That chastising tone shamed me better than my own mother could have, and nerves did the rest. As much as I wanted to end this turmoil, it was nearly eleven and I felt like I hadn't slept in years. On top of that, my best friend loved me, and my wife didn’t want me. I didn't know where to even fucking start.
The words dried on my lips.
If I said it now, that would be it. There was no way this wasn’t going to end in a fight. One of us would be out of this house by morning and I assumed it was going to me but I was bone tired and suddenly scared.
When I remained silent for a full minute, she sighed and pushed to her feet. She went into the walk-in closet to change into her pajamas—when hadthathappened? Come to think of it, I couldn't even remember the last time she'd changed in front of me. Then, without saying a word, she shut off the light, leaving me sitting in the dark with the album still open on my lap as she climbed into bed.
After a long moment, I finally shut the album and stood in the dark to set it on the dresser. I usually slept in my boxers, so simply pulled off my clothes, dropping them next to my side of the bed since I couldn't see and climbed under the covers next to her.
“Were you smoking?” she asked.
I gritted my teeth, for some reason annoyed that she already knew.
“No.”
“Goodnight,” she whispered after a while.
“Night,” I returned.
For a long time, I could tell she was still awake. We were both tense, barely breathing, maybe waiting for each other to say something, but neither of us did.
Everything was so different from how it had been, and I hadn’t even noticed the shift until I’d seen those messages. I’d been completely blindsided. I shouldhateMelissa, but I didn’t, because the more I laid there, in the dark, the more I understood.
We were still married, but I didn’t evenwantto roll over and hug her. I didn’t want to kiss her or make love to her.
All I could think of was the man I’d left sitting on his living room floor looking like the world was ending.
Hewas the one I wanted to fix things with. He was the one that I wanted to hold and beg for forgiveness.
Me and Mellissa were laying here in this bed, both after being with someone else. We were two peas in a pod. Both terrible.
But at the same time, it made it feel less wrong.
We didn’t want each other. We both knew that now. Soon, it would be over, we just had to rip the bandage off and after that, I could be with Ryan.
Shock rippled through me at that thought, at the sureness of it.
Until today, I hadn’t thought I was properly into men. I’d thought I could do stuff with Ryan because I trusted him, he felt good, and I wanted the comfort.
Now, a light bulb had gone off in my head and it was all I could think about.
Me and Ryan… Aside from my own idiocy, what was to stop us from being together? Because now that it was in my head, it was like the world was making sense in a way that it never had before. Like my brain was saying “Ah! Of course!”
Me and Ryan… we just made sense.
More sense than me and Melissa ever had because she was like a separate person. Someone that I cared about but… Ryan was like a part of me, an extension. He wasmy personand always had been, ever since that first college party had put us in the same room playing beer pong.
I'd always known it, but for the first time, I felt like I really understood it. How fucked up that it had taken getting to this point for me to see it for what it really was. We could lose the B from our bromance and never need anything or anyone else ever again.
Sorting out my messed-up marriage had felt like an all-consuming issue but now another one swiftly flew in and took over; I needed to make things right with Ryan.
TEN
Ryan
“Here's my form, for the away game, Coach.”
“Thanks bud,” I said, taking the offered sheet from one of my young players.
