“Babe …?”
I shut my eyes and hunch over the counter. “Not yet,” I choke to my husband. “Please. Not yet.”
“The kids …”
“It’s late. School starts for them in another week. We need to get them back on schedule, instead of staying up all …” My mouth shuts all on its own. I think I’m tired of having the same old fight, and we just got heated about a stupid drawer. He’salways the one to be the kids’ buddy, the pal, the cool dad, leaving me to inherit the role of asshole, the one who stresses, the villain.
Tanner seems to follow without my uttering another word anyway. For a second, he hesitates, as if really wanting to say something else, but after a breath, he only settles with, “I’ll go get the kids to bed,” before seeing himself out.
I peer back up at the picture of us at the beach.
The laughter in our eyes. How Tanner’s looking at me instead of the camera, adoration in his eyes.
And my tightened grimace.
Trying not to show my discomfort.
The house is quiet and dark soon. Tanner compromised—as always—with getting the kids to bed, allowing them to stay up in their bedroom with the TV on. Then it’s just us putting ourselves to bed. The door left open, the hum of the kids’ TV through the wall, I’m turned onto my side staring at that squat marshmallow nightstand with just one drawer in, looking like a plump cartoon character missing a row of teeth. Tanner cleaned up most of the mess, but that unfinished piece of furniture is still out there right in my line of sight, reminding me of the terrible scene, haunting me with its toothless smile. I didn’t even want the thing. Tanner did. Said it’d match the reading chair by the back window, a chair his mom planned to throw out until Tanner rescued it. It’s hideous but as comfortable as sinking into a cloud.
“Ready to talk?”
Here it is. The moment I’ve been dreading for over an hour. I take in a breath, then realize I’m not ready. “In the morning. I just need sleep.”
“Ain’t neither of us gettin’ a wink of sleep until we talk it out. It’s how we always work, we talk it out.” He touches my back as if to rub it, then stops and slowly retracts his hand. “Is this about the tiny table? Do you hate it?”
Nightstand, I want to correct him because it’s important to call things what they are, but the last thing this bedroom needs is any more of my pettiness. “No.”
“The measurements were off. Manufacturing error. That’s it, gotta be, that’s why the drawer won’t fit.”
My patience is razor thin. “It’s all premeasured. Nothing’s off. We just didn’t put it together right.”
“Sure we did. It’s like Legos for adults. Follow the instructions, screw this into that, plug that into this, andvoila: a tiny table to go with Mama’s old reading chair you love so much.”
I let out a heavy sigh and clench my eyes. This is so Tanner, to push blame everywhere other than where it ought to be, acting like everything’s okay, shrugging off all stress. How lovely it must be to live like that, totally carefree, buying any piece of furniture we find online after a half-baked thought. One night, I considered buying a tall stork-shaped floor lamp complete with feathers, but did I? No. I practiced restraint, like an adult.
We’re supposed to be a household of two dads and two kids.
Feels like one dad and three kids lately.
“I think we should ship it back and order a new one,” Tanner decides, back to rubbing my back, certain it’s that rogue drawer that’s got me in my mood. “I can disassemble it in the mornin’.”
“Don’t.”
“It’s no biggie. They make n’ ship thembuild-it-yourselfthings so quick, there’s bound to be mistakes in the construction. With a new one, I’m sure the drawer will fit.”
“Tanner …”
“It wasn’t anything we did wrong. It was cut wrong, I’m tellin’ you. The drawer was just—”
“It’snotabout the dangdrawer,” I finally snap.
His hand stops.
My words shut him right up.
I feel terrible suddenly. And angry. Why am I so angry at the love of my life? When did my brain take up a sword and lead me into battle against my heart? How have I let it?
“Did you even hear them …?” I find myself asking, my voice barely air. “What I … What I shouted before …?”