That’s what my husband said to me on a Thursday night in October, standing in our kitchen with his coat still on.
I was at the stove stirring a pot of chili. His favorite. The kind with the extra beans and the little bit of cinnamon that he always said made it taste like Sunday afternoons at his grandmother’s house. I had the radio on. I was humming.
I didn’t even turn around at first.
“What did you say, honey?”
He didn’t repeat it. Instead, I heard paper. A soft rustle.
Then the light thump of something being set down on the kitchen table.
I turned around.
Greg was standing by the table with his hands in his coat pockets.
There was a thick manila envelope lying next to the salt shaker.
He wasn’t looking at me. He was looking at the envelope.
“What’s that?” I asked.
“Papers,” he said.
“What papers?”
He finally looked up. His eyes were red around the edges.
“Divorce papers, Claire.”
I laughed.
I honestly laughed out loud.
I stood there holding a wooden spoon dripping with chili, and I laughed, because it was the most ridiculous thing I had ever heard in my life.
We had been married for twenty-two years.
We had a daughter in college. We had a mortgage, a golden retriever named Biscuit, and a vacation planned to the Smoky Mountains in the spring.
We still held hands at the grocery store.
He still kissed me on the forehead every single morning before he left for work.
“Very funny,” I said. “Take your coat off. Dinner’s almost ready.”
He didn’t move.
“I’m not joking.”
The smile slowly slid off my face.
“Greg.”
“I’m sorry,” he said quietly. “I’ve already signed them.
I’ve talked to a lawyer. I’m going to stay at a hotel tonight, and I’ll find an apartment this weekend.”
The wooden spoon slipped out of my hand and hit the floor.
Chili splattered across the tile. Biscuit came running over to lick it up, and neither of us stopped him.
“I don’t understand,” I said. My voice sounded strange.
Far away. “What happened? What did I do?”
“You didn’t do anything.”
“Then why?”
He took a long breath.
“We’ve grown apart,” he said. “We’re too different now.
We want different things.”
“What things? What do I want that you don’t want? Tell me one thing.”
He didn’t answer.
“Is there someone else?” I asked. My throat was so tight I could barely get the words out. “Just tell me. I’d rather know. Is there someone else?”
“No,” he said, and he said it so fast and so firmly that I believed him. “There is no one else, Claire.
I swear to God. There’s never been anyone else.”
“Then I don’t understand!”
I was shouting now. I never shout. In twenty-two years, I could count on one hand the number of times I had raised my voice at that man.
He flinched like I had hit him.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered. “I’m so sorry.”
Then he turned around and walked out the back door.
I heard his car start in the driveway.
I heard it back out onto the street. I heard it drive away.
And I stood there in my kitchen with chili on my shoes, staring at that manila envelope next to the salt shaker, waiting for him to come back in and tell me it was all some terrible, stupid joke.
He never did.
The next three weeks were the worst of my life.
I called him every day. Sometimes three or four times a day.
Most of the time he didn’t answer.
When he did, he was always gentle.
Always kind.
And always saying the exact same thing.
“We’ve grown apart, Claire. We’re too different now.”
It was like talking to a recording.