MARGOT
Back in the house, I flop down on the bed, forcing myself to breathe. I feel trapped—by the house, by the fear of a pregnancy test, by my brother’s mercurial love—but I don’t want to suffocate and panic. I had to remove myself from the forced chill downstairs as people scrolled through their phones and watched TV while drinking wine and eating snacks.
There was a moment last night after Rini told me I’m going to have a baby in a matter of months when I thought I could back off Aimee and Adam and focus on my own growing family, but that was turned on its head by Adam. He really doesn’t see a future with Aimee; it’s not just this affair that’s distracting him. Divorce seems inevitable and I feel more desperate than ever. I want my baby to be around the girls all the time. In case I can’t have any more, I want them to feel like older sisters.
If Rini is right, Adam’s youngest will be less than two years older than my baby. More than extended family, we will operate like a blended family, one singular unit in multiple locations. How is that going to happen if he’s in some sad apartment and can barely keep straight the weekends he has the girls, let alone plan parties and family gatherings? This is where my future becomes bleaker than the girls’. I can’t manage all their logistics on top of mine.
Sadly, I threw away my only shot at forcing Adam’s hand. I can’t make him break up with Eden, and if they’re in an open marriage, then Rick won’t either. The last option—telling Aimee—isn’t really an option at all. That’s why Adam laughed—he called my bluff. I’m trying to save them, not destroy everyone in her path.
A strong gust of wind blows and something white floats by my window, catching my eye. But when I look, there’s nothing. I need a sign to set me off in a direction that isn’t this spiral. The rain pelts the glass with a thud that punctuates every negative thought I have.
Standing next to the window, I remember the dumbwaiter. I pop it open, and once again there is a single tarot card. I can read THE FOOL on the bottom. Before I pick it up, I remember what Rini asked me last night. Was it upside down?
I google, What does it mean when a tarot card is upside down?
The answer is the card is “reversed,” and a reversed card has a different meaning than an upright card. I search The Fool.
Meaning: The Fool represents beginning stages. She is inexperienced but lucky. She does not know what to expect but relies on faith.
Right below the definition, there’s a distinction I didn’t notice yesterday.
Upright card (keywords): Beginnings, Creativity, Leap of faith, Spontaneity
Reversed card (keywords): Chaos, Naivety, Poor judgment
I search The Empress again.
Upright card (keywords): Abundance, Nurturing, Pregnancy, Stability
Reversed card (keywords): Domestic problems, Financial issues, Stagnation, Unwanted pregnancy
Those are two very different fates. How can one card mean two opposite things?
I have to find Rini to ask about this. It’s important to know.
Ted walks in as I’m on my way out and I’m reminded of what Adam said. I pull him into the room and close the door behind us. My question for Rini will have to wait.
“Why didn’t you tell me that your best friend is in an open marriage?”
Ted guides me gently to the edge of the bed. “Margot, you’ve known Rick for years. He’s never exactly been a pro at monogamy, even way before Eden. Making it official didn’t feel like a new development.”
“Do you two go out picking up chicks?”
Ted stops fidgeting. He looks directly at me and I know I’ve crossed a line.
“I’m sorry,” I say.
Ted sits down on the bed next to me and takes my hand in his.
“You know I would never,” he says. “Everything I do is to make you happy.”
“Of course I know that.” I was acting out of hurt. It feels like a betrayal, like Ted was more loyal to Rick than to me. “So why, then?”
“Why didn’t I tell you about Rick’s marriage?”
“Yeah.”
“Honestly, I don’t want to hear about it, let alone discuss it with my beautiful, fun, fascinating wife.”
He kisses me on the cheek and I lean into it.
“I came up to tell you that Rini made sandwiches. Gourmet ones. Fancy stuff,” Ted says.
“I’m not hungry right now, but thanks.”
Ted starts to close the door behind him, and I call out to tell him I love him.
“Love you too,” he says before the lock clicks shut.
I notice the flowers and daily horoscope cards on the dresser across the room. When could Rini have had time to place those? She was making sandwiches while Adam and I were taping up the window. I pick up my card.
Good morning, Pisces! Open your eyes today to what you’ve been blind to, but do so with a kind and gentle heart. You were deliberately ignoring what you could not handle before. You are ready now.
I lie down again and close my eyes. I feel woozy and disoriented. Moments from the weekend bombard me.
With Rini: There’s something big coming to you around their death. Some new information, or a new perspective. It’s going to be a life-altering realization. Maybe a story you realize is different from the one you’ve been telling yourself.
I reach in my memory to the long-ago past, trying to call up the proof Adam wanted. Examples of our parents in love. But all that appears in my mind, over and over, is my father’s desk.
When I graduated law school, I decided I wanted my father’s old oak desk. Seventeen years later it was in the same condition as it had been in the house, sitting in storage. We were too young to make decisions about their belongings, and my Nana was too burdened.
Cleaning out the desk, I found a variety of key documents: their birth certificates, passports, Social Security cards. I also discovered my father was going to divorce my mother. He had filled out dissolution-of-marriage documents for the State of New York.
At the time, New York required proof of fault to grant a divorce, and the options were cruel and inhumane treatment, abandonment for one year, imprisonment for three years, or adultery. New York held on to this archaic system of fault, rather than allowing couples to claim irreconcilable differences, until 2010. My father selected cruelty.
I don’t know if my mother knew about the divorce papers, or the alleged fault, but I can imagine how mad that would have made her. In her mind, if anyone was cruel, it was him. And if anyone was going to leave, it should have been her. But she didn’t believe in divorce.
The divorce papers in my father’s desk were undated. They could have been from ten years prior, before Adam was born. They also could have been drawn up the day before their car accident.
Divorce doesn’t cause car accidents. I know this. But if I’m being honest, I’ve had questions.
- The fact that the tire skid marks show them swerving right before the sharp left into the guardrail.
- The fact that my mother’s body was turned sideways so her back was pressed up against the car door.
- The fact that my father had bruising on both shoulders and both sides of his face, even though he only hit the doorframe on the left side.
The police didn’t reveal any of this to an eight-year-old. They probably didn’t even tell my grandmother. They declared the deaths an accident. These were details I found in my own personal quest for answers as to why I had to grow up without parents. I didn’t ask God; I didn’t turn to drugs. My answers were always found in rational assessment; that’s how I became a lawyer.
But what if, as Adam asserts, all the arguments I saw between them weren’t the passionate flip side of an intense love, but deep hatred and rage?
It’s possible that day my father had planned to tell my mother about the divorce, and that’s why we were at Nana’s. If that was the case, and she had seen that he marked cruel and inhumane treatment as his grounds, I can see my mother breaking. Finally. Explosively.
I relax into the bed and let my imagination take over, knowing the answer to my problems is within my reach. A few minutes later, a tingling kicks in and the hairs on my arms stand up straight, like I’m channeling ghosts.
I can’t sit still any longer. I open my laptop and begin to write a new story. One I’d been too scared to see before.