She covers her face with her hands and starts sobbing inconsolably.
Oh God, stop it! Maybe it’s cruel of me, but I feel only impatience and hostility. I want to shake her until she breaks apart and squeeze the truth out of her once and for all.
Paula can’t stop crying, so I go to the bathroom and get a roll of toilet paper. I hand her a few squares to wipe her tears and blow her nose.
She finally collects herself, takes a deep breath, and begins to explain. She dumps it on me so fast I nearly lose my balance.
“On the Friday before the accident, Alan found out he had cancer.”
I blink a few times. “What? That can’t be true. He would have told me.”
But I should know better than to presume anything. At this point, nothing is out of the realm of possibility.
But how could he have told Paula first, while keeping it from me? Did that mean it was true love between them? Not just sex?
She rises from the sofa and goes to the kitchen. I follow, but I give her a moment before I ask another question. “When did he tell you this?”
“Friday afternoon. As soon as he got out of the doctor’s office.”
I’m trying to digest this news—that my husband had cancer—but I can’t seem to get past the fact that when he learned of it, he called Paula and not me.
Where was I that night? I was in the OR.
Then I try to remember if he was different over the next two days, and I recall that he seemed tired on Saturday afternoon. When I asked if he was okay, he brushed it off and said he might be coming down with something. I made him a cup of tea, and he seemed to perk up after that. He was obviously very good at keeping me in the dark.
“What can you tell me about the diagnosis?” I ask, digging deep for the doctor in me, not the wife who has never felt more betrayed or more like a failure as a woman.
Paula stares at the floor. “I don’t know. It wasn’t good. All I know is that he went to see his doctor about a mark on his shoulder that he thought looked suspicious. Then he found out it was cancer, which started in his kidneys and had already spread everywhere . . . to his lungs, liver, and bones. There were hardly any symptoms other than the mark on his shoulder. The doctor gave him three months to live.”
I feel suddenly breathless and cover my face with my hands. Hot tears fill my eyes.
Paula doesn’t let up. “He called on Sunday to tell me that he wanted to end it between us and spend whatever time he had left with you. I tried to change his mind, but I couldn’t. So you won in the end.”
I look up. “I beg your pardon?”
She stares at me with bitterness. “He wanted to spend his last days with you and Zack. So there you go, Abbie. Congratulations.”
I stare at her in shock. “Are you kidding me? You think I should feel triumphant? As if the past three years of lies and infidelity never happened?”
She turns away from me, staggering slightly because she’s still intoxicated. “This is messed up.”
“You’re damn right it is.” I follow her. “I’ll never really know if he would have spent his last days with Zack and me. Was he coming here to see you on Sunday? Had he changed his mind?” I realize I’m shouting now, and I try to cool my temper. “And why the hell was he drunk driving, regardless?”
“I’m not sure, but he was angry with me because I threatened to tell you everything. The last time I spoke to him was on Sunday afternoon, and he was upset. He hung up on me, and I think he must have gone to a bar or a liquor store after that.”
“What do you mean exactly, that he was upset?”
She shakes her head. “I don’t know . . . he said he screwed everything up, and he begged me not to tell you about us. He went on and on about what a bad person he was and how he was sorry for ruining my life. I told him I wasn’t going to just disappear and leave him to die alone. I said I wanted to be by his side until the very end, but that just made him even more angry. He reminded me that he wouldn’t be alone. He’d have you. Then he told me to stay away, that it was over between us.” Her voice shakes while she fights not to cry. “I was begging him not to end it, and that’s when he said he’d be better off dead if I told you the truth, and he hung up on me.”
My eyebrows pull together in a frown. “Better off dead? Wait a second . . . was he suicidal?”
She sobs. “I don’t know! Part of me wonders if he was coming to see me because he’d changed his mind, or maybe he was coming here to threaten me in person, to make sure I’d keep quiet. Now I’ll never know for sure. And neither will you.”
I stand up because I can’t listen to any more. I don’t want to be in the same room with the woman who was sleeping with my husband and tried to keep him from me in his final days. Does she truly believe that I beat her in the end? That I feel victorious because Alan wanted to devote himself to Zack and me and not her? I didn’t even know that I was a player in this game until this very moment.
She follows me to the door, where I grab my jacket and shove my arms into the sleeves.
“Wait, Abbie,” she says. “Please, don’t go.”
“Why not? I got what I came for. You told me everything I need to know. There’s no point in beating a dead horse.” I look around for my purse.
“I’m sorry I kept this from you,” Paula says, sounding a little less drunk now, “but Alan made me promise never to tell you, and after the accident, I felt so guilty . . . that it was my fault he was on the road that night. And then I figured . . . what would be the point in telling you? It couldn’t change anything, and you’d only be in more pain.”
“Then you shouldn’t have come to the funeral,” I reply. “You should have stayed away.”
But would I have preferred to live the rest of my life in ignorance? I honestly don’t know the answer to that question. Maybe I would have.
“Despite how this must seem to you,” Paula continues, “you should know that Alan loved you.”
I hold up a hand. “Please. Don’t patronize me.”
“I’m serious,” she replies, sounding desperate. “I was the one who was jealous of you, because I knew he’d never choose me. He didn’t want to break up your family. It was always that way. He was very clear about it.”
I find my purse and shake my head at her. “I don’t want to hear any more.”
I walk out the door, but she won’t stop. She’s like a tenacious terrier, following me down the hall to the elevator.
I press the button, the doors open, and I step on. “Please don’t contact me again. We’re done now.” The doors shut between us.
A moment later, seated in my mother’s car, I insert the key into the ignition with trembling hands and start the engine. My tires skid on the pavement as I pull away.
I make it less than a block from the apartment building before I pull over because I need to have a meltdown. I squeeze my eyes shut and pound the steering wheel multiple times with my fist.
God in heaven. Alan had cancer. And on the day that he died, he may have been trying to put an end to his affair. Or maybe his life . . .
But why didn’t he call me right away when he found out about his diagnosis? I’m a doctor. Did he not think I could handle it? Maybe I could have helped him somehow. There might have been hope, a better prognosis . . .
I force myself to sit back and take a few breaths.
Why should I even care whether Alan had a terminal disease? He’d been cheating on me for three years. Maybe longer. There could have been others before Paula. And if he was suicidal, was he just being a coward because he didn’t want to face me when the truth came out?
I squeeze my fists around the steering wheel, flex my fingers, and look up at the roof of the car. I need to let this anger flow out of me, because I can’t go home and see Zack like this, with poison in my veins.
After a moment, I dig into my purse for my cell phone. I dial my sister’s number, and I’m relieved when she answers.
“Hello?”
“Hi, Carla. It’s me.”
“Finally,” she replies. “I’ve been waiting to hear from you. What happened?”
I bite my bottom lip and fight back the tears. Alan doesn’t deserve them.
“Paula told me that she and Alan had been having an affair for the past three years and that Alan found out he had cancer on the Friday before he died.”
“What?” Carla replies. “Are you serious?”
I continue on, explaining everything I know. “He didn’t have long to live, and that’s why he was drunk on Sunday—because Paula was pressuring him to leave me, and I guess he couldn’t deal with any of it.” I pause. “He might even have been suicidal, but I doubt we’ll ever know for sure.”
There’s a long pause on the other end of the line. “Oh my God.”
“But that was no excuse for him to get behind the wheel when he was drunk,” I continue. “He could have killed other people. I can’t feel sorry for him, Carla. Not after all this. He deserved what he got.”
I regret my words the instant they pass my lips, and I cup my forehead in my palm. “Oh, I didn’t mean that. I’m just really upset right now.”
“Of course you are,” she gently replies. “And you have every right to be. I can’t imagine how I’d feel if I were in your shoes and found out that Braden was keeping secrets like that from me.”