By early evening, the house had settled into its usual pattern.
One baby slept.
Another needed feeding.
The third seemed determined to remain awake no matter how gently I rocked him.
I had changed into a clean shirt, although the front was already marked with a little milk.
I sat on the couch and held the awake baby against my chest.
My phone remained on the kitchen counter.
I could see its screen from where I sat.
I expected Ethan to call again.
I also hoped he wouldn't.
Both feelings were true.
I wanted him to understand what he had done.
But I didn't want to spend another hour explaining my exhaustion to somebody who treated it like an inconvenience.
When the phone finally rang, I let the baby settle before reaching for it.
Ethan's name appeared again.
I answered.
"Are you going to tell me what you changed?"
His voice was quieter now.
I could hear the frustration underneath it.
"I already told you why."
"That's not an answer."
"It is the answer you're getting right now."
He exhaled sharply.
"You've made this entire trip miserable."
I looked down at the baby sleeping against me.
His mouth moved in a tiny dreamlike motion.
I shifted him slightly so his head rested more comfortably.
"I didn't book the trip, Ethan."
"You knew I was going."
"I asked you not to go."
"Because you wanted me to feel guilty."
I stared at the wall.
For a moment, I was too tired to respond.
He had managed to turn everything around again.
My request for help had become an attempt to control him.
My exhaustion had become a problem with my attitude.
And now his ruined afternoon was somehow my responsibility.
"I wanted my husband to stay home with his children," I said.
"You could have handled this without doing what you did."
"Maybe."
I surprised myself by admitting it.
I could have handled my anger differently.
I could have waited until morning and tried again to make him listen.
I could have left the suitcase alone.
But I could not go back and make a different choice.
What I could do was stop pretending the choice had happened in a vacuum.
"I shouldn't have changed your things without telling you," I said.
He went quiet.
I waited.
I thought he might acknowledge his own part in what had happened.
Instead, he said, "Then fix it."
I blinked.
"What?"
"You heard me. Tell me what you did so I can fix this."
I let out a breath that was almost a laugh.
"You want me to help you fix your vacation?"
"I want you to undo what you did."
I looked toward the nursery.
The baby in my arms stirred.
I began rocking him gently.
"Ethan, I'm not in Cabo with you."
"That's not my problem."
The sentence was so plain that, for a moment, I couldn't understand how he had said it.
Then I understood perfectly.
He was still thinking of the situation as something that had happened to him.
He had left me with three newborns.
He had watched me struggle.
He had dismissed my requests.
And now he was upset because his own plans had been disrupted.
I wondered how long I had been making excuses for him.
Perhaps I had started before the babies were born.
Perhaps I had mistaken confidence for dependability.
I had thought a man who spoke so easily about fatherhood would know how to be a father when the time came.
I had thought his promises meant he had already decided what kind of husband he would be.
I had been wrong.
"What exactly do you expect me to do?" I asked.
"Figure it out."
I pressed my lips together.
"I have three babies here."
"And I have a problem here."
I looked at the phone in my hand.
Then I ended the call.
I did not throw the phone.
I did not shout after him.
I simply put it down and returned to the baby in my arms.
The child had begun to fuss.
I stood slowly and walked around the living room.
My incision pulled, and I had to stop near the doorway.
I waited for the pain to ease.
Then I kept walking.
The baby settled after several minutes.
I lowered him into his crib and watched him for a moment to make sure he was comfortable.
His little fingers opened and closed.
I thought about Ethan saying that my problem was not his problem.
I wanted to be angry enough to stop caring.
But marriage did not work that way.
Even when I was furious, part of me still wanted him to come home and help.
Part of me still wanted him to open the nursery door, take a baby from my arms, and tell me to lie down.
That was the part I found hardest to admit.
I had not stopped loving the man I thought I married.
I was beginning to understand that the man in front of me might not be the same person.
Later, I washed another row of bottles.
I wiped the counter and gathered the dirty clothes into a basket.
The work was small, but it gave my hands something to do.
I did not want to spend the whole evening replaying the phone calls.
I wanted to get through the next feeding.
Then the next.
Then perhaps find a few minutes to close my eyes.
I had no grand plan for what would happen when Ethan returned.
I didn't know whether he would apologize or continue blaming me.
I didn't even know how I would feel when I saw him again.
All I knew was that I could no longer keep waiting for him to notice how hard things had become.
I needed to make decisions based on the help I actually had, not the help I hoped he would provide.
That meant thinking about practical things.
It meant accepting that I might need other people to help me when they could.
It meant admitting that I could not keep pushing my body past its limits simply because Ethan refused to share the work.
I was not ready to make every decision that needed to be made.
But I was ready to stop pretending nothing was wrong.
When the phone rang again, I looked at it without moving.
Ethan's name glowed on the screen.
I let it ring until it stopped.
Then I picked up the next bottle and continued washing it.
Click here to continue reading: PART 7: The Quiet Between His Calls Forced Me to Face What I Had Been Avoiding Since the Babies Came Home
I Thought We Were Building a Family Together, Until Three Tiny Cries Filled Our House and My Husband Started Sleeping Behind a Closed Door
Part 6 of 24
