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TALIA
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I HATE PACKING.
Hate isn’t even a strong enough word.
I loathe packing, with everything in me.
I would rather work a double at the hospital, drink Diet Coke instead of Diet Pepsi, have my eyes gauged out, listen to Starship’s ‘We Built This City’ on a loop, and eat an eggroll with shrimp.
That’s how much I loathe packing.
I could always have it done for me. It would probably have been easier—less hassle, less mess. But no, I had to do it myself, and I had to do it my way. I couldn’t risk coming across something that shouldn’t be there, something that I intended to get left behind.
The way I had been.
“Talli?” Sondra’s voice broke into my thoughts as I was rummaging through the cabinets in the kitchen, separating dishes, taking what I would need, what the children would need.
“Yeah?”
“The movies... the music...”
“Leave it.”
I didn’t mean for the two words to sound so cold, so biting. I didn’t want anything from the room he’d made for me.
“Some of the pictures on the wall,”
“Sondra, right now... I couldn’t fucking stand to look at it, okay? I really have no desire to be reminded of this... prison.”
“A prison,” I heard the prick say as he entered the kitchen. “You could have said something if that was how you felt.”
I refrained from throwing the butcher knife in my hand directly at him, wrapping it carefully and placing it in a box instead.
“The children’s movies, Talli,” Sondra continued.
“They can be replaced,” I said.
“Don’t do that to them, Talli,” the prick said. “This isn’t about them; this is about us.”
What us, you asshole? The us that hasn’t had a civil word to say to each other in weeks? The us that hasn’t slept in the same bed in months? The us that you threw away? WHAT US?
“Damn it, Talli, look at me!”
“Jase,” Sondra spoke up, completely in my defense, “now is not the time.”
“Stay out of this, Sondra,” he snapped.
“If you hadn’t been a fucking idiot, you wouldn’t have to worry about me being in this, now would you?” she snapped back. “Go ahead, fucking fire me! You think I care about that now?”
“Sondra, don’t,” I said softly, as I passed her.
“What, are you defending him?” she asked quietly as she followed me to the great room.
Oh...fuck.
There were pictures everywhere.
Our perfect fucking happy family.
I wanted to take that butcher knife and carve him out of every single one of them.
But I didn’t let it show. I was never going to let it show.
He’d said he was so proud of me when I went back to school, finishing near the top of my class in spite of my high-risk pregnancy. I received my master’s degree less than two weeks before Michael had been born, a scant two and a half years after Elizabeth. He’d been planned, too. Both of them had.
Emily had not been planned.
Emily was a big surprise that neither of us was expecting, and that quite honest I wasn’t ready for. I had received my Nurse Practitioner’s license and was working in the OB/GYN area, showing one of the new techs how to use the doppler to hear the baby’s heartbeat. Jokingly, I had told her to practice on me.
Emily was born six months later.
So here our kids were five, almost three, and eleven months.
Elizabeth was Daddy’s girl, Michael was an easygoing child, and Emily clung to me like glue.
She didn’t know Jase.
Jase never took the time to get to know her.
Jase was too busy getting to know someone else.
“The kids’ clothes are packed,” Sondra was saying as I took the dreaded trip up the stairs.
“Great.”
“I took out their favorite toys,” she continued.
“Fantastic.”
“Did you need me to get your things?”
I paused outside the bedroom door, my hand on the doorknob. This room held so many memories, so many long sleepless nights. This room had seen love, and loss, joy and pain...
I faltered for a moment.
“Talia, I can...”
“No, Sondra, I’ve got this,” I said, regaining composure as I opened the door to the room.
I hadn’t slept up here in months. Hell, I hadn’t even slept upstairs in Em’s room in weeks—not since I came back from Ohio a bit early. Emily had been on one arm, and Elizabeth and Michael had been directly behind me when I had opened that door to the room I’d once shared with their father, unprepared for what I saw.
Candles.
Roses.
Jase.
And... Bree.
Breeann Hamilton, tiny blonde actress/singer extraordinaire.
Their clothing discarded haphazardly around the room.
Jase on top of her, even in the tangled sheets I know he was inside of her by the way they were both moving, the way she was moaning, her hands buried in my husband’s hair, and he... he was kissing her, too.
Fucking her and kissing her.
In our bed.
Elizabeth’s voice had trailed from behind me asking what was wrong with Daddy, and his head snapped up.
And my world stopped.
I remembered briefly taking the children downstairs and putting in some video while I went to the kitchen to gather my thoughts. I couldn’t yell, I couldn’t scream—that was not something I wanted my children to witness.
None of it was something I wanted them to witness. Ever.
God, was this really happening? Had the man who had sworn before... before God, before everyone that he would forsake all others... was he really in bed with someone else?
Well, the answer to that one was a literal no as I heard his footsteps come into the kitchen. I stood there, my back up against that island, my arms folded, waiting.
But I could see it in his eyes.
It was really over.
We... we were really over.
His hands were shoved into the pockets of the jeans that he had just thrown on, he hadn’t even bothered with a shirt. His hair was still disheveled, probably from her hands running through it. I could see where a bead of sweat was still hanging to his bangs, and it made me absolutely nauseous.
But I held my ground.
I kept my head high, somehow, I kept the tears away. I knew... I knew something had been going on, but I had trusted him blindly, every time he told me that he wasn’t that type of person. Fuck, of course he was! How quickly I had forgotten.
I wonder what he had told her about me.
I wonder what he had told her about us, or the lack thereof.
I wonder if he had told her that we hadn’t even made love since shortly after Emily was born. Hell, he obviously didn’t need me.
Not when he had her.
I had glared at him, screaming in my head for him to talk to me, tell me that somehow I was mistaken, tell me he was drunk even though I could tell by his eyes that he was stone cold sober...
Just tell me that he loved me.
He swallowed heavily and looked away, a faint blush marring his cheeks.
You. Bastard.
When he looked back at me, his eyes were nearly blank, as if they were devoid of all feeling. Then he had the nerve... the nerve to say two little words.
“I’m sorry.”
“Bullshit,” I spit back at him, low enough so the children couldn’t hear.
“Ah, you’re angry. Nice to know you have some emotion left in you.”
Where the hell did THAT come from? He was going to attack ME? Put this on ME?
And then Bree sauntered lazily into the kitchen, having the nerve to wear my robe.
“Listen... um... Talli,”
“Put your clothes back on,” I said, my tone angry but even, “get back in your car, and get the hell away from this house.”
“You know,” she tried to continue, but I cut her off again.
“You may not respect me but respect the fact that my children are here now, and they don’t need to see or hear any of this.”
“They’re his kids, too,” she said, placing one hand on her tiny hip.
“Bree,” he said, in a soft tone he used to reserve for me, “not now, okay? She’s right... not now.”
She. I’m a she now. Not his wife, not the mother of his children, not the person he dragged across the country to share his life with. I’m just a she.
I could see it all like it was yesterday as I walked silently across the carpet to my dresser. I pulled out my duffel bag like I had so many times before, for one trip or another, and emptied my drawers one by one.
Every love letter I found I threw on the bed, leaving them behind for him.
I hope he choked on every fucking word.
When I was through with the closets and the bathroom, I picked up the suitcase and the duffel bag, which were now quite heavy, and made my way down the hall to the stairs.
“Let me help you with that.”
Jackie was suddenly beside me, taking both items from my hands, motioning for me to go on down the stairs. I kissed him on the cheek before I silently walked down, not knowing if I could say goodbye to him in front of everyone. I could almost swear I heard a sniffle from him, but I couldn’t turn around to look.
It seemed that everyone was upset by my leaving.
Everyone except Jase.
The U-Haul had been packed, one of the maintenance workers from the hospital behind the wheel. The car was also packed, except for the kids and me.
Linda handed Emily to me, who went straight into her car seat without so much as a whimper.
Michael waved goodbye to Jase before running up and taking his booster seat, still smiling as I strapped him in.
Elizabeth was sobbing in Jase’s arms.
I had long suspected that perhaps she was the only reason he had held on to this lack-of-us for as long as he did.
“It’s time to go,” I said softly to her, holding out my hand.
“Don’t make me go, Daddy,” she whined into his shirt.
“Baby girl, you need to go with Mommy,” he was whispering to her.
“I’ll be good, I promise, don’t make us go.”
Oh... god.
I can’t cry. Not now, not in front of him.
“Elizabeth,”
Jase motioned to me that he’d put her in the car, and I stepped aside, part of me wanting to scream at him, demand to know.
Was Bree worth it?
Was she?
I moved quickly to get into the driver’s seat, knowing I had to get the hell out of there as soon as Jase had Elizabeth strapped in. Her screams and sobs set the other two off, but did he say anything? To any of us?
No.
He shut the door.
And he walked away.
He walked past everyone into that fucking house closing that door behind him, shutting me out for the very last time.
And he would never... never know how much it hurt me. I would make sure of that.
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JASE
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“DON’T MAKE ME GO, DADDY.”
Elizabeth was clinging to me as if her very existence depended on holding on. I kept my eyes shut tight, calling on every bit of strength I could to keep from crying. This was hard enough on her without me breaking down, too.
And Talli... she wouldn’t give a damn if I cried.
“Baby girl,” I managed to whisper, “you need to go with Mommy.”
This was so hard.
It hurt so... so much.
“I’ll be good, I promise, don’t make us go.”
I choked back a sob, cradling her to me, wanting to scream at the top of my lungs.
I don’t want you to go, Baby Girl. I don’t want any of you to go. Please don’t cry... this isn’t your fault, I swear, and I’m so... so sorry.
I couldn’t say it out loud.
Saying it out loud would be a sign of weakness, and I couldn’t be weak, not now. Not in front of Talia, not when she had been so very clear for so long that her feelings for me had changed.
I know she didn’t love me anymore.
I had resigned myself to it.
But now... now with this happening—now that she was really leaving, walking away from me, taking our children across the city with her... God, it was over.
It was really, really over.
Knowing Talli couldn’t pry Elizabeth from me, not wanting to put either one of them through that, I motioned that I would strap her in.
I had to be quick with this.
She screamed as I placed her in her booster seat, securing the straps as quick as I could. I couldn’t look up. I couldn’t risk a glance at Talli, see how cold those eyes had become.
I knew I would break.
Who the hell was I kidding?
I was already broken.
My heart had ached every time that Talia had pushed me away, every time she had told me she was too tired or too busy. I died a little inside every time she had canceled our plans for her to come out and see me at whatever city I was in. I shut myself off even further when I came home to find her sleeping in the single bed in Emily’s nursery, with her claiming it was easier to get up with her in the middle of the night if she was right there. I gave up when she refused to move her crib to our room.
I just gave up.
I know I was wrong.
Fuck, I know I was, but what the hell was I supposed to do?
I couldn’t remember the last time Talia had told me she loved me.
Then there was Bree...
Bree who had actively pursued me from day one.
Bree, who went out of her way to touch me, brush up against me.
Bree, who was there, reaching out to hold my hand when Talia had called and canceled for the third weekend in a row because she just couldn’t get away.
Bree, who kissed me when I was feeling low.
Bree, who held me at night without a promise of anything more because she said she longed to be close to me.
Bree, who told me she loved me and understood that I couldn’t say the same.
I couldn’t love anyone else.
Not when I was still so in love with Talia.
I changed my plans around to be home early, surprise Talia who couldn’t find the time to fly out to Texas to spend time with me, only to find that she had packed up the kids and flown out to Ohio.
Ohio. Further away than Texas. Gone longer than she would have been to come and see me.
I couldn’t pretend, I couldn’t fool myself anymore. Even with everything we had gone through, even with our family, our children, it wasn’t enough for her.
And then, Talia couldn’t even find it in herself to give a shit when she found me with Bree. She didn’t question, she didn’t ask for an explanation, not that she would have listened or even believed. Her only concern was that it not happen in front of the children. She didn’t raise her voice; she didn’t ask why. As soon as Bree had gone, Talia quietly informed me that she and the children would be leaving as soon as possible. She didn’t see any more reason to stand in my way.
I just wanted her to care.
I wanted her to fight.
I wanted to believe that I was worth it, that we were worth it, that our family was worth it.
But here we were.
“Daddy, please!” Elizabeth was screaming.
And there went my little man, his tears starting.
Oh God, not Em, too... Please not Em, too. I know she barely knows me, I know she’s probably crying because they are, but it still...
“Talli,” I choked, my voice barely audible as she started the car. She didn’t turn, she didn’t even look in the rearview mirror.
Stay, damn it. Fucking stay. We can fix this, I swear, I know we can.
But I know better. Even if I had the chance to explain, even if she would listen, even if she would believe me... I know better.
I shut that door as quickly as I could and walked the hell away, hiding my face, pushing my way through everyone. I felt the sobs building, the tears threatening, the anger... the anguish so overwhelming...
I slammed the door to the house behind me.
She couldn’t see this. Fuck, she wouldn’t care.
I grabbed our wedding photo off the wall as I passed on my way up the stairs, the tears already falling freely as I walked by my babies’ rooms.
There wouldn’t be any laughter in the house today.
No little handprints all over the walls.
No resolving disputes between Elizabeth and Michael.
No Talia softly consoling Emily in the middle of the night.
My family was gone.
I threw the door to my bedroom open, seeing through my eyes how it looked when Bree had surprised me, the candles and roses everywhere.
It should have been Talia.
I closed the door, sinking to the ground, the sobs racking my body as I cradled that photo to me, letting the grief consume me, asking myself over and over... what have I done?
What have I done?