. “I don’t want to be here when Emma wakes up. She’ll realize something is amiss.”
Though my legs were still shaking, I walked Valerie to the door. “Thank you,” I said, quiet so that my voice wouldn’t travel up the echo-prone center stairwell. “For everything, Valerie.”
She nodded, her gaze drifting to the staircase. “Thank you, for protecting Emma from this.” She paused, and her next words were pained; they came at a great cost, I knew. With her hand on the door, she said, “And for taking care of him.”
She left, and I stood staring at the door for a long moment. Once again, the woman had left me speechless.
* * * *
“I don’t know what all the fuss was about,” he told me, pinching the bridge of his nose. He sat swaying on the edge of the bed, and though his speech was still a bit slurred, he was mostly with it. “I wouldn’t do anything irresponsible, I just wanted—”
“Don’t you ever do this to me again.” I went from tired and defeated to furious and trembling in three-point-five. Which, I assumed, was fast. It had to do with cars, and I’d heard Neil use the phrase before. Which just went to show how pissed off I was. I couldn’t even think of my own idioms.
Neil squinted at me in annoyance.
He
was annoyed? He hadn’t just had the “by the way, your fiancé is an addict” conversation with one of
my
exes.
The worst thing Neil can do in an argument with me is try to act like he’s being totally reasonable and I’m the one out of my mind. It only enrages me further, making him seem even more collected in comparison. He tried that now. “Don’t you think you’re overreacting, just a bit? It isn’t as though I swallowed a bottle of sleeping pills.”
“No, just Valium and scotch and enough marijuana hard candy to make me want to call the hospital!” My anger was like a jackhammer inside my body, shaking my bones. “Can you imagine how upsetting that would be to Emma? If you were in the hospital,
again
? And during her grandmother’s funeral?”
He glanced sideways at me but didn’t maintain eye contact. When he spoke, it was in the maddening, controlled voice that always sounded as if he were scolding me. “I’m in pain, Sophie. My mother has just died.”
“Don’t use that angry dad voice on me. It’s not intimidating.” I paced the room, from the door to the fireplace to the window. “I understand that you’re hurting, but that doesn’t mean you can be reckless. You need to be present this week. Your brothers and sister are going to need you. Your daughter needs you.”
“And who do I need, Sophie?” he demanded. “Who will be there for me, in all of this, this obligation you’re heaping on me?”
“I will, you big dumbass!”
Neil’s expression of outrage was somewhat spoiled by the twitches at the corners of his mouth. I couldn’t stay at my level of upset, either. I was too exhausted, and as far as angry retorts went, that one hadn’t been my best. It would be foolish to keep fighting.
Bleary eyed, Neil patted the bed beside him. “I’m sorry I worried you.”
I sat, still reluctant to make it seem like all was forgiven. “I called Valerie.”
“Why did you do that?” He squinted slightly, a deep vertical line of confusion appearing between his brows.
“I needed help. I wanted to keep this from Emma.” With a shaky breath, I added, “And I had to know what was up with all this. She said you’ve done this before.”
There was a catch to the beginning of his exhale, and that soft noise dashed any hope I had about this being an easy conversation. He’d already lapsed back into Sophie-is-overreacting mode. “Valerie has known me for a long time. I’m sure she had a lengthy list of my faults catalogued.”
“Don’t blame this on Valerie. You’re the one who fucked up,” I said softly. I took his hand in mine. “I need you to go back to therapy. When we get back home, I want you to make some calls.”
“I don’t need any more therapy.” It had been a touchy subject between us, since he’d stopped seeing the counselor he’d consulted in New York. I’d thought he could use more time. He’d wanted to be better so badly, he’d gone to this whole new level of denial and declared himself just fine.
“Then, you need AA. But I’m not sure how ‘A’ it’s going to be.” I didn’t need to remind him of that. We’d been under some increased scrutiny since my book had come out, and since Emma’s lavish wedding had been gushed over by “society.” Whoever those people were.
“Fine, I’ll call.” He lifted my hand to his lips to kiss it. “I’m sorry I worried you.”
“We’ll talk about it later. Let’s just get through this week. I know it’s going to be hard for you.” I searched his expression for any indication of grief or sadness. Mainly, he just looked tired.
“It will be. I suspect I won’t fall apart until after the funeral, though. At the moment, I’m just…numb.” He shrugged. “It was this way when my father died. It was so sudden, I shut down.”
“Is that why you were on the psychotropic train to Blissville?”
The suggestion of a resigned smile crossed his face. “I needed to feel something. And to not feel anything.”
“Not what you were feeling before. I get it.” I leaned my head on his shoulder. “Your mother loved you so much.”
“She did.” He put his arm around me and squeezed me to his side.
“It’s okay if you’re still in shock. There aren’t any rules for how to grieve.” I wished I was better at comforting people. “You can’t beat yourself up over what you’re not feeling. Especially when you know that, eventually, you’ll get there.”
He kissed the top of my head. “Thank you for being sensible when I can’t.”
“And thank you for being sensible enough to get some counseling.” There. I was being so earnest he’d have to go through with it.
Neil stood and took a few unsteady steps. “Oh dear god, the head rush.”
I started to get up to rescue him, but he straightened out on his own, albeit staggering like a sailor. He dragged his hands down his face. “You’re right, Sophie. I have been incredibly stupid.”
“Your equilibrium is punishing you worse than I ever could,” I chirped happily.
There was a knock at the door, and Michael asked, “Mr. Elwood, can I speak to you?”
“Come in,” Neil called, straightening his shirt and combing his fingers through his mussed hair.
Michael entered and quietly closed the door, but he kept his hand on the handle. “Are you a little more together now?”
“Yes. And thank you, Michael, for helping Sophie—”
“I wasn’t helping Sophie,” Michael interrupted. It took me a second to figure out what was off about him. Michael was angry. We’d never seen it before.
I wondered if Neil even recognized it yet.
“I was helping you,” Michael went on, with the calm, controlled anger of Tom Cruise learning he’s been betrayed in a movie. “I was helping you so that your daughter, my wife, who is carrying the baby we worked incredibly hard to conceive, isn’t subjected to any more stress than she’s already under from the death of her grandmother.”
Neil said nothing. Though his face didn’t give it away, I knew he had to be shocked at this, coming from Michael.
After his initial outburst, he was much more subdued. “Look, I understand you’re hurting. And I’m probably being overprotective—”
“Neil wouldn’t know anything about
that
,” I said, forcing a laugh that earned me two very terse looks. If Neil could have sent me a mental message, it would have been something like, “Sophie, now is not the time.”
I was pretty sure those were the exact words in his head at that moment.
Michael went on. “If I’m being overprotective, it’s because I love her. And she’s been disappointed so many times. I couldn’t take it if—”
“It’s understood,” Neil said uncomfortably. “And you’re right. I’ve acted very selfishly.”
“Emma’s going to be fine,” I assured both of them. “God, you guys treat pregnant women like they’re made out of glass. We don’t have to lie to her about this. If she asks what’s going on, we’ll tell her.”
