WORK IN PROGRESS: Challen and Addy

Chapter 5 (Challen): Some Serious Debris

Copyright © 2024 by GroveltoHEA

Usually, you have an idea, even if it's a vague one, as to how something was going to play out when you were walking into a situation. For the first time in my life, I had no idea what I was about to face as I entered Addy's hospital room. But my gut was churning, warning me.

"Addy," I said and her head turned slowly toward me.

"Sorry to take you away from Jennifer," she said and her voice was breathy and soft. "I'll make this fast since I know you don't like to keep her waiting."

Her father muttered something that sounded a lot like motherfucker, and her mom skewered me with her eyes. I focused my eyes on Addy.

My wife's eyes were blank as they looked at me dispassionately.

"You didn't take me away from her," I said evenly.

"I know. You already showed me I couldn't take you away from her."

"That's not what I meant."

"I need you to just listen because talking is painful with my broken ribs and listening to you say anything is even more painful."

"I'm so sorry, sweetheart."

She made a face at the endearment, but didn't say anything.

"I have some extensive injuries that are going to keep me here a while longer. And then, I'm going to need rehab for at least several months. One of my legs is broken, my one arm is, plus I have a fractured hip and I already mentioned the ribs."

"Oh, God," I breathed, sickened. 

My wife could have died and I was focused on a deadline at work, not trying to call her because I thought she was mad at me, and I didn't have time for her pettiness.

"Yes, thank goodness this didn't happen to Jennifer. I know that would have devastated you."

"Addy, I am devastated. For you. You're my wife. Hearing all of this makes me feel sick." In so many ways. 

She ignored that, and I didn't blame her given the last conversation we had before her accident.

But hearing the words come out of my mouth sickened me, too, because for the first time in my life, I was realizing that words may have power, but sometimes they have no meaning in someone else's eyes -- my wife's -- since I'd basically rendered them useless with my actions. Or, more accurately, my lack of actions. I'd made it that way with Addy. Why would she believe anything I was saying? 

"So for the next who knows how long, but it could be up to a year, I'm going to focus on healing."

"Of course." 

I was trying to figure out how many days a week I could work from home to be with her or help her. Maybe my company would let me work at home full time, going into the office only for team meetings that couldn't be handled with video conferencing.

"I don't have any energy to give to divorcing you, Challen. Our marriage is so...so insignificant at this point that it's meaningless, and I'm not going to expend any energy on ending it until I'm healed. Nothing is going to take my focus off healing. The only good thing we have between us is your health insurance, so that does matter to me, given what I'm facing."

"I don't want a divorce, Addy."

"Well, you don't want me as a wife, either, so I'd guess that's just the guilt talking since I'm in the hospital."

"It's not," I insisted, but it rang untrue given the way I'd been acting for so long. I shut my mouth because right now there was no way she'd believe any professions of love I made. I'd fucked up for too long to have any credibility with her.

"What can I do to help you?" Maybe if we focused on her healing, that would be a way for me to start proving some things to her now.

"Nothing," she said, a hint of exasperation seeping into her voice. "That's my point. I want you to keep your job for at least the next year so I don't have to deal with any insurance surprises or changes. Right now, they're trying to work out what the best plan for me is. A skilled nursing facility and then stepping down to an inpatient rehab facility for a while, or something like that."

"Whatever you need. I want to be part of those conversations."

"No. You didn't want conversations with me before the accident, so you don't get them now. I'm just letting you know what's going on as a courtesy. Tomorrow, you go back to work and live your life the way you've been living it lately -- as if I don't exist. Be with Jennifer, but I swear if you try to divorce me before I no longer need your insurance, I will make your life a living hell, Challen. I love my company, but the insurance is nowhere near as good as yours and it's twice as expensive."

"I'm not divorcing you!"

"Mom and Dad are staying for two weeks and then they have to get back to work. I won't let them take any more time. If I need something, I have friends who will help."

"You have a husband who will help, Addy."

I heard Nate give a loud snort, followed by a muttered, "Some husband."

"I need people I can depend on," Addy said.

"You can depend on me, I swear it."

"How long was I in the hospital before you realized it?" she asked so sweetly it took me a second to realize just how not sweet her question was.

Her question hung over me like the Sword of Damocles. I was in imminent danger of losing my wife.

"I'm going to make this up to you, Addy."

God, Challen, just shut up. Your words sound stupid. They're just empty to her right now.

"Don't let guilt make this become more than it is, Challen. You know where we were before the accident. We'd still be there if I hadn't been in an accident."

I kept my mouth shut because she was right. Before the accident, I hadn't been willing to listen and change my ways. My selfishness was wrapped around me, allowing me to ignore my wife who just didn't understand what I needed. I had spent more time with Jennifer than with Addy because it was easier to avoid the unpleasantness at home and gravitate to someone who wasn't constantly at you, who didn't ask anything of you, who didn't see you as a disappointment.  

It was easier to avoid the problems in my marriage than to work through them. I didn't want to hear about how short I fell in Addy's eyes, how I constantly let her down, how unhappy she was with my work schedule when I saw it as a necessary evil to provide us with a good life. 

Seeing our marriage through my eyes only had led us to this point. Not once had I stopped to consider Addy's point of view; to me, I was focused on her dissatisfaction and not being able to please my wife no matter what I did. It felt frustrating and disheartening. So I ignored our issues instead of addressing them. Avoiding our problems was easier because nothing changed if we discussed them anyway. We each got tired of the same fights, I think, and continued ahead with nothing ever getting resolved. That meant the issues grew bigger and we let them get worse.

In the day-to-day of a marriage that wasn't going well, that had some serious cracks forming, I'd forgotten why I'd fallen in love with and married Addy. I wondered if she could look at me now, or ever again, and remember why she'd fallen in love with and married me.

The reality of living with someone could take some of the shine off the love that brought you together in the first place. It was easy to forget your beginnings and all of the good things when the difficulties were looming large. And when the difficulties were all you were seeing, you just avoided them even harder. You began to go your separate ways because it meant fewer fights.

But I'd married Addy because I loved her like I'd never loved any woman before her. No matter what had gotten in the way since then, I'd fallen hard for my wife and I'd wanted to spend the rest of our lives together. That love was still there -- buried under some serious debris, but it was still there, waiting to be uncovered, cleaned off and brought back into the open.

Convincing my wife of that was an entirely different matter. From the cold, blank look on her face, it might be impossible.

I just knew I had to try. If it was a love strong enough to marry each other for, it was a love worth salvaging.