My Biggest Mistake

by Leddy Harper

  “So, what are you, Donnie…my husband, soon to be ex, savior of my drunken night? How noble of you. But I don’t need you. All I need is my purse with my keys and my phone.”

  “It’s in the van, but you’re not driving home. You’ve had too much to drink.”

  “I’ve been sitting here for about fifteen hours, doing nothing but sobering up. And before I was kicked out of the bar because of the purse thief, Joe the bartender gave me like ten glasses of water.”

  Donnie laughed as he dropped his head and shook it back and forth. I didn’t find anything humorous, so I sat there and blinked in his direction, waiting for him to fill me in on what he thought was so funny.

  “You’ve been here for less than twenty minutes. And Joe the bartender’s name is Jon. You might’ve known this had you finished the one glass of water he gave you. But nice try. You always were a bit of an over-exaggerator when you drank. Good to know not everything has changed.” He reached out and grabbed me by my arms, tugging me forward. “Come on, let’s get you home.”

  “Where is home, Donnie? Huh? Can you tell me that?”

  “That’s something you have to figure out for yourself. I can’t answer that for you.” He continued to pull me to the van, walking me around until we were at the passenger door. “But for now, I’m going to take you to your mom’s house. And from there you can figure out where you’ll go next.”

  I faced him as he tried to maneuver the door while keeping me on my unsteady feet. He had one arm around my waist, holding me tight against him. My chest was pressed firmly against his and I could not only feel his heartbeat from beneath his heavy shirt, but I could hear it, too. Or maybe that was the pounding of my own heart I heard. I wrapped my arms around his torso and buried my nose in his shirt, inhaling his scent and feeling the calmness cover me like a warm blanket in the middle of winter.

  “Edie,” he whispered above me, his voice deep and distressed. “Come on, let’s get in the van.” With the door now opened, he leaned me into the seat with his upper body.

  I didn’t remove my arms from around him, and when he pulled his head back, we were face to face with the way we both leaned into the van. I didn’t give him time to react or push me away. I closed the gap between our faces and covered his mouth with mine, relishing the feel of his warm lips and absorbing the sound of his inhale.

  He kissed me back. It wasn’t only one-sided, and he didn’t fight me. I parted my lips slightly to test out his reaction, and it didn’t let me down. His mouth opened, his tongue met mine, and when a moan escaped me, he gently pressed his body into me. Then his hands came up and cupped my face.

  “Edie,” he whispered with his lips still on mine, breathing my name into me. “I can’t…” He sounded so torn, so confused and broken. Slowly, he pulled away from me. “We can’t, Edie.”

  “Why is it okay for you to fuck me when you’re drunk, but I can’t kiss you when I’m the one that’s drunk?”

  “I can’t do this with you.”

  The sound of his words alone was enough to make my eyes burn with the threat of a new onslaught of fresh tears. I released my hold on him and waited until he had backed away before pulling myself completely in the seat, allowing him room to close the door. I couldn’t find the strength to look at him, knowing the pain I’d see in his eyes. It would’ve been the same pain I felt throughout my entire body. Agonizing, heart-wrenching pain. Instead, I remained in my seat and kept my gaze in my lap while he rounded the van and climbed in behind the steering wheel.

  Awkward silence doesn’t begin to describe the drive leaving the bar. I had so much I wanted to say, but I felt too humiliated to speak. Too rejected and raw. I’d put myself out there to be turned down…turned away.

  “I don’t want to fight with you, Edie,” Donnie said, breaking the silence. “We have kids we have to think about. We need to learn how to be around each other like normal people. Without the pain, the sadness, or the anger. I don’t want this to be a negative thing for the kids.”

  I rolled my eyes, even though I knew he couldn’t see it. I found his word choice to be preposterous. “It’s divorce, Donnie. How could it possibly be a positive thing for them? Their family is breaking up. They won’t have their parents under the same roof. Split holidays. Separate birthdays and vacations. Visitation schedules. How is any of that positive?”

  “You know what I mean. I know it won’t be positive, but we can at least make it as normal as possible. I don’t want them to deal with parents that can’t stand to be around each other or cry when they get within ten feet of one another.”

  “Well, if we like to be around each other, and we don’t fight, and everything is fucking perfect, then why get divorced? Why not just stay together? I’m sure that’ll be positive and normal for them.”

  “Because I can’t do that, Edie.” His words were strained and full of agony, filling the space between us with a despondency so deep I could barely get enough air to breathe. It tore my heart out of my chest, making me even more confused.

  “I feel like you just want to punish me.”

  “That’s not it at all.”

  “Then what is it, Donnie?” I pleaded, fighting back my unending desire to cry, to purge myself of this sadness that seemed to never go away.

  “If I stayed with you, I’d be punishing myself.”

  “So being with me is a punishment?” I lost the war against the tears as they coated my face. They didn’t come on lightly. They came with a vengeance, burning my skin like liquid fire, bringing with them a shaky voice and short, rapid breaths.

  Donnie pulled into my mom’s driveway and put the gearshift in park before turning to face me. “No. It’s not a punishment, but it doesn’t mean that I won’t feel like I’m the one suffering. Ever since I married you—hell, long before that—I wanted to spend my entire life with you. I wanted us to have a family, a house full of love.” He paused to take a breath, and it sounded as if he needed the moment to settle his emotions. “I wanted to be your rock. I wanted to be your universe, your everything. Your hero, your best friend, your lover, the one you ran to when you were happy and the one you fell into when you were sad.”

  “You are!” I cut in before he could say more. “We have all of those things…you are all of those things to me. What I did…my choices doesn’t take that away. It doesn’t change that.”

  “Clearly, I’m not. How many times did you have the opportunity to come to me, but you didn’t? You got to a point where I was no longer your best friend. I was no longer your hero or the person you cried to.”

  “See? You’re punishing me for what I went through!”

  “No,” he said with a raised voice. “I’m not. I know that you couldn’t help what you went through. I understand this, and I’ve accepted it. How I feel isn’t about that. It’s not about how you handled things. It’s about what I see when I look at you. So my acceptance of your depression, my forgiveness of your departure…all of that doesn’t change the person I see when I look at you.”

  “What do you see?” I asked so quietly I wasn’t sure he’d heard me.

  “I wanted to be all of those things to you. I also needed you to be all of those things to me. But when I look at you, I can’t see my best friend or even someone I can cry to. Because all I can see is the woman that took something from me that I can’t ever get back. I can’t cry to you about it because you’re the reason I’m crying in the first place. You can’t save me from it or make it better.”

  There are moments in your life when you think it couldn’t get any worse. When you feel so heavy with grief, it’s like you could sink like a lead weight to the floor of the Atlantic Ocean. You’re drowning without a life jacket and there’s no one to save you. It feels like nothing could ever be worse. And then something else happens and you realize how wrong you were. Because it can always get worse. And then you look back on that previous pain, and you pray to God to make you feel that way again, because even that would be better than the new p
ain that has taken over.

  “You can say all you want that you’re not punishing me, but you are. You know that I made that decision in my darkest days, and you’re holding it against me.”

  Donnie ran his hands over his face, inhaling deeply. “If this—what’s going on between you and me—turned me into an alcoholic, and while inebriated, I drove with the kids in the car and wrecked, would you ever be able to look at me the same? Would you honestly be able to look me in the eyes and think, ‘It wasn’t his fault something happened to one of the kids, he was sick’?”

  “You’re not comparing apples to apples.”

  “I’m not? Because it’s a rather popular opinion that alcoholism is a disease. It’s an illness. What’s the difference, Edie?”

  I knew what I wanted to say, but I couldn’t find the words to vocalize my thoughts. I chewed on the inside of my cheek as he stared me down, waiting for my opinion. “You refer to the pregnancy, as a baby. Yet you never held it. We don’t know the gender. It had no name—”

  “Fuck you!” he screamed, interrupting me. “I never got to hold it because you didn’t let me. You took that right from me. And since when is a baby defined by a gender or name? Without that information, it’s still a baby! How about it had a fucking heartbeat, Edie? That doesn’t make it a baby? If I’m medically considered alive as long as my heart is beating, then explain to me why a fetus—a baby—with a beating heart is questionable. Don’t you dare fucking tell me it wasn’t a baby.”

  I shook my head, not because I disagreed with him, but because I had no words to say. The tears continued their furious trails down my face in never ending waves as I sat there and desperately tried to catch my breath.

  “I understand that it’s your body, and that ultimately, you had the final say-so in it. I get that you were depressed and having trouble holding on to reality. This isn’t about that. It’s about you making that decision without ever coming to me. Without talking to me about it first. You didn’t even allow me to have an opinion regarding my child. You didn’t let me help make that decision. It was our baby yet your choice.”

  “If I would’ve gone to you, you would’ve made me keep it.”

  “You don’t know that. I can’t tell you what I would’ve done back then. I spoke to one therapist, one time, for one hour and managed to learn what it was like for you. What’s to say I wouldn’t have done that then? We’ll never know because you never gave us that chance. You don’t know what I would’ve done, just like you don’t know what you would’ve done. You very well could’ve found the help you needed then. But you won’t admit to that because that would mean everything that’s happened since you took off was for nothing,” he argued with such intensity my head spun. “You’re so stuck in the mindset of you didn’t have a choice. Well, you did, Edie. You had lots of choices, lots of time to do something different. But you refuse to see that. Once again, you took me out of the equation, yet you sit here and tell me I’m your best friend, your hero. You can’t have it both ways.”

  “So there’s no fixing this?” My voice shook with fear.

  Silence. That’s what I was met with after my question. Donnie didn’t answer me. Instead, he hung his head as I watched his shoulders shake in the darkness of the van, his movements only illuminated by the lights on the dashboard. His hands covered his face, muffling his agonizing cries.

  “Can you just answer me this one question?” I didn’t give him an opportunity to respond before asking, “Is it that you don’t want to fix it, or you can’t find it in your heart to. Is it the will or inability that’s keeping you from forgiving me?”

  “I have forgiven you, Edie. It’s not about forgiveness. You did what you thought you had to. You did what you thought was right at the time given what you were going through. I understand that. But that realization and acceptance doesn’t make this easier on me. It doesn’t stop my heart from hurting or feeling like I just lost my whole world,” he answered me without picking up his head or looking at me.

  My fingers played with the rings he’d put there nearly eight years ago. I spun them around while contemplating my next move, thinking about my life, my family, my marriage. I remembered that day in the church when we took our vows. I remember standing at the front of the church, promising to love Donnie until the end of time. He made those same promises to me as he slipped my wedding band on my finger. In front of the pastor, friends, family, and God, we promised to love, honor, and obey ‘til death do us part, yet there we were, parting, yet neither one of us were physically dead. I’m sure we were both no longer living on the inside, but as Donnie had pointed out earlier, our broken hearts still beat in our chests.

  It made me question myself. Who broke the vows first? Did I when I made the decision to abort the baby? When I opted to permanently prevent myself from having more children? When I ran away to find some sort of peace? Or was it Donnie when he chose to no longer honor the “in sickness and in health” vow? The “in good times and bad” promise? At what point were our vows broken, and more importantly…at what point were they irrevocably destroyed?

  And somewhere between my attempt at calming my quivering lip and Donnie’s painful sob, I slipped the rings off and carefully placed them in the cup holder. I grabbed my purse from the center console and opened the door, closing it behind me without a backward glance.

  I went inside while he continued to sit idle in the driveway. I couldn’t bear to look outside to see how long he stayed there or to watch him leave. I’d done enough of that. It was time to move on. I had my night of sulking, and with it came insight and understanding, but it was time to put that part of my life to rest. I knew that in the morning, I had a life to begin, along with a marriage to end.

  The thought of sleeping alone in my mother’s spare bedroom gutted me, so I quietly made my way into her room and climbed in bed next to her. She sighed deeply and rolled into me, wrapping her arm around my trembling shoulders as I curled into her. The moment the sobs overtook my body, her hand ran circles on my back and she pressed her lips against the top of my head. She whispered soothing words to me, but I could tell by her quaking breaths that she cried along with me.

  I spent all day Saturday organizing my life. My mom helped me go through all of my possessions, and making a list of things I knew I wanted from the house. We set up a time to get the furniture from the Millers’ house, and rented a storage unit to house it in until I could find my own place. Part of me stalled on finding a place until I knew more about where Donnie planned to go, the other part stalled because I still hadn’t fully accepted my fate. I didn’t want to be too far from him for the sake of the kids, but I couldn’t handle being too close to him, either. That one week spent in front of the window, watching him, was enough. I couldn’t go through that again. I wouldn’t allow myself to.

  I picked the kids up from Dorothy’s house on Sunday and brought them over to spend time with my mom. It was bittersweet seeing them together. The kids loved her, and it was the first time I witnessed my mother with my children. I was able to see the side of her that I’d never seen before, the loving grandmother. I’m not sure who benefited from the visit more, but I know I’ll never forget it.

  We had a picnic in the backyard and then took naps. I had to drop them back off at Donnie’s parents’ house before dinner, so we didn’t have too much time after resting, but we spent it going for a walk. My mom pointed out the flowers and birds as we passed them, and answered all of their silly questions. More than once my eyes misted at the thought of all the things I’ve missed, not only from leaving, but from pushing people away. It was yet another lesson to be learned…talk to people about your feelings. It’s amazing the resolution that can come from it.

  I didn’t get the kids on Monday since Donnie took the day off work to handle house business. I only knew this through a text message he’d sent me that morning. I tried not to let it bother me. I knew that we’d have a schedule we’d have to follow, and I wouldn’t get to see them
every day, but I at least wanted to while I still had the chance.

  Sleep didn’t come easy for me that night. The next day was my anniversary, yet knowing I’d just signed divorce papers made it harder. I had four days with my family. Four days with Donnie, but it wasn’t enough. If I knew that was all I’d have, I would’ve done more. I would’ve told him more how much I loved him, although I was sure that wouldn’t have changed anything. He knew I loved him, and I knew he loved me, but love wasn’t always enough. Not when you throw betrayal into the mix.

  Since I didn’t get much sleep, I spent most of the day in bed on Tuesday. My mom was at work, so at least I didn’t have to worry about her hovering. I thought about applying for jobs, but couldn’t find the strength to get up, let alone leave the house.

  I sent Donnie a text around two, asking if I could get the kids from school. I got a quick no back. No explanation, no compromise, just the one depressing word. That kept me in bed a little while longer. Around five, I decided to text him again. This time, I told him I had the divorce papers signed and asked how he wanted to go about everything. At least he gave me a decent response that time: I’m on my way home, drop them by.

  That was the last thing I wanted—to drop off our divorce papers on our anniversary. I thought about telling him no, that he would have to wait. I’d been on his schedule long enough, but I wanted to see my kids. I hadn’t seen them since Sunday, so I’d go and drop everything off on this one particular day, just to get a few minutes with Livvy and the boys.

  What I wouldn’t do was get dressed up. I wouldn’t fix my hair or apply any makeup. I didn’t care about looking strong or put-together. I didn’t need to fool anyone, and Donnie would know better. So without changing out of my sweatpants and keeping my hair in a messy bun on top of my head, I dragged myself from the bed and headed over to his house, papers in hand.

  I don’t know what I expected when Donnie opened the door. He said he was on his way home from work, so I guess I assumed he’d still be dressed as such, but instead, he wore a pair of jeans and a plain white T-shirt. I didn’t even bother to look at his feet, knowing they would be bare, and unable to handle the emotions that would run through me at that sight. I also couldn’t meet his eyes, I knew they would make me cry. So, I briefly took in his appearance, and then averted my gaze over his shoulder. No words were spoken as he stepped out of the way and made room for me to pass him.