I'm Fine and Neither Are You(48)

“You were staring at me like I made some unintentional gaffe. What did I say?”

Sanjay glanced at the timer on the microwave, which he’d set for the nuggets. Then he met my gaze. “What happened to ‘stop making everything look easy’?”

“How was I doing that ?”

“Pen, even after everything that’s happened lately, you’re still smoothing things over with your brother instead of telling him that he sucks for never coming to visit.”

“Need I remind you that I’m the one who told you I wasn’t happy with how our marriage was going? That’s hardly smoothing things over. And what about what I said to Yolanda after she said Nancy’s scholarship was a lucky break? I even told Matt that Cecily needed more attention. Nick already knows I’d like to see him more often, and I’d rather leave it at that. I don’t want to be that woman. ”

He scrunched up his face. “What woman?”

“You know the type. You say hi, and she immediately launches into a laundry list of what’s wrong with her life.”

Sanjay put his hands on his head. “Penelope, I’m not asking you to turn into Debbie Downer. I just think you feel the need to make it seem like everything is fine, even when it’s the exact opposite.”

I was seething. Make it seem like everything was fine! I didn’t do that—not anymore. That I was standing in my kitchen fighting with Sanjay was proof.

“Even when you’re direct, you still manage to avoid confrontation,” he added.

“Are we not in the middle of a confrontation this very second?”

“Same team, Pen. I’m trying to be honest with you.” He walked over to me and put his arms around my waist, but I shook him off. He couldn’t just stand there insulting me and think I’d want to cuddle. “Okay. But you said you were ready for the next thing on my list.”

“And I am,” I said defiantly.

“Good. I want you to be more honest with everyone—not just me. This project is a start, but you could be taking it further than our marriage.”

Had he missed everything I told him about Yolanda and Matt? “How?” I said.

“Well, I wish you’d tell Nick and your dad that you feel like an afterthought to them.”

An afterthought. That’s what I was, wasn’t it? My face was growing warm, and my throat was tightening.

“I’m not trying to hurt you,” he said, but he sounded defensive. “All I’m saying is that if things aren’t okay, then don’t act like they are.”

“Fine.” I waited until I was sure I could speak without crying. Then I said, “Since we’re being honest, I’d like to know how your job search is going. I’m glad you’re doing so much around the house, and trying to be more engaged in our marriage. But money is still a major issue, and I don’t think the book project is going to fix that.”

He looked wounded. “I haven’t had anything to tell you. I’m sending out application after application. Doesn’t that count for something?”

“Sure,” I said. “It counts for a lot.”

“Thank you. I’ll let you know if I get any bites.” He leaned against the counter, looking like he was on the verge of defeat. But he couldn’t raise a white flag yet—at least one of us needed to be all in on our project. “It’s been nearly a month. Do you really feel like this is improving our marriage?”

He had just told me to stop faking it, and I had agreed. But there was honest—and then there was stupid. “Yes,” I lied.





NINETEEN

I might not have known how to fix my marriage, but I knew how to be a good parent, and I threw myself into the task. I read to Stevie every single night. I woke even earlier so I had time to build elaborate Lego spaceships with Miles before leaving for work. I helped the kids and Cecily set up a lemonade stand one weekend. The next, I took them to a waterpark and let them shove cotton candy into their little mouths with abandon, then gently coaxed them out of their sugar-induced meltdowns an hour later.

July was nearly over, though I couldn’t say where the time had gone. But around midmonth, Miles had stopped wetting the bed; one dry night became two, and suddenly all four of us were sleeping straight through until the morning.

Jenny often liked to say that success stuck when it came with a reward, so one Saturday afternoon while Sanjay took Stevie to dance class, I took Miles to buy a toy. I knew he would play with it for three hours before requesting a new one. Still, when we pulled up in front of the toy store, you’d think I had just given him the keys to the kingdom.

“Can I get anything I want?” Miles asked, looking up at me expectantly.

“Not anything, love,” I said, tweaking his nose. “You can choose something that costs up to fifteen dollars, remember?”

His eyes grew even wider. “Fifteen is a lot, right?”

Not anymore it wasn’t, but I wanted to bask in the role of Best Mom Ever for at least a few minutes. “Let’s go see what we can find,” I told him.

Miles tore through aisle after aisle with a joy that made my heart ache. I could not remember a time when my own father had let me pick out my own toy. Would my son ever realize how fortunate he was—to have parents who not only bought him presents, but who also loved him as much as we did?