My hopes for a reconciliation deflated as I felt those inches and minutes stretch into miles.
With a heavy heart, I realized it was time that I admitted we had drifted apart, possibly irreparably. I needed to come to terms with the fact that some divides were insurmountable. That some relationships broke, and there was no fixing them. That at some point, I’d have to accept the reality of our situation and move forward, whichever way that might be.
Monday morning came, and with it, the game of cat and mouse I had to play with Mason. I purposely showed up to work with just a few minutes to spare, knowing he wouldn’t have time to seek me out before getting his day started.
Feeling like a cat burglar, I practically tiptoed to my desk, and sat down softly. I let out a breath of relief once I’d taken a furtive glance around and realized I hadn’t drawn anyone’s attention. Except, of course, Josie’s.
“That’s an interesting way to arrive to work on a Monday.”
“I’m trying to be inconspicuous.”
She snorted delicately. “You’re doing the opposite.”
I frowned at her and took another quick peek around the room to make sure no one had noticed me come in.
“Who are you hiding from?”
I didn’t want to spill what Mason had confessed to me, but knew I needed to talk to someone. My warring emotions were tearing me apart, and I had few people I could confide in.
“You’re in deep shit, Mack,” was Josie’s response when I’d recounted my disastrous brunch with Mason.
I covered my face with both hands. “I know,” I mumbled.
“Did you tell Bryson?”
I kept my face hidden. “I mean, kinda’.”
“Kinda’? Don’t you think your husband has a right to know there’s another man who’s that interested in you?”
I was shaking my head before she finished her sentence. “No. Hell no. He knows all he needs to.”
Josie shook her head. “I think you’re making a mistake, Mack,” she said softly.
I dropped my hands on the desk hard enough to jolt the pens and papers scattered about. “Honestly, I don’t know that it would make that much of a difference at this point.”
“What do you mean?”
“I thought after the way he acted Saturday night when he saw me dancing with Mason that things would go back to normal between us. I thought I’d finally broken through to him. But he woke up on Sunday like nothing had ever happened. I even told him I had brunch with Mason and all he asked was if I’d had a nice time. Does that sound like a man who gives a shit who is after his wife? In fact, maybe he’d rather Mason take me off his hands.”
The words burned my throat as I said them, but I couldn’t help but hear the small ring of truth to them. Maybe Bryson had checked out of this marriage for good. Maybe he wouldn’t really care if another man was interested in me. Maybe he wants an out.
Josie shook her head again sadly. “I don’t think that’s true.”
I scoffed and rolled my eyes, hoping to keep the stupid tears I felt rising at bay. “I don’t know what’s true anymore, Josie. I really don’t. On one hand, I want Bryson back. I want what we had. But Mason actually wants to talk to me, to be with me. I feel like I’m stuck between a man who doesn’t want me, but I’m tied to, and a man who does want me, but I’m not supposed to be with. Where do I go from there?”
Josie sighed. “I can’t tell you how to feel or what to do. That’s something you have to figure out for yourself. What I do know is, despite how Bryson is acting, you took a vow and you owe it to yourself and to him to cut ties completely before doing anything with anyone else.”
My eyes widened in horror. “I wouldn’t cheat on Bryson.”
Josie arched a brow. “That’s not what it’s looking like from where I’m sitting, friend. It seems like you’re flirting with that line, and I don’t want you to do something you’ll regret that you can’t take back. Either commit to making it work with Bryson or end it.”
End it.
Two little words. Only five letters, but they packed a punch I wasn’t expecting.
Should I end it with Bryson?
Could I end it?
I’d been with him since college. In a lot of ways, it felt like we’d grown up together. Not in the way a child grows into an adolescent, but in the way a young adult matures into the person they’re meant to be. I’d been through so much with Bryson, I couldn’t imagine throwing that all away.
But, what choice did I have? He’d pulled away from me. For months, he’d been so distant and absent, that it didn’t even feel like a marriage anymore. We barely spoke, and the few interactions we had were stilted and uncomfortable. Long gone were the two people who could talk for hours about everything and nothing at once. The lovers that were best friends and each other’s greatest confidants. All of that was gone.
Could it be retrieved? Could our relationship be repaired? I’d heard somewhere before that marriages weren’t fifty-fifty, but one hundred-one hundred. Both parties had to give their all if they had any hope of succeeding. If I gave my all again, would Bryson do the same? And when had I stopped giving my one hundred percent to the relationship? It was like the question of what came first, the chicken or the egg. Who stopped caring first? Who let go first?
At the thought of throwing myself back into this relationship and dragging it from the depths it had plummeted to, I felt exhausted. Just thinking about the effort it would take to restore us made me want to give up.
It might be different if I knew it would work. If I could guarantee my efforts would pay off in the end, and I’d get my husband back, it might have been enough to propel me forward, but there was no such thing. I had no way of knowing how Bryson would react, or worse, if he would react.
One thought kept circling in my head. One question that I shoved down every time it popped up. One I didn’t want to face but knew wouldn’t relent until I tried to answer it.
Was it worth it?
Would all the aforementioned work be worth the effort it would take? With no guarantee, did I even want to work to put this marriage back together? Especially knowing I had an easy out, knowing I had another man, waiting in the wings, ready to pick up the pieces of my heart and do his best to put them back together.
Do I put myself out there and work on what I have? Or do I cut my losses and move on to what I could have?
Both options scared me equally.
I didn’t want to lose Bryson. I didn’t want to start all over with someone new. I didn’t want to throw away all that we had, but I wasn’t sure I had much of a choice anymore.
I sighed and leaned back in my office chair, resigned to the fact that there was really only one thing I knew for sure: I wasn’t ready.
I wasn’t ready to make this decision; I wasn’t ready to move on, and I wasn’t ready to move forward. For now, the only thing I could imagine doing was exactly what I had been.
That thought was both comforting and frustrating, but it was all I could commit to for now.
I’d thought I was doing a good job avoiding Mason but should have known it was only a matter of time before he found me.
“Hey, Kenny.”
The deep voice came from behind me in the break room while I doctored up a much-needed cup of coffee shortly before lunchtime. There was only one person who’d ever called me “Kenny”, so I knew who it was, even without the telltale smattering of goosebumps his voice spread across my skin.
“Mason,” I replied evenly.
We were quiet for a moment, the only sound the scratching of the wooden stirrer against my paper cup as I mixed the cream into my coffee.
“Are you avoiding me?”
I closed my eyes briefly, thankful he couldn’t see my face. Mason was direct as ever, and I felt the mental whiplash at his abrupt question. I decided I’d take a page out of his book.
“Yes, I am.”
His laugh was abrupt and breathy. I don’t think he expected my honesty, but
what else was there at this point?
“Kenny, look at me.”
I sighed and tossed the stirrer in the trash before turning to meet his intense blue eyes. My hand shook slightly as I brought the hot coffee to my lips and took a quick sip.
Mason crossed the room until he was only a handful of feet away from me. “I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable.”
I laughed humorlessly. “What did you think your confession would do, Mason?”
He looked away and rubbed his jaw. “I don’t know what I was thinking. It’s so hard to think around you, and sometimes I say things I shouldn’t. But you have to know, I meant every word.”
I sighed. “I know you did, Mason. That’s part of the problem.”
He took another step closer. “It doesn’t have to be a problem.”
I held up a hand. “It is a problem. I’m married.”
His eyes flashed in anger. “You keep saying that.”
“Because you seem to keep forgetting.”
He closed the distance between us, bringing his hard chest against mine. I tried to stifle my gasp as I clutched my coffee so tight I feared the paper cup would crumble and spill the hot liquid all over my hand.
“I remember, Kenny. How could I forget that every night, you lay beside another man? That he gets to kiss you and hold you when I would do anything to have that right? How could I forget he has everything I want?”
My whole body was shaking, and my breath was caught in my chest. I couldn’t have answered him if I wanted to.
“I remember, I just choose to ignore it. Because if I have my way, you won’t be married for much longer.”
He reached up to brush a lock of hair behind my ear, letting his fingers trail across the sensitive skin of my neck. With a deep breath, he balled his hand into a fist and spun on his heel, leaving the room and taking all the air in it with him.
I slumped against the counter behind me and ran a shaking hand across my face. While Bryson cooled off, it seemed Mason was heating up, and I was stuck between the ice and the fire, not wanting to freeze or burn, but knowing I couldn’t stand on this middle ground forever.
Chapter 14
Present
I was thankfully able to avoid any meaningful interactions with Mason for the next few days. Christmas was on a Thursday this year, and I was extremely grateful that it cut my work week short. But, the extra-long weekend meant a lot more time with Bryson, and I didn’t know if I could handle the frostiness between us.
We hadn’t talked much since Sunday night, not that that was abnormal for us these days, but this distance felt different. More charged. Instead of just emptiness between us, there was tension, and it was almost unbearable on the hour-long car ride to my parents’ house that day.
The radio playing cheerful Christmas carols was the only thing breaking up the silence between us. In years past, we’d play silly games like finding as many out-of-state license plates as we could or singing along to the radio in embellished operatic voices, but there was none of that today. Although the heat blasted through the vents, a chill permeated the air and slid beneath my skin.
When we were within a few miles of my parents’ house, I turned down the radio.
“Listen, Bryson, I know things aren’t great between us, but could we at least act like everything is fine today? After the mess at Thanksgiving, I really don’t want to have to answer any more questions from my family.”
Bryson sighed heavily. “I didn’t know there was a problem between us.”
A short, humorless laugh escaped my lips. “You didn’t know there was a problem between us? Seriously, Bryson?”
“I feel like I never know what’s going on lately,” he muttered.
“If you were around, maybe you’d know.”
He sighed again. “I have to work, Mackenzie.”
“On Thanksgiving?” I blurted, my voice rising in the quiet car. “On Sundays? I doubt it, Bryson.”
His hands clenched tight around the steering wheel. “Are we really still talking about this?”
“Yes! We’re still talking about this because we never talked about it to begin with.”
“I thought you understood.”
“Well, I don’t.” I crossed my arms over my chest and sat back in my seat. I knew it wasn’t the time, and I knew I shouldn’t, but the words were bubbling up in my throat and I couldn’t swallow them down fast enough. “Are you having an affair?”
Bryson’s head whipped around to face me, his hazel eyes wide and incredulous before he turned them back on the road. “Are you fucking kidding me?”
I sprang forward in my seat. “You’re working later than ever, going into the office on odd days,” I counted on my fingers, “you’re distant, we never talk, we never fuck–”
“Didn’t we just have sex the other day?” he interrupted, his voice rising to meet mine.
I scoffed. “We used to have sex every day, Bryson. And last weekend was the first time in a long time.”
“It hadn’t been that long,” he muttered, but I ignored him.
“And then you were gone the next morning before I even woke up. It was like you regretted it,” I added quietly.
Bryson sighed heavily. “I thought we talked about this,” he said again, and my temper flared once more.
“Maybe you said all you had to say, but I haven’t! I’m sick of the way things are between us. I’m sick of you working nights and weekends and having no time for me. I’m sick of the distance.” I was panting by now, but I had one more thing I had to say. “And every time I ask you about an affair you change the subject. Just answer the question, Bryson.”
We were at a red light now, and he turned to face me fully. “I don’t answer that question because it’s fucking ridiculous. No, I’m not having an affair. I would never do that. Don’t you know that about me? Haven’t I proven that over the years?”
I fell backward against the seat and let out a large sigh, feeling all the fight in me escape with it. “I’m not sure what I know anymore,” I admitted quietly. “But things aren’t the same between us and I hate it.”
We pulled into my parent’s driveway and Bryson put the car in park before turning to me again. “We’re fine, Mackenzie, we’re just going through a rough patch. This happens to everybody.”
I nodded, but deep down, I didn’t agree. I knew the distance between us wasn’t normal. That the chasm was growing, swallowing up everything in its path. Our friendship, our happiness, our future. All of it was being swept into the void.
I realized that I could argue with him until my throat was raw, and it wouldn’t make a difference if he didn’t see it. If he didn’t want to change, he wouldn’t. If he didn’t want to make this better, I couldn’t do it on my own.
I sighed and tucked away these thoughts and feelings for now. We had Christmas dinner to get through with my family and I didn’t want to bring these problems in there with us.
“So, can we act like everything is okay?” I asked.
“Everything is okay, Mackenzie,” he replied before popping the trunk and climbing out of the car.
“If you say so,” I muttered, knowing it was a lie but choosing to let it go for now.
We let ourselves into my parents’ house and shrugged out of our coats before setting the presents we brought in a pile near the tree. Loud voices were unsurprisingly coming from the kitchen and we followed them to my family.
“Hi everybody, Merry Christmas,” I called as we stepped through the doorway.
My family responded with a loud chorus of welcomes and well wishes. I smiled at them all before holding out my hands to my sister-in-law. “Give me that baby,” I demanded. Everyone laughed as Dina handed over my beautiful drooling niece.
I pulled her close to my chest and carefully climbed onto the last remaining stool at the bar. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Bryson find an expanse of wall to hold up and repressed a sigh. In the past, Bryson would have taken the last remaining seat and pulle
d me onto his lap, but that was not the case anymore. I tried not to let that sting as I buried my face in my niece’s soft hair.
A few minutes later, my mom ordered us to the dining room table, and we all filed into the room, picking chairs at random. I reluctantly gave the baby back to her mom and once again, sat in the last remaining seat. It was directly across from Bryson, the large table between us was like a visual representation of the distance in our relationship.
We passed around heavy dishes of my mom’s delicious cooking while the baby cooed happily from her highchair gumming small bits of food.
Halfway into our meal, Connor cleared his throat nervously, catching everyone’s attention. “We have some news.”
My stomach plummeted, twisting and turning in the base of my belly while I waited anxiously for Connor to continue.
He looked adoringly at his daughter and then turned his gaze to his wife. “We’re excited to share that Dina’s pregnant.”
“Again?” I blurted. I immediately wanted to pull the words back into my mouth and swallow them down, but they were already out there for everyone to hear.
For everyone to judge.
Connor laughed nervously and rubbed the back of his head. “Yeah, it wasn’t planned, but we’re excited for another baby.”
Another baby. As if one wasn’t enough for them. As if they didn’t already have everything in the world I wanted. Now they were doubling that blessing.
My insides twisted with ugly jealousy that I fought to control.
I looked up to find Bryson watching me with wary eyes. Beneath the concern, however, I saw the devastation that I was feeling reflected in his gaze. This news was tearing him apart too, and it was all my fault. It was me that was broken. It was me that couldn’t provide us with a baby. I couldn’t even have one and Dina was on her second.
It was suddenly too much for me and I jumped to my feet, barely catching my chair before it clattered to the floor. A roomful of eyes were trained on me, but I stared at my feet, too ashamed to meet them.
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