The Broken Ones

CHAPTER 14

GWEN

Before

It's been eight weeks to the day I found out about Noah and Simone's affair.

I have piled our things --- mine and Emma's --- neatly into boxes and stacked them out front, ready for the movers.

Noah hovers, looking lost, like he can't believe what is happening. He blinks when the movers mass at the front door, and stares at them, then at me dazedly, as if he doesn't know what has brought them to the house, his face bewildered, helpless, looking at me as if this were a nightmare, as if I could shake his shoulder and say, Wake up, Noah, it's not real, you're having a bad dream, I'm here, see? I'm here and I'm not going anywhere, you're safe, Noah, it's okay, looking at me as if I were his salvation, his anchor, someone who could arrest the tumult, press the pause button on his life spinning out of control.

He stares at the boxes piled up high, crammed deep into the back of the movers' truck. In the old easy world, a world that hadn't been broken by infidelity and lies, I would have appeared at his side, offered him a beer, and said, Oh, the neighbours are moving, how about that? and we would have strolled back to the living room, and shut the door on all that noise and activity.

But this is not a dream. This is real, the movers are here, and I'm moving with Emma to my mum's in London. For good.

Emma doesn't understand what's going on. When I told her we were leaving Norwich, she looked at me with wide, scared eyes and whispered, "Why are we moving to London?"

"To be with Grandma," I said brightly. "Grandma's lonely, and she's on her own in that great big apartment of hers. Mummy's worried about her --- "

"But Daddy," Emma broke in, her voice high, panicky, "what about Daddy? I'm worried about Daddy. Daddy will be alone."

It was on the tip of my tongue to tell her Daddy's not alone, Daddy's got a new girlfriend and guess who, it's Auntie Simone, how about that, so no worries, it's all good, yay --- and then Emma looked up at me, and her eyes welled up and she said in that new scared voice:

"Why doesn't Daddy come home anymore? Why's Daddy always working? Why doesn't he call us or come see us anymore? I miss Daddy so much, Mummy. Don't you?" There was a quiver in that sweet, sad voice, and she stopped, blinking hard. Damn you, Noah. Damn you for doing this to my sweet innocent baby, for planting that fear in her eyes.

"Daddy's so busy, pumpkin. He called me last night when you were sleeping to say how much he loves you and misses you." It was a lie.

Noah doesn't call anymore. He just leaves frantic, pleading texts on my phone telling me he wants to see me "alone, without Emma" to explain about Simone. He has dropped the Emma visits; it used to be twice a week: Wednesdays and Saturdays, before he skipped on the Wednesdays (he's busy with his new job) and it became only Sundays. Until the excuses started coming: Can't make it this Sunday. Something came up. And then my lawyer called me up to tell me that Noah's lawyer has contacted him. Noah's "not ready" to see Emma, he's in "a bad place right now", still trying to "gather his thoughts" about the impending divorce, he feels "devastated" and "can't face Emma until he's properly sorted himself out" --- Noah's exact words, conveyed to me over the phone by my lawyer with thinly veiled contempt.

Noah's been gathering his thoughts for almost three weeks now.

It's becoming clear to me he has no intention of seeing Emma. And it makes me wonder, did he ever really love her like he professed? If so, how could he shrug her off so easily, like an inconvenient piece of baggage he was forced to shoulder in order to trode down the path with his idea of a perfect wife? A disposable carry-on he could shove deep into a dark, easily-forgettable corner somewhere the moment his life got inconvenient?