Shouldering the Burden

Marge was sitting at the small table, looking out the window and wringing her hands together. Her eyes were moist; not full of tears, not yet, but right on the verge. When she heard me enter, though, the first one slid down her cheek. "Charlie, baby. We need to talk."

That phrase never presaged a happy conversation. Everyone, man or woman, married or single, knows that. I knew it better than most. Sitting down in the chair next to her, I said, "What is it, love?"

She swallowed, unable to speak for a moment. "I-- Charlie, I'm so sorry. I don't know how to tell you this."

It hurt her so much to say. I knew; I'd known for a long time. But she was confessing to me now, and I would let her. "Marge, I love you. Whatever it is, we'll get past it."

My wife sobbed, a single solitary sob, and said, "Baby, please. I don't know if we can. I-- God, Charlie, I love you so much, but I-- I-- Oh god, Charlie. I cheated on you." Her hand covered her mouth as the waterworks started in earnest.

"What?"

Marge nodded, unable to speak at first. Her mouth opened and closed a few times, then she said, "I'm so sorry, Charlie. I... we..."

I took a deep breath and let it out. "Tell me what happened, Marge. Why? Who?"

"Milt. It-- it was Milt." She sniffled, and I handed her a tissue. "He-- You had been so angry after we fought. I don't-- I can't even remember what we fought about. A few months ago, I mean. I was mad and I went to the bar and got drunk, and he..."

"Milt, your ex Milt?" I raised my voice just a touch, an angry tone to it.

She wailed, "I'm so sorry!"

"Was it just the once?"

Her head emphatically shook 'No.' "I didn't... Charlie, I promise, I didn't even mean for it to happen once, but I was drunk and mad, and I don't even remember most of it. And during... during he had taken pictures, ones where... where I was wearing my wedding ring and--" She choked. "He told me he'd tell you, show you the pictures if I didn't... if I wouldn't keep..."

I knew the answer, but I had to ask. "How long?"

Marge looked down at her hands, afraid of the rage in my eyes. "Since then. A couple times a week, while you were at work. He'd come by and-- and he'd wave the pictures around, tell me he'd send them to you. His face wasn't in them and--" Marge looked up. "Please, baby, please! I didn't want to do it! I promise! But I didn't-- I can't lose you! I'm sorry!"

A tear ran down my face. It hurt to listen to her confession, hurt even more to see her like this. There was an angry edge in my voice. "You can't ever do this again, Marge. Never. I can forgive the mistake you made this once. And I understand why you didn't tell me, but it hurts that you didn't. I'll--" I put my hand on hers. "We'll figure it out. I love you, Marge. I'll always love you. Just never again, okay?"

Her expression was indescribable. Surprise, amazement, joy, love, hope, all mixed together into one expression. "You-- really, Charlie? You'll forgive me?" I nodded solemnly. She hobbled up off her chair and sat in my lap, sobbing.

I guided my frail, tired love to the too-small bed and held her in my arms. Marge cried herself to sleep, tears of sorrow and relief mixing together and falling on my chest. She was out within minutes. When she was finally down, I brushed a silver tress away from her face and gently kissed her forehead. Then, slipping out of the bed, I watched my wife of almost fifty years sleep.

Marge's small room in the memory care facility was filled with mementoes of our life together. Pictures of our kids and grandkids, our friends, wedding photos, and small tchotchkes lined shelves and walls.

On the table sat a vase, once broken and now reformed. The cracks in the vase were filled with gold, in some cases replacing small pieces that had been lost. When Marge had told me of her infidelity and Milt's blackmail, I had taken this vase, a gift from her beloved grandmother that had died shortly after we were married, and threw it against a wall, shattering it. Then I stomped out of the house, afraid I would turn my rage on her.

I had been an angry and arrogant young man, so certain there was more to her infidelity, so sure that she had done it all of her own free will. I would've ended our marriage then and told myself it was all her doing. But the fight that drove her to leave on the night she cheated had been over nothing. My anger, the demon that would surface at the drop of a hat, was something she'd lived with for a long time, and I had finally pushed her too far. Pushed her into the arms of a predator.

I know that now. At the time, I couldn't accept it, so I chose to believe she was a willing participant. Marge could be very prickly; I got angry, but she also pushed my buttons when she was feeling insecure. She'd never gone so far as to cheat, but she was beautiful and, when she wanted to get a rise out of me, flirtatious. It wasn't until I crashed with Joe, a buddy I worked construction with, that Sandy, his wife, read me the riot act. And then, more importantly at the time, she told me Marge wasn't the only woman Milt had done this to.

He was a weedy little prick, handsome and charming in an oily way. Always willing to buy a lady a drink. Always, it turned out, willing to slip something into it when her back was turned. He'd been a shit when he and Marge had gone together, but he'd gotten worse as the years went by, going from lothario to... well, we didn't have a term for it back then. "Date rapist" is what they'd call it a decade or so later.

I didn't kill him. It was a narrow thing, his survival, but he walked with a limp for the rest of his life, and those prettyboy features were smashed to bits; the bastard could have given Quasimodo a run for his money. And, of course, I didn't do anything at all; while Milt was broken and almost bleeding out in an alley, I was playing poker at Joe's with him and three other good union boys, and his wife was kind enough to keep the beer flowing. This was before DNA and CSI and all of that other acronym bullshit, so it was our word against his. He left town a year or so later; hopefully he got hit by a bus somewhere out there.

Marge stirred in her sleep, quietly muttering something indistinct. This had not been a great morning for her. The best days were the ones where she'd recognize me, knew where she was, and knew why she was here. Those were getting fewer and farther between.

The kids had helped me get her into the center after a near-disaster. I had been napping, and Marge wandered out of the house. She was missing for hours before the folks living in our old apartment called to let me know she'd been banging on the door and demanding to be let in.

After Milt, things were touch and go with our marriage for a while. I knew she'd been tricked and abused. I knew I'd been an ass, that I had to get my anger under control. I knew we loved each other. But knowing was one thing and doing was another. Turning that knowledge into self-improvement and forgiveness and a renewal of trust was the hardest thing we'd ever do. Marge and I spent a lot of time with our pastor, our friends, and our family trying to get back to something like the marriage we'd had before.

We made our way there eventually. There were recriminations, fear, and anger, but there was always love. Marge was a new woman. Her brush with real evil made her realize how petty she could be at times. My last truly violent act was against Milt, and when I realized how much I had contributed to the near-end of my marriage, I worked as hard as I could to keep that rage at bay. I wasn't perfect, nor was she, but we both worked at ourselves and at our marriage.

The shattered vase went into a box in the closet; I thought it beyond repair, but Marge couldn't bear to part with it. It wasn't until we visited an art museum while Marge was pregnant with our first child that I found a way to put it back together.

The museum was running an exhibit on a Japanese art form called kintsugi that used precious metals to repair broken objects, making them whole again while also highlighting the cracks and flaws that had once broken them. The philosophy behind it was called wabi-sabi, the embracing of flaws and imperfections as their own part of something, a mark of its history.

On our anniversary that year, I presented Marge with the repaired vase, run through with seams of gold. She took my hand, with tears in her eyes, and whispered, "It's us." I simply nodded and kissed her. We would never be who we'd been before, but we could be whole. We could be beautiful.

I stepped next to her bed and stroked her hair. She was so peaceful when she slept, her face free of the tension and worry I too often saw on it these days. She had been in the facility for the better part of a year now, and I'd had to hear her confess so many times.

The first time she relived that memory was the worst, both because it was such a searing pain to be subjected to and because I couldn't be the person I'd become in the years since. She expected the angry young man, and when she didn't find him, she became even more confused and upset. It was wrong. I was wrong.

The next time, I tried to be him again. That was worse. She got as upset as she had when I stormed out nearly fifty years before, to the point where she had to be sedated.

In the end, it was a delicate balancing act. I had to be angry enough to be recognizable, but not so angry that I caused her more harm. I kept trying to hone my performance to be as gentle as I could be while still providing what she needed to feel she was really confessing. I could give no hint that I knew, because that set her off as well.

It still hurt. It was one of the worst times of our life, and even if we had come out of it intact, it was painful to live through again. That pain began to dull as I went through it over and over, but it never went away entirely. I tried to think of that as a blessing; it made it easier to play my role. But my pain was a distant second to watching her pain, and I needed to do everything I could to ease it.

The best days, the ones where she was fully lucid, were happening less and less. But we still had a lot of good days, the ones where we were newlyweds, or where she remembered our kids and wanted to reminisce. The ones where she mostly understood, where she was still the Marge I knew. We kept the days where she was completely incoherent mostly at bay for now, the times her eyes were dull with incomprehension or wide with fear.

I loved her, this woman who had hurt me and who I had hurt. The woman who made me a father, who made me a better man, who had given her life to me and rebuilt herself for me. I had been the angry, betrayed husband a hundred times. I would play that painful role a thousand more times if it meant I got to have a few more good days with her, if I could make her bad days less painful until she was gone.

She was still a beautiful soul, my Marge. Still worthwhile. Not a broken thing to be discarded. Yes, our history had left its mark, and her psyche was broken; the memories fragments that needed to be held together. I would be the gold for her, filling in the cracks and trying to make her whole. The love of a lifetime existed between us. I would tend to her and repair her for as long as I could. How could I do otherwise?