Paris

This was the beginning of the end. Brad stood in front of Paris after he’d finally stopped pacing and threw his arms up at her. She hadn’t heard anything he said after the word ’divorce’ and that it was her fault because of this very reason. She checked out, she was guarded, she was blah, fucking blah, and whatever else he’d just said. She sighed and brought her hands up to her face and closed her eyes, willing the headache that was throbbing the front of her face to go away.

“Paris, are you even hearing anything I’ve said?” Brad dropped his head back like an annoyed teenager and grunted before looking back at her. “What do you want to keep in the divorce?”

She glanced around the kitchen of the house that they’d shared for the last eight years and shrugged her shoulders. “I don’t know, I guess just yellow sticker everything you want and red sticker what you don’t.”

“Red and yellow stickers? That’s how you want to treat this?” He seemed offended, which amused her since he was the one telling her he wanted the divorce. “Our marriage has come down to you tagging it like a fucking yard sale?”

“Well, what do you want from me? You’re the one asking for the divorce.” Paris walked into the kitchen with Brad in step behind her.

“Oh, I don’t know. I guess since we have a child together that you would be more upset about this.” He looked at her like she was stupid that wasn’t obvious, but instead of calling him out on it, she sighed heavily and took a drink of her nearly cold tea.

“You’ve said pretty much all there is to say. You want a divorce, I can have Tallulah, and you found someone else and you two are in love.” Apparently, she was paying more attention than she thought she was. “This isn’t news to me. I’ve known about you cheating for the last year, I’ve been done with our marriage long before ‘legs for days’ came around. I was done right about the time that you started messing around with that girl you kept going back to Atlanta for two years ago.”

“You knew about that?” The color drained from his face as he stepped up to the island counter in the middle of the kitchen.

“Yeah, I knew about that. I also knew about every other one since then, and I know that me and Lu are going to move back home. You can just sell the house and send half of whatever you get for it. I’ll take care of the bank stuff for you.”

Brad sat in the barstool chair that was tucked under the edge of the counter and looked down at his hands. “So this is it then?”

Paris nodded and leaned back against the counter along the wall, thankful that she was holding it together like she was. “This is it then, I suppose we can tell Tallulah about us, together.”

“Yeah, alright. Tonight, we can have a nice quiet dinner and maybe after we can tell her?” He was talking more to himself at this point as he stood and pushed his stool in. “I’m gonna head back to work. You need anything?” She shook her head as they walked out of the kitchen and went into the living room like it was any other normal day of the week.

She supposed it was though, it was a typical Tuesday, early afternoon. The world turned upside down on her and left her standing inside a house that was filled with memories of a happy family. The early morning pancakes, the late-night Disney movies that they were always suckered into watching past Tallulah’s bedtime. All came down to her standing in the living room with the sick feeling in her chest that she was thirty years old with a seven-year-old and starting over.

Paris stood there for another five minutes or so after Brad left, staring hard at absolutely nothing. The quiet of the house was suffocating her until she heard the neighbor’s dog barking and snapped back to the present. She walked back into the kitchen and dumped the rest of her tea down the sink and rinsed the cup, because what the fuck else was she supposed to do right now? Her phone buzzed on the counter, and she saw it was a text from her sister Caroline.

How’d it go?

He wants a divorce. I’ll call you later.

She didn’t wait for a response before setting the phone face-down and heading upstairs to Tallulah’s room. The door was cracked open like always, and Paris pushed through to find her daughter’s floor covered in colored pencils and half-finished drawings. Tallulah was supposed to be at school for another two hours, which meant Paris had exactly that long to figure out how the hell she was going to tell a seven-year-old that Daddy wouldn’t be living with them anymore.

She sat down on the edge of Tallulah’s bed and picked up one of the drawings, a lopsided house with stick figures in the windows. The drawing showed one tall figure, one shorter one with long hair, and a tiny one in between them holding both their hands. Paris set it back down on the nightstand and rubbed her face with both hands.

“Fuck.”

Her phone started ringing downstairs, and she ignored it. The one day that she actually remembered to turn the volume on and it hadn’t stopped ringing. The ringing stopped and started again, and then it rang a third time. Paris jogged back down and grabbed it without looking at the screen. “What?” She expected Caroline to be on the other end.

“Well, hello to you too.” It wasn’t Caroline, it her mom, and Paris sighed heavily as she leaned against the counter.

“Sorry, I thought you were—never mind. Hi, Mom.” She rubbed at her temple where the headache was getting worse.

“Caroline told me Brad asked for a divorce.” Her mother’s voice had that careful quality to it, like she was trying not to sound too interested while absolutely being too interested, and Paris walked toward the living room window to look out at the street.

“Yeah, he did, and we’re telling Lu tonight.” Mrs. White was getting her mail in her bathrobe even though it was almost noon, and Paris watched her shuffle back up her driveway.

“Tonight? Paris, that’s too soon, you need to have a plan, you need to—” Her mother was gearing up for a lecture, but Paris cut her off before she could really get going.

“Mom, I have a plan, I’m moving back home, he’s selling the house, and we’re done.” She said it flatly, without any room for argument, and waited for her mother to process.

“Back home meaning here, to Austin?” Her mother sounded surprised, which was fair since Paris hadn’t mentioned any of this before today.

“Yeah.” Paris didn’t feel like elaborating when she didn’t have anything else to say about it.

Paris could practically hear her recalculating everything in her head before she finally spoke up again. “Well, alright then, when are you planning on doing all this?”

“I don’t know yet, maybe a few weeks or so?” Paris hadn’t actually thought this through at all, but saying it out loud made it feel more real, like she was committing to something she couldn’t take back.

“You can stay with us until you find a place, your old room is just storage anyway.” Her mother’s voice had softened a bit, and Paris’s heart thumped hard making her feel sick, but pushed it back down where it belonged.

“Thanks, Mom, I need to go though, I’ll call you later this week.” She hung up before her mother could say anything else and sat down on the couch. The house was too quiet, and she knew she should probably start packing or making lists or doing something productive, but instead she just sat there until the alarm on her phone went off reminding her to pick up Tallulah from school.

Paris picked at the chicken on her plate and watched Tallulah push her broccoli around with her fork. Brad was telling Tallulah about something that happened at his office, some story about his coworker bringing in donuts that were stale as a rock, and Tallulah was giggling into her hand trying to keep her food in her mouth. Paris took a sip of her water and tried to figure out how they were going to transition from this to telling their daughter that they were getting divorced.

“Mom, can I have more broccoli?” Tallulah pushed her plate forward a little, and Paris stood up to get the bowl from the counter and scooped another spoonful onto her daughter’s plate. She sat back down and caught Brad’s eye across the table, and he gave her a small nod that made her stomach turn over. Of course he was going to make her take the lead, she always had to start when it was bad news.

“So, Lu, your dad and I wanted to talk to you about something.” Paris set her fork down and folded her hands in her lap, trying to figure out how the hell people did this.

“Am I in trouble?” Tallulah looked between them with wide eyes, and Brad shook his head quickly and reached over to rest his hand on her shoulder.

“No, no, nothing like that, sweetheart. Your mom and I have been talking, and we’ve decided that we’re going to live in different houses from now on.” He was using that calm voice he used when he had to tell clients bad news, and Paris watched Tallulah process what he was saying.

“Like Sadie’s parents?” Tallulah took a bite of her chicken, chewing slowly, and Paris was surprised at how calm she seemed about the whole thing. Brad moved his hand off her shoulder and began eating again.

“Yeah, kind of like that. You’re going to live with me, and we’re going to move back to Austin to be closer to Grandma and Grandpa.” Paris glanced at Brad, who was staring at his plate like the conversation didn’t involve him at all.

“What about Dad?” Tallulah looked at Brad, and he finally lifted his head to meet her eyes.

“I’m going to stay here for work, but you can come visit me whenever you want, and I’ll come see you all the time.” He was using that overly cheerful voice that adults used when they were lying to kids, and Paris wanted to kick him under the table. “It’s only two and a half hours away.”

“Okay.” Tallulah went back to eating her dinner like they’d just told her they were going to the grocery store, and Paris felt sick to her stomach at the realization that her daughter might actually be taking this better than her.

“That’s it? Just okay?” Brad leaned forward a little, like he was waiting for Tallulah to have some kind of breakdown.

“Yeah, I mean, Sadie says it’s not that bad having two houses because she gets two Christmases. Can I be done? I want to finish my drawing before I have to go to bed.” Tallulah shrugged and took a drink of her milk, and Paris nodded. She slid out of her chair and carried her plate to the sink before running upstairs, and they sat there in silence for a minute, listening to her footsteps above them.

“Well, that went better than I thought it would.” Brad finally let out a long breath and started gathering the dishes, and Paris stood up to help him.

“She’s seven, Brad, she doesn’t understand what this actually means yet. Give it a few days, and then we’ll see how she really feels about it.” Paris scraped the leftover food into the trash and handed him the plates.

“You don’t have to be so negative about everything.” He turned on the faucet and squirted soap onto the sponge, and Paris scoffed and shook her head.

“I’m not being negative, I’m being realistic, there’s a difference. You’re the one who wanted this, so don’t act surprised when it’s not all sunshine and rainbows for the rest of us.” She dried the first plate he handed her and put it in the cabinet.

“I didn’t say I was surprised. I just thought you’d be a little more supportive, considering.” Brad scrubbed at a pot harder than necessary, and water splashed up onto his shirt.

“Considering what? That you cheated on me? That you’re in love with someone else? That you’re breaking up our family? What exactly should I be supportive about?” Paris set the dish towel down and crossed her arms, waiting for him to answer.

“Considering that you checked out of this marriage a long time before I did.” Brad turned off the water and turned to face her, and his jaw was set in that stubborn way that meant he was gearing up for a fight. “You think I didn’t notice? You’ve been going through the motions for over a year now, Paris, and every time I tried to talk to you about it, you shut me down.”

“Oh, Gee, I wonder why?” Paris’s face went hot, and she hated that he was trying to have this talk now. “I was trying to keep our family together; trying to show up with enough enthusiasm for the both of us to one of Lu’s after school things. I was trying to make it work even when you were off screwing around with whoever would give you the time of day.”

“I’m not saying what I did was right, I’m saying that you don’t get to act like you’re the only victim here.” He dried his hands on a towel and leaned back against the counter. “You were miserable, I was miserable, and we were both too stubborn to admit it until I finally did something about it.”

“So, this is my fault then? You cheated because I wasn’t paying enough attention to you?” Paris crossed her arms tighter across her chest. “You are unfucking believable.”

“No, that’s not what I’m saying at all.” Brad ran his hand through his hair and let out a frustrated breath. “I’m saying that we both stopped trying a long time ago, and yeah, I handled it badly, but you can’t pretend like everything was fine until I met someone else.”

Paris opened her mouth to argue and then closed it again, because what good would it have done? She’d known things weren’t right for a long time before she found out about Atlanta and looking back now, him screwing around behind her back had probably gone on longer than that. She turned around and gripped the edge of the counter and stared at the backsplash they’d picked out together three years ago, back when they still made decisions as a team.

“I didn’t know how to fix it.” She said it quietly, and she wasn’t even sure if she was talking to him or to herself. “Every time I tried to bring something up, you’d either make a joke or tell me I was overthinking things, and eventually I just stopped trying because it was easier than fighting about it.”

“I know.” Brad moved to stand next to her, and he kept his hands in his pockets like he wasn’t sure if he still had the right to touch her or not. “I’m not good at the serious conversations, I never have been, and I thought if I just kept things light then maybe we’d get through whatever rough patch we were in.”

“We weren’t in a rough patch, Brad, we were drowning because you were fucking around on me and thought I never knew.” Paris finally looked at him, and she could see the exhaustion written all over his face. “I don’t even know when it started, but one day I woke up and realized that we were just two people living in the same house and raising a kid together, and that was it.”

“Yeah.” He nodded and looked down at his shoes, and Paris noticed that he was still wearing the ones she’d bought him for his birthday last year. “I felt it too, I just didn’t know what to do about it, so I did the worst possible thing instead.”

“You think?” Paris felt a laugh bubble up in her throat, and it came out sounding more bitter than she’d intended. “You know what the worst part is? I’m not even that angry about it anymore, and I don’t know if that makes me a terrible person or if it just means I really am done.”

“I don’t think it makes you terrible.” Brad shifted his weight and finally pulled his hands out of his pockets. “I think it means we both knew this was coming, and I was just the one who pulled the trigger first.”

Paris nodded and picked the dish towel back up and started drying the rest of the dishes, because she needed something to focus her aggression on before she said something she’d regret. Brad went back to washing, and they worked in silence for a few minutes before he cleared his throat.

“I’m sorry, you know. For all of it.” He handed her a plate, and she took it without looking at him. “I should have been honest with you from the start instead of sneaking around like some asshole, and I should have told you how I was feeling before it got to this point.”

“Yeah, you should have.” Paris put the plate away and reached for the next one. “But I should have done a lot of things differently too, so I guess we’re both pretty much shit at this.”

“We really are.” Brad let out a short laugh, and it sounded almost fond in a way that made Paris’s chest ache. “Lu’s lucky she’s not going to remember most of this when she gets older.”

“She’s going to remember some of it.” Paris finished drying the last dish and hung the towel on the oven handle. “We need to make sure we don’t screw her up too badly, that’s the only thing that matters now.”

“Agreed.” Brad pulled the plug in the sink and watched the water drain out. “I meant what I said earlier, about seeing her whenever I can, and I’ll help with whatever you need for the move.”

“Thanks.” Paris leaned against the counter and looked at him, really looked at him, and tried to remember when things had started to fall apart between them. “I don’t hate you, you know, I just hate what we became.”

“I know.” Brad met her eyes, and there was something sad in his expression that she recognized because she felt it too. “I don’t hate you either, for what it’s worth.”

Paris nodded and pushed off the counter, “I’m going to go check on Lu.” Paris pushed off the counter and headed toward the stairs, and she could hear Brad opening the refrigerator behind her and the sound of plastic containers being shuffled around. She took the steps slowly, one hand on the railing, and stopped at the top to listen to Tallulah humming in her room.

Paris knocked on the doorframe, and Tallulah looked up from her drawing with a smile that made Paris’s night feel a lot less lonely. “Hey, baby, how’s it going?” She walked over and sat down on the edge of the bed, looking at the new picture her daughter had started of what looked like a house with a big tree in the front yard.

“Good. I’m drawing Grandma and Grandpa’s house because you said we’re moving there.” Tallulah added another branch to the tree, her tongue sticking out a little in concentration. “Can I have my own room there, or do I have to share with the guest room stuff?”

“You’ll have your own room, I promise.” Paris reached over and smoothed down a piece of Tallulah’s hair that was sticking up. “Are you doing okay with everything Dad and I said at dinner?”

“Yeah, I guess so.” Tallulah set down her colored pencil and picked up a green one. “Sadie says her parents are nicer to each other now that they don’t live together, so maybe you and Dad will be nicer too.”

Paris looked away and focused on the drawings scattered across the floor, because the idea that her seven-year-old had been paying that much attention made her want to cry. “We’re going to try our best, sweetheart, and we both love you very much, okay?” Tallulah nodded and went back to coloring, and Paris sat there for another minute watching her draw before she kissed the top of her head and told her to brush her teeth for bed. She left the door cracked on her way out and walked to her bedroom.