After All I've Done

by Mina Hardy

  “She was always making sure to keep stuff neat. She hated clutter. She hated things being dirty.” The words barked out of me, hoarse and harsh. “She didn’t deserve all that pain. I’m glad it’s over. I’m glad she’s dead. I’ll never feel bad about what we did. Never!”

  I started to shake. Diana pulled a jar out of the box and pressed it into my hand. I didn’t know what to do with it. She took one for herself. Held it up. She looked at me.

  She threw the glass as hard as she could. It shattered against the side of the shed. The crash was spectacular, loud and shocking, and the glitter of broken glass reminded me of fallen snow in the summer’s green grass.

  “Now you,” she said.

  I threw the jar as hard as I could. Then another. Another. She went into the shed and brought out another box, this one bigger. Mason jars are heavy glass. Thick and hard to break. Together, we shattered every single one.

  After, panting and sweating, she hugged me hard. She breathed into my hair. She whispered in my ear. “When you hate so much you can’t feel anything else, Val, break something you won’t miss.”

  * * *

  I’ve thought of the day by the shed hundreds of times since, and of Diana’s advice. “Break something you won’t miss.” I don’t want to miss her. I do want to break her.

  My ex–best friend, my lover’s wife, is not made of glass. For fuck’s sakes, she survived a car accident and then an emergency surgery to take out an organ that was so close to rupturing she might have died. That bitch is not so easy to break.

  I’ve known Diana for more than half our lives. I should know her well enough to find her weakness. To break her in other ways. The thing is, my dear friend Diana’s weakness and her strength have been two sides of the same coin. Need to put someone toxic out of your life, even if you love them? They’re gone. Need to defend someone you’re loyal to, even if they’re in the wrong? Done. She is both fiercely emotional and dispassionate.

  I mean, look at the way she cut me out of her life, just like that. Anyone else would have fought me, at the very least. Instead, she used me and then dumped me as easily as she’d unzip a dress and step out of it to leave on the floor behind her. I was nothing more than the means to an end.

  “We need a rock-solid case,” Diana had said. She’d been wreathed in smoke on the front porch of her beach house, several glasses of wine deep. “Incontrovertible proof. Harriett’s lawyer wrote that prenup like he wanted to take it to the prom. If I want to put the adultery clause into effect, I have to file first. If he does, I can’t come back with that after the fact. But it’ll be worth it to you, Val. If we can break that prenup, I’ll have enough money to make sure you can move wherever you want.”

  She’d laughed drunkenly. “We’ll get a place in New Orleans. Share a cute little place near Bourbon Street. Have cats. The way we always talked about.”

  “What if I can’t get what you need?” I’d asked her. She had a whole list of specifics required by the prenup. “I mean … what if I can’t make him love me?”

  Diana had scoffed. “He doesn’t have to really love you. We just need to get proof of him telling you he does. Whether or not he really feels it doesn’t matter.”

  So, when did it become love? Was it the night he brought me ibuprofen and a heating pad, a bottle of wine and a box of chocolates because I’d complained about a rough period that had laid me flat? The night we didn’t fuck, but instead cuddled in my bed and watched classic movies until I fell asleep? I woke to find him gone, but a note on the pillow. In it, he called me beautiful. Was that when it happened?

  Or was it the weekend in August when we stole away together to New York City while Diana went down to the beach by herself? A real dinner date. Dancing after. I’d imagined him, tall and lanky, dancing like one of those blowup mascots you see waving outside of car dealerships, but Jonathan danced with the ease and grace of Fred Astaire, if he’d done his routines to hip hop. When Jonathan danced for me, yes, then, that’s when I fell in love. Three months, that’s all it took for me.

  But for him?

  I have no idea.

  I have not been answering his texts the way I used to. He was always the one who got to decide when and where and how we could be together, but now I have a say in that too, and right now I am choosing not to see or talk to him. I turned off the function that allows him to see if I’ve read his messages. Now he can sit with a “Delivered” for hours, not knowing if I’ve even seen it.

  I need this distance from him, and if I don’t force it, I won’t get it. He will woo me with his flirty words and compliments. With the promises I do believe he wants to keep but that he cannot bring himself not to break.

  His tone in my voicemail is pitched low. Furtive. I imagine there’s some hesitation, some anxiety.

  “Please,” he says. “Just call me back, Valerie. Okay? Call me.”

  I don’t.

  You can’t prove whether someone really loves you, but it can be possible to prove that they’ve told you they do. He has never said he loves me, never in person or on the phone or in a text or a message. That’s the one thing I know she needs in order to divorce him the way we’d planned. If I get what I want, Diana gets what she needs.

  But I’m going to do my best to make sure she really gets what she deserves.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Diana

  First, there is darkness. Then, light. It blinds me. I am running in the rain, cold and wet, icy slaps of clawed fingers from a monster I can’t see.

  My mother’s face. Twisted. She is shouting. I hit her with a closed fist. Again. Again.

  Again.

  She falls.

  I am running.

  There is pain in my knees and on the palms of my hands; there is going to be blood. I taste it in the place where I bit my lip. My hair obscures my vision.

  I see trees.

  I am close to home. I see my house when I twist back, I see the house, I see the lights on inside the house, the lights that blinded me at first have gone dark, but in the house there is a shape. A person. In the window. Watching. Then gone. Maybe not there at all, maybe a shadow, maybe curtains, maybe I am insane and running, running through the night and the dark and the cold, and I fall to my hands and knees again.

  My fingers sink into the earth at the base of a tree, and I dig. A nail breaks; there is more pain. I am digging, and the sound of my breath is loud in my ears, and the world is shifting and turning upside down, and I am on my back with the rain dripping into my open eyes.

  Rain, like needles.

  A man is with me.

  “Are you all right? You’re going to be all right. Don’t you worry, Diana. You’re going to be all right.”

  * * *

  There are some nights without dreams. Seamless and black. After those nights, I wake with a dry mouth, hair plastered to me with sweat and no idea what day it is. Somehow, the nightmares are better.

  The one I had last night is the closest I’ve come to what feels like a real memory.

  Not the part about my mother. I’d never actually punched her in the face, although I’d thought about it many times. No, it had been the man’s voice. That, I think was real. From the night of the accident. But is this really a memory or just another dream? I don’t know.

  I hate him for being right, but Jonathan was, at least about this. What happened with my mother last year really did mess me up even more than I’d already been. We’d been supposed to meet for coffee, part of her efforts at returning to my life. She didn’t show. It took authorities two weeks to track me down as someone who needed to know she was dead. I was devastated. Not because I’d missed a last chance to connect with her, and not because she’d succumbed to an addiction she’d told me she’d beat.

  I was destroyed that I’d allowed myself to trust her again. Still, that’s my baggage to deal with, on my own terms. Jonathan had no right to blab about it to Dr. Levitt. She had no right to talk to him behind my back.

  I
didn’t speak to Dr. Levitt directly when I canceled my next appointment. I politely told the secretary I was not interested in rescheduling. I was not expecting Dr. Levitt herself to get in touch with me, definitely not on Christmas Eve, so when her name popped up on my phone screen yesterday, I didn’t answer it.

  Her voicemail message was brief, her voice calm.

  Diana, I’m concerned that you haven’t made any new appointments with me. If you’re intending to stop our sessions, please let me know. I can refer you to another doctor if you like, but you do need someone overseeing your care, if only for the sake of monitoring your meds. Please call my secretary … No, just call me directly. You have my number.

  I’m not going to call her back. The idea that she and Jonathan discussed me, my mother, my issues, that all along she knew about it without so much as raising an eyebrow when I deflected … I’m not totally sure if that’s unethical or immoral, but it certainly feels like it should be.

  I haven’t told Jonathan I’m not going back. It’s possible he’ll ask me, but honestly, it’s been so long since he seemed to have any sort of clue about what’s going on with my life, I doubt it will occur to him that I’m not seeing her anymore. As for her concern about my meds, the last time I checked, every single bottle still had plenty left in it, so I don’t care if she won’t renew the prescriptions. Besides, I don’t need them … even if I sometimes want them.

  My internet searching taught me that January is “Divorce Month” because so many people try to stick together through the holidays but can no longer stand it once the new year comes around. Will he do it then? Is he waiting until after the holidays? More importantly, what will I do if he doesn’t?

  If I leave him for any reason other than his infidelity, I will lose almost everything. If I go after him for having an affair, I need to have everything documented and proven in a specific format, or it won’t hold. Until I can track down that prenup document, I don’t know everything I need, and I can’t tip my hand before then. The one who files first has the advantage.

  Standing at the master bathroom sink to wash my hands, I have a clear view into the back yard. Although the temps have dropped to freezing and we had some snow in November, there’s been nothing but ice since. The trees in the back yard are coated in it, their branches weighted and probably ready to break. Beyond the deck and the huge backyard shed is the small slope of yard that goes up into the trees.

  It is the scene from my nightmares. That view, from a slightly different angle because of where I’m standing now. It takes the water scalding my hands to shake me out of just standing there staring. With a hiss, I run the water cold and rinse my hands. The back of one hand is red already fading to pink. My skin will be fine.

  My mind, though. What about that? The nightmare comes back to me, the sense of running. Falling. I turn my palms up to look at them, scanning for any signs of scars, but of course there are none. Only the lines crisscrossing and making hashmarks.

  A palm reader in New Orleans had told Val and I that we’d be friends forever. She’d traced a series of curving lines on both our palms. Friends forever. We got matching tattoos, small hearts outlined in black and red. Hers on her left shoulder, mine on the right. It doesn’t escape me, the irony of that being the place of my worst injury.

  What does my husband think when he presses his mouth to the ink on her body that matches mine?

  From downstairs, I hear the clatter of dishes in the kitchen and the low murmur of voices. It’s not quite eight on Christmas morning. It’s the earliest I’ve been up without an alarm in months, so it makes sense that Harriett looks startled when I come downstairs and find her and Jonathan at the kitchen table. Mugs of steaming coffee are in front of them, and he has a bowl of creamy oatmeal.

  “Merry Christmas,” he says.

  “You’re up so early,” Harriett chimes in as she gets up. “Let me make you some eggs, dear.”

  “Merry Christmas,” I say to both of them but put up a hand to stop her from going to the stove. “Oatmeal looks great, Harriett. I’ll just get some from the pot.”

  She keeps moving. “It’s no trouble, Diana.”

  “It’s Christmas, Harriett. The last thing in the world you should be doing on Christmas morning is cooking for me. Sit. Relax.” I try to keep my voice jovial. Festive. It’s Christmas, after all. Everyone’s supposed to be happy and nice on Christmas.

  She looks uneasy. “It’s really no trouble at all. Are you sure you don’t want eggs and bacon? You need your protein …”

  Instead of filling a bowl, I just pour myself a mug of coffee. “You know what—I’m not really even hungry. Hey. Why aren’t we opening presents?”

  This is what she lives for, I swear, and so, distracted, Harriett beams and claps her hands. The three of us go into the den, where the tree has been set up. Lit with plain white lights and strung with pearl garlands, hung with what are mostly Harriett’s “heirloom” ornaments, it’s pretty, but it’s not mine. Beneath it is the modest pile of gifts I’d ordered online for them both. They’d arrived already wrapped, since I wanted them to look nice and not like something a demented monkey with a glue stick and safety scissors had put together.

  In contrast, the towering stack of exquisitely wrapped boxes with gift bags and coordinating ribbons and bows is clearly Harriett’s work. As always, she’s done too much. It used to make me uncomfortable, but I’m used to it by now. There will be packages of new underwear and socks. Bath products. Trinkets. Books. Scented candles. It’s like she can’t stop herself.

  “Oldest to youngest,” she says with another clap of her hands.

  It takes her a few minutes to unwrap each gift, and she takes the time to try on each item or marvel over it. Or worse, as in the case of the leather-bound daily planner that Jonathan got her, cry over it. I mean, it’s a nice planner and all, but the woman spends her days cleaning and cooking in my house. I don’t know what she needs to plan. It’s the sort of gift that’s so typical of him, though. Expensive, high quality, practical, but not necessarily … right.

  Like the car.

  It’s my turn to open presents. In the driveway is a silver sedan. A Volvo. It wears a broad red ribbon on the hood.

  “What’s this?” I shiver in the frigid December air, but it’s not really the cold making me shake.

  “Merry Christmas!” my husband says, as pleased with himself as a man can be.

  Next to me, Harriett clasps her hands to her bosom. “Oh my goodness. A new car?”

  This car cannot be for me. I’m well aware of beggars and their ability to choose, but the fact is, I’m not a damned beggar, and I did not choose this … this vehicle. It’s safe, reliable. It’s boring.

  It is the complete opposite of my Camaro.

  “I … wanted slippers …” I whisper. Neither of them hear me.

  “It’s time you get back to driving yourself around. You can’t expect to rely on Mom or friends forever,” Jonathan says.

  “I never minded driving her,” pipes up Harriett. She sounds reproachful. “You make it sound like it was a burden on me, Jonathan.”

  I haven’t been in the driver’s seat since that last memory I have, rolling down the highway the Friday before Memorial Day in my cherry red baby with the radio on and the wind whipping my hair while Val and I sang along with the radio. I can’t recall the accident, but my body does. Dry mouth. My throat convulses. The burn of acid sizzles the back of my tongue. I blink and blink and blink, trying to force away the hazy tinge of red around the edges of my vision.

  My shoulders and back are so stiff, he practically has to force me to bend so I can get into the car.

  Jonathan slides into the passenger seat. In the next second, Harriet gets in the back. They’re both gabbing on and on about the car, but all I can hear is an effervescent hum. I close my eyes. Grip the wheel. My body tenses and clenches, bracing for an impact I am happy not to recall.

  “… got it because it has the most safety features on th
e market,” Jonathan says.

  He hated my red car. He hated that I drove it fast to places I went without him, but most of all, he hated that I’d bought it without any input, financial or otherwise, from him. He once called it “ridiculous,” and he was right. It had been ridiculous, but it had been mine.

  Jonathan told me he’d had the car towed away. I’d never even asked to see it, my poor broken baby. I’d been broken enough.

  This … this is the kind of car he thinks I should drive. Not the kind of car I want to drive. If that doesn’t say it all about our marriage, I don’t know what does.

  I hate this car.

  “C’mon, babe. Let’s take it for a spin.” Jonathan jangles the keys toward me.

  I decline, shaking my head. “No, not right now. I’m not dressed, I’m not wearing shoes—”

  “Go grab a pair.” He’s excited, eyes shining.

  For a moment it’s so easy to remember why I fell in love with him. This is something I wish I could forget. I shake my head again and force a smile.

  “It’s cold. Icy. I’m not ready.”

  Jonathan looks disappointed, but Harriett understands. She bustles us back into the house for cinnamon rolls and coffee, and to unwrap more gifts. When she uses the bathroom, he and I sit in silence.

  “You’re not going out?” I ask at last.

  “It’s Christmas,” he says. “Where would I go?”

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  Valerie

  All of this was meant to be over by now. He would leave her, filing before she could so he could block the prenuptial agreement he’s never mentioned and which he might believe I didn’t know about. We would spend Christmas celebrating the birth of our new lives.

  Instead, about twenty-two hours before our plane was supposed to leave for Punta Cana, she ended up in the hospital.