“No. Listen.”
He did.
“I am angry that you found out you had a granddaughter and decided I wasn’t entitled to know.”
He looked down. “I’m sorry.”
“I know.”
“Can you forgive me?”
“I don’t know.”
That was the truth.
We went home a day early.
Our anniversary trip ended without champagne, photographs, or the dinner reservation Robert had made for our final night.
Three days later, Ariella texted me.
“I hope it’s okay that I have your number. Robert gave it to me.”
I stared at the message for a long time.
Then another arrived.
“I didn’t come looking for him to ruin anything. I had already lost my dad and my grandmother. I just wanted to know if there was anyone else left.”
I called her.
We talked for nearly two hours.
Mostly about Mike.
A little about Robert.
Nothing about the state of my marriage.
That’s between Robert and me.
Ariella and I are meeting for coffee next week.
Robert isn’t coming. He knows.
For 40 years, I thought our honeymoon hotel represented the beginning of our life together.
Now it represents something else too.
A place where my husband tried to keep two parts of his family from touching.
I don’t know yet what happens to our marriage.
Forty years doesn’t disappear because of one terrible decision.
But 40 years doesn’t erase that decision either.
The strangest part is that I spent one awful night believing some young woman had stolen part of my husband from me.
She hadn’t.
She didn’t even know she was a secret.
That mistake belongs entirely to Robert.
Ariella was only looking for family.
And whatever happens between my husband and me, I refuse to make her lose another one.
