His voice rose.
“When I was throwing up? When you were sleeping three hours a day? When neither of us knew if I’d still be here in six months?”
“You had 11 months.”
“And for 11 months, I wondered the same thing.”
“When I was throwing up?”
“What?”
“If you would still be here if I wasn’t sick.”
“That’s not fair, Theo!”
“Neither was finding out you were planning to leave me.”
Something inside me gave way.
“You’re right.”
“That’s not fair, Theo!”
Theo went silent.
“I was thinking about leaving.”
His face changed.
I kept going.
Not because I wanted to hurt him, but because stopping would be what I had always done: swallow the difficult part; clean the kitchen; answer an email; pretend silence was peace.
His face changed.
“I didn’t hate you,” I said. “I felt invisible, Theo.”
“That’s not true.”
“Do you remember our anniversary?”
He looked down. “I was working.”
“I sat alone for over an hour.”
“I felt invisible, Theo.”
“I apologized.”
“You texted me one word.”
I could still see the untouched place setting and hear myself telling the server, “He’s coming.”
He never did.
That night, I sat in my car and searched for divorce attorneys.
“I apologized.”
Theo wasn’t cruel. That almost would have been easier.
He had simply stopped seeing me.
A week earlier, I’d told him, “I miss you.”
He barely looked up from his phone.
“I’m right here.”
After that, I stopped trying.
“I miss you.”
Then cancer arrived, and there was no room left for pretending.
***
“You got sick, and we started talking again.”
“About treatment.”
“About everything, Theo. We laughed again.”
“Because everything was awful.”
Then cancer arrived.
“You reached for me.”
“Because I needed you.”
I stepped closer.
“You’re turning every good thing we found again into a symptom.”
His eyes filled.
“You were leaving me.”
“You reached for me.”
“Yes. But then I almost lost you.”
“And that made you feel guilty.”
“No.”
“How do I know?”
I opened my mouth.
Nothing came out.
“How do I know?”
So I left.
***
My mother, Lydia, opened the door in slippers and her old green cardigan.
She simply opened it wider when she saw my red eyes.
“Tea?” she asked.
I nodded.
Five minutes later, I sat at her kitchen table with both hands around a mug.
“Tea?”
“Do you want me to tell you what to do?” Mom asked.
“No.”
“Good. Because I have no idea.”
I almost smiled.
Then I told her everything.
When I finished, she touched my wrist.
“Because I have no idea.”
“You can love someone and still be unhappy with the life you’re building together.”
“What if he was right?”
“About what?”
“What if I stayed because he needed me?”
Mom leaned back.
“What if he was right?”
“I can’t answer that for you.”
I hated the answer because it was honest.
Then she said, “You’ve been saying ‘I’ve got it’ since you were 12.”
“I don’t say it that much.”
She raised an eyebrow.
“Okay. Maybe I do.”
“I can’t answer that for you.”
“Sometimes you say it so fast nobody gets the chance to say, ‘Let me help.'”
I stared at the tea.
“When somebody needs you, you run toward them,” she said. “You always have.”
My throat tightened.
“The harder question is what you do when they don’t.”
Driving home, I finally admitted something ugly.
“You always have.”
I had liked being needed.
Before Theo got sick, I never knew where I stood with him. During treatment, I always knew.
He called for me when he was sick and reached for me when he was afraid.
For the first time in years, I felt essential.
Need had felt dangerously close to love.
Maybe both things could be true.
During treatment, I always knew.
When I got home, Theo’s duffel bag was still by the door.
“Where did you go?”
“Mom’s.”
I pulled my suitcase from the bedroom closet.
Theo followed me. “What are you doing?”
“Packing enough for a few days.”
“Where did you go?”
“I thought you wanted me to stay.”
I set the suitcase on the bed. “I did. Then I spent an hour asking myself why.”
His face tightened. “And?”
