“It’s not a matter of if I’ll get hit by a car, but when.”
One of my visually impaired clients told me that back in New York, grumbling about the rise in popularity of hybrid and electric cars.
The morning that began with what has now become Stone’s new routine of feeding Garnet her morning bottle was definitely a fresh start. But waiting to see how he responds to coming off his unprescribed pill habit feels like waiting for a car to strike.
I brace for impact, expecting his new drug-free status to disrupt our relationship in some meaningful way.
Maybe he’ll wake up next to me one morning and say, “Wait, this is stupid. I don’t even like you. Why the hell did I insist we get married? Thank God, I’m off those drugs.”
Or maybe he’ll turn to me one morning, and decide to touch me for real, to cover me with his body and…
I always cut myself off right there. It’s a fresh start for Stone, but not for us. And if Rock and Amber taught me anything, it’s that hoping for any kind of happily ever after is a fool’s game. At least for me.
But the truth is, not much changes in the weeks following his pill flush.
He’s still Stone. He still doesn’t talk much. Still looks irritated when I ask him too many questions. Still…ahem…wifes me on the regular, without asking for anything in return.
If Stone has resumed having sexual needs, he either truly doesn’t want me that way, or is getting them met from someone else during the four days he’s in New York.
I try not to indulge myself in the ego-crushing game of “which of these options would hurt you the worst?”
Instead I track Stone’s encouraging progress in other areas.
For instance, he’s become a smidge more tactful. “I think you and your sis should stay on with us,” he told Cami a few days after he flushed the pills. “This is a better neighborhood. Gated. Plus, you’d be saving me some dough on rent.”
I’d been pleasantly surprised when Stone had actually pitched this solution over the dinner table as opposed to commanding Cami and her sister to stay put, like he did with me.
Cami pushed one of her now properly moisturized curls behind her ear, before answering. “I don’t know, we’ve already put you guys out so much. I mean, Tia Mari’s been having to cook extra for us. And Talia can’t walk home from school if we’re living here.” She finished her counter argument with an apologetic look directed toward Stone. “I’ll figure out how to pay you back for rent, I promise.”
“Or you can transfer the kid here,” Stone answered. “This neighborhood’s got great schools.”
“But—” Cami started to protest.
“And cooking for six is easy for me,” Aunt Mari interrupted with a pfft and a wave of her perfectly manicured hand. “At least the two of you have manners. Those boys of mine used to attack my sancocho like wolves, without a thank you or a please.”
“Yeah, I want to go to school here. Please, Cami,” Talia pleads. “I want to stay here, with Tia Mari and all this good food. And I like learning Spanish with her by TV.”
With that testimonial, she held her empty bowl and says, “Por favor, Tia. Can I have so more.”
“You see, she said por favor!” Aunt Mari declared, picking up a ladle and waving it in the little girl’s direction, as if that one phrase of Spanish was a perfect illustration of her dubious teaching methods.
“You’ve got to stay here,” Aunt Mari insisted, scooping two more spoonfuls of the tasty beef sancocho stew she’d made for dinner into Talia’s already empty bowl. “At least until we see what will happen when Alejandro discovers the woman he married is actually his fiancée’s evil twin sister.”
“He’s going to be so mad!” Talia exclaimed, practically begging her sister to let them stay with her eyes.
“I don’t know,” Cami said, still looking unsure.
As silly as I found Aunt Mari and Talia, I also jumped on their reassurance bandwagon. “Cami, please say yes. It would give me so much more peace of mind to have you stay here.”
“And there’s always free babysitting, if you’re looking to make yourself useful,” Stone added, around a jaw full of beef.
I could tell our arguments were getting through her pride wall when Cami nodded and said, “Yes, I want to make myself useful. I want to pay the both of you back for everything you’ve done.”
“Well, free babysitting and not worrying Naima to death is good start,” Stone answered. “So you staying or what?”
Obviously Cami agreed after we all ganged up on her. Stone has a somewhat familiar, but technically new way of continuing to get what he wants. Even if he no longer issues blunt commands or shoved women in the back of cars to get them to comply.
Same old Stone. Just a tad, tad bit nicer.
He’s also become slightly more expressive since ditching the pills. He smiled when Talia brought home a first trimester report card full of As and Bs. “Better than I ever did,” he told her, grabbing a magnet to stick the report up on the fridge.
And he even laughed once when Garnet fell on her butt during an ill-fated attempt to stand on her own.
But other than a super occasional smile and a new routine of feeding Garnet her morning bottle whenever he was in town, not much changed.
I wouldn’t say I was surprised. I wasn’t expecting miracles, especially since he was still in the process of finding a good therapist with availability when he was in town.
But a slight disappointment begins to set in as the weeks click by and nothing changes for good or for bad. Halloween passes, then Thanksgiving, and then suddenly it’s December.
And I have to consider weird questions, like, should I get the husband who will probably be dumping me as soon as he finds a good therapist and comes to his senses a gift?
I discover that Stone has my digits when my phone lights up with a New Jersey number in mid-December, while I’m wrapping donation presents for our agency’s annual holiday drive.
“I’m at a toy store. What do you think the kid wants for Christmas?” he asks in answer to my tentative “Hello?”
“Garnet?” I ask, scrambling to catch up.
“Yeah, Garnet. I already got Talia a BB gun.”
“Okay, we’ll talk about that,” I answer. “But I’m assuming since Garnet’s not old enough to really know that it’s Christmas yet, she’ll want whatever age appropriate gift you find in the toy aisle. Maybe ask an associate to make sure it’s age appropriate. You know, like not a BB gun.”
He chuffs. “I like how you always say ‘we’ll talk about it’ when you really mean hell no.”
He’s being sarcastic, I know. But a weird part of me wants to ask, “Do you really like it? Like me? Even a little bit?”
Instead I clear my throat and ask, “So are you coming down for Christmas? I wasn’t sure, since you spent Thanksgiving in New York.”
“Yeah, Luca’s flying the whole family out to the Tourmaline in Mexico, and I’m not about that resort shit, so I’ll stay down there with you.”
I can’t tell if he’s disappointed or resigned to having to pass the holidays with us.
“I’m sorry you won’t be able to spend Christmas with your family.”
“Don’t be stupid,” Stone answers. “You’re my family. I would’ve been down there for Thanksgiving, too, if you wasn’t insisting on keeping all of this secret.”
God, the hope…it’s like a stalker, always lurking around the shadows of my heart. Waiting to pounce on any positive thing Stones says. Yes, our marriage is mostly pretend, but I like the idea of Stone wanting to be here with us more than he wants to be with his huge Italian family in New York.
At least he does for now.
I swallow, unable to say, “Sure let’s shout from the New York rooftops that we’re married, right before you decide to dump me.”
So instead I decide to let him know, “Next Christmas I’ll probably need to take Garnet to Santo Domingo. Let her meet her grandparents.”
“Okay,” he says after a long beat of silence.
I wait for him to say something else about me not wanting his family to know. Maybe bring up his mom, Peg, who I’m fairly sure still doesn’t know Garnet exists.
Only to be surprised when he says, “I found a head shrink. But she can only meet on Wednesdays. So starting in January, I’ll be down there four days instead of three.”
My brow lifts with surprise at his announcement. “All to meet with a therapist?”
“Nah, I got business, too. Few things I’m starting up on behalf of the Ferraros. And like I said before, all of you. I like you guys. Like what we have.”
His voice sounds softer than usual. Sincere as opposed to its baseline of sarcastic.
And, I know how this will all end, I do. But my stupid heart…it warms at his words, and the thought of him not just deciding to stay on an extra day in North Carolina, but also wanting to stay. Because of us.
“See you in a few days,” he says when I find myself too caught up in my battling emotions to answer.
Then, in still typical Stone fashion, he doesn’t wait for me to answer before hanging up.