Sunday afternoon was cold.
I spent most of the morning cleaning the kitchen.
I washed the cupboards.
Wiped the counters.
Changed the towels.
Then I opened the cabinet above the refrigerator.
There were old photographs inside.
Some were from family holidays.
Others were from trips Faron and I had taken before his body shop closed.
I found one from our first Christmas together.
We were standing beside a small tree.
The decorations were mismatched.
There was a paper star at the top.
Faron had one arm around me.
I was laughing.
He looked happy.
I sat down with the photograph.
For a long time, I simply stared at it.
I remembered the coconut cream pie.
The truck.
The radio.
The late nights after my shifts.
I remembered the man who used to wait outside the diner.
I wanted to believe that man was still somewhere inside the person who had threatened me.
But I couldn't keep using old memories to excuse what he had become.
People change.
Sometimes they change slowly enough that you don't notice.
Sometimes you notice and decide to wait.
I had waited eleven years.
I placed the photograph on the table.
Then I opened the drawer where I kept the divorce papers.
The judge's signature was on the final page.
I read it again.
The marriage was over.
The cards were mine.
The payments were mine.
The decision to stop was mine too.
I put the papers back.
Later that afternoon, Faron sent another message.
He asked whether I could meet him somewhere.
He said he wanted to settle things peacefully.
I looked at the message.
Then I asked what he wanted to discuss.
His answer came quickly.
He wanted to talk about the accounts and whether I could help him with a replacement card.
I read it twice.
There was no mention of the divorce.
No apology.
Nothing about the threat to my job.
Just another request for access to my money.
I put the phone down.
I didn't reply.
I made myself a cup of tea.
Then I took the old photograph and placed it inside a small box.
I wasn't throwing it away.
I wasn't pretending the good years had never happened.
I was simply putting them somewhere they belonged.
In the past.
On Monday, I went to work as usual.
Peg was preparing the morning coffee.
She looked at me and smiled.
"Ready for another week?"
I tied my apron.
"Ready."
The grill was already warming.
I placed the first order on the flat top.
The sound was familiar.
The smell was familiar.
The work was familiar.
But something inside me had settled.
I no longer checked my phone every few minutes.
I no longer wondered whether Faron needed something.
I no longer planned my paycheck around two other adults.
For eleven years, I had believed that being a good wife meant keeping everybody else from feeling the consequences of their decisions.
Now I understood that I had been carrying a responsibility that was never supposed to be mine alone.
And I was finished carrying it.
Click here to continue reading: PART 13: Faron Started Telling People I Had Ruined His Life, but Nobody Asked How Much of Mine He Had Spent
I Thought Being a Good Wife Meant Never Making My Husband Feel the Weight of His Own Mistakes
Part 12 of 20
