The Ex Talk(79)

“We’re lucky enough to also have Phil Adeleke in the studio, another Seattle Symphony violinist,” Dominic says.

“That’s me,” Phil says with his usual cheeriness.

“And you and Leanna have been sitting next to each other for—”

“Nearly twenty-five years,” he finishes, and he and my mother laugh.

“Could you tell us about your wife?”

That cheeriness doesn’t completely fade, but it does diminish a little. “Joy and I met in college in Boston, in a West African students association. We are both Nigerian, both came to the States for college. She was studying history, and I was studying music, and I proposed on our graduation day.”

He talks about how it wasn’t a perfect marriage because of course no marriage is. They didn’t always have enough money, and her first bout with cancer a year into their marriage almost destroyed them. But she fought it into remission, and for a long time, they were okay. They moved to Seattle, where she worked in a university library and he in the symphony. Four kids. A mortgage. A cat. Unexpected kittens.

And then the cancer came back.

“I don’t know how you went through all of that,” my mother says to Phil. Like the two of them are having a conversation without either of us here, and this is where radio really becomes great. “For me, it was sudden. One day Dan was here, perfectly healthy, and the next, he was gone. It was unbelievably unfair, I know that. But my heart still breaks for what you went through.”

“We don’t have to play tragedy Olympics,” Phil says. “What you went through was terrible. What I went through was terrible. Nothing makes any of it any less terrible.”

Dominic and I sit back, letting them tell their intertwining stories.

“I truly thought I was done,” my mother says. “I’d been lucky enough to have one great big love, and that was it for me. I didn’t date. I didn’t make any online profiles or go on any apps, like some of my friends wanted me to. Five years passed, and they thought it was time for me to ‘get back out there.’ Seven years, and still nothing.” She shakes her head, and I want to tell her no one can see her doing that. “There was no getting back out there.”

“We were sitting right next to each other,” Phil says, “and we had no idea the other person was grieving the same way. For so many years.”

It’s at that moment that my eyes meet Dominic’s for the first time the whole episode. There’s a jolt in my chest that turns into a pang when he looks away first.

We take a few listener calls through the end. People want to talk to my mother, to Phil. A woman who lost her husband last month tells my mother how great it is to hear her so clearly happy. She says my mother gives her hope, and I wish we had more than an hour to talk about this. To listen to stories.

When we have a few minutes left on the clock, I gesture to where my mother and Phil’s violins are already set up and mic’d in the corner of the studio.

“Since we happen to be in the presence of two of Seattle Symphony’s finest,” I say, “we thought you two could play us out.”

The music is somber but not hopeless. Maybe I’ve never loved it, but my mother does, that’s clear. We’ll never have what I had with my dad, but we have something else.

Finally, the RECORDING sign blinks off. There’s a burst of applause from the adjoining studio in our headphones. Ruthie’s eyes are wet, and she asks both my mother and Phil for a hug. They’re happy to oblige.

When it’s over, I hate that the only person I want to celebrate with is Dominic.

And I hate even more how quickly he leaves the studio.





Apple Podcasts Reviews



Iconic duo

★★★★★

I’ve listened to every episode three times, and I can’t stop humming the intro music. My friends are sick of it. My family is sick of it. Do I need professional help? MAYBE! Just give me more Shay + Dom.


Love love love ★★★★★

I don’t know what I love more: Shay’s cautious optimism or Dominic’s endearing cynicism. Regardless, they’re chef kiss perfection together. Five hundred stars.


Insightful and empowering ★★★★

Fun podcast, surprisingly insightful. Taking off a star because the live calls sometimes drag on too long.


Garbage

★

I tried so hard to like this, but their discussions are shallow and the hosts aren’t as charming as they think they are. Am I the only one who doesn’t care that they used to date? Why is that interesting? Hard pass.


otp

★★★★★

if shay and dominic don’t somehow get back together, then i don’t believe in love anymore





29




That Friday, we hit the Apple Podcasts Top 100 again at slot number fifty-five, and I’m so relieved, so grateful, so proud that I could cry. I do, a little, in the women’s bathroom at lunch.

Even better, though, is that PodCon wants us in Austin next month. It’s a last-minute addition to their lineup, but still. We’ll be doing a live show, our very first, and we have a couple more big sponsors interested in coming on board. Dominic went pale when Kent announced it, and I remembered what he said about stage fright way back before our first episode. Well. He’ll just have to deal with it, even if part of me is desperate to reassure him.