My wife had been removing her wedding band before going out with her girlfriends, and I discovered it only because she forgot the ring beside our bathroom sink one Friday night. When I texted her to say she had left it behind, I expected surprise, maybe even panic. Instead, her answer arrived less than a minute later: I know. Guys buy me drinks when they think I’m single.
Chapter 3
We attended counseling for six weeks.
Those sessions did not save our marriage.
But they did save something else.
The truth.
For years, Dana had felt that my job, television, my brother, weekend errands, and nearly everything else received whatever energy I had before she did. She said she stopped asking me to go places because my answer was usually, “Maybe next weekend.”
I wanted to argue.
Then Dr. Price asked me how many dates I had planned during the previous year.
I could not remember one.
Dana reminded me that our anniversary dinner had happened because she made the reservation.
Our Christmas trip to her sister’s house had been organized by Dana.
The concert we attended in June had been tickets Dana purchased.
Even the occasional Sunday breakfast out happened because she suggested it.
I had confused providing with participating.
That was mine to own.
But when Dana tried to connect my failures to her Friday nights, Dr. Price stopped her.
“Your loneliness matters,” she said. “Michael’s emotional absence matters. But kissing other men was still a choice you made.”
Dana nodded.
“I know.”
Dr. Price continued.
“If you were unhappy, you could have demanded counseling.”
“Yes.”
“You could have separated.”
“Yes.”
“You could have told him you were considering divorce.”
“Yes.”
“You did not have to create romantic availability outside the marriage.”
Dana began crying again.
“I know.”
I looked at her and felt something complicated.
Vindication did not feel good.
It felt empty.
I did not want a professional to declare me innocent.
I wanted my wife back.
But by then I was beginning to understand that the woman I wanted back belonged partly to memory.
The real Dana sitting beside me had been lonely enough to seek attention from strangers and dishonest enough to conceal it.
And the real Michael sitting beside her had spent years assuming that because he wasn’t cruel, unfaithful, or drunk, he was automatically being a good husband.
We were both wrong in different ways.
During our fourth session, Dr. Price asked the question neither of us had wanted to answer.
“Do you both genuinely want to repair this marriage?”
Silence.
Dana looked at me.
I looked at her.
Neither spoke.
Dr. Price waited.
Finally I said, “I don’t know.”
Dana gave a sad little laugh.
“That was my answer too.”
For the first time since that terrible Friday, something almost tender passed between us.
Recognition.
Not love exactly.
But recognition.
We were two people sitting beside the ruins of something we had both neglected, arguing less about who broke the final window and beginning to admit the house had been empty for a while.
That night we went home and talked until three in the morning.
No counselor.
No yelling.
No phones.
We talked about the beginning.
The first apartment with the terrible brown carpet.
The night our furnace broke and we slept under three comforters laughing.
The miscarriage we had never properly discussed because Dana insisted she was fine and I believed her because believing her was easier.
The years after that when neither of us brought up children again.
The promotion I didn’t get.
Her father’s death.
My mother’s surgery.
All those ordinary injuries married people accumulate.
Somewhere along the way, we had stopped bringing pain toward each other.
We carried it separately.
Separate pain became separate lives.
Dana wiped her eyes.
“I wasn’t taking the ring off the first few times.”
I looked at her.
“What changed?”
“A guy saw it and apologized for flirting.”
She stared at her hands.
“My friend joked that I’d get more drinks without it.”
“And you tried it.”
“Yes.”
“How did it feel?”
She took a long time answering.
“Good.”
That honesty hurt.
“Why?”
“Because somebody noticed me.”
I looked away.
She continued.
“They’d ask my name. Tell me I looked nice. Ask what music I liked. Stupid things.”
“Things I stopped asking.”
“Yes.”
I nodded.
Then she added, “But that doesn’t make what I did your fault.”
I looked back at her.
“I need you to know that.”
For weeks, I had wanted to hear those words.
Now that I finally heard them, I realized they were not enough to rebuild trust.
“Did it go further than kissing?”
“No.”
I searched her face.
“I need the truth, Dana.”
“That is the truth.”
I decided to believe her.
Not because I was certain.
Because there comes a point where digging for additional pain becomes another way of avoiding the decision already in front of you.
We did not need another betrayal to justify ending the marriage.
We already had enough truth.
The next morning, we made coffee and discussed divorce.
Strangely, it was one of the calmest conversations of our marriage.
She wanted the house only if she could refinance it.
I didn’t want it.
I wanted my grandfather’s tools from the garage.
She wanted the dining-room set her parents had given us.
We divided savings.
We talked about the dog we had lost three years earlier and both started crying.
At one point Dana said, “Is it terrible that we’re communicating better while planning our divorce than we did while married?”
“Yes,” I said.
Then I smiled.
“But it’s also kind of funny.”
She laughed through her tears.
For the first time in months, neither of us was pretending.
