“Ma.”
“Timothy.”
Silence.
“I need to talk to you,” he said finally.
“I’m listening.”
“Not on the phone. Can I come over?”
Margaret set down her teacup. “Yes.”
Twenty minutes later, he was standing on her porch. He looked like he hadn’t slept in days. His shirt was wrinkled. His hair was uncombed.
She let him in.
He sat at her small kitchen table and stared at his hands.
Margaret poured him tea and set it in front of him. He didn’t drink it.
“I went to see her,” he said quietly.
Margaret sat down across from him. “How is she?”
“Angry. Scared. She wouldn’t look at me.”
“Did she say anything?”
“She said it was your fault. That you manipulated everything. That you poisoned me against her.”
Margaret nodded. “And what did you say?”
Timothy’s jaw tightened. “I said she was the one who stole. She was the one who lied. And she was the one who treated you like garbage in front of a room full of people.”
Margaret’s chest tightened. “Timothy—”
“I should have said it that night.” His voice broke. “I should have told her to stop. I should have stood up for you. But I didn’t. I just stood there like a coward.”
“You were in an impossible situation.”
“No, I wasn’t. I just didn’t want to see the truth. I didn’t want to admit that I’d married someone who—” He stopped. His hands clenched into fists. “Someone who didn’t love me the way I loved her.”
Margaret reached across the table and covered his hand with hers. “I’m sorry you’re hurting.”
He looked up at her. His eyes were bloodshot. “Are you sorry you did it?”
Margaret held his gaze. “No.”
He nodded slowly. “I didn’t think so.”
They sat in silence for a long moment.
“I don’t know what happens now,” Timothy said finally. “I don’t know how to fix this.”
“You don’t have to fix it. You just have to survive it.”
“And then what?”
