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“Maybe I’ll never have to see him again,” Barbara said, looking Michael’s direction. “Soon I’ll stop thinking about him. I really, really hate him this time. I’ve known since London. They were together in St. James Park when I came back from shopping. I didn’t do anything to stop it. Sonya is different than his other girlfriends. He has a nurse at home. He was supposed to be rid of her before we left. He has always had someone. Since we got married. Never before. Only since the marriage when he was sure he had me.”
She was getting tears in her eyes again.
“The way you cried, I thought you had no idea,” Michael said.
“Some years ago, I promised myself I wouldn’t cry anymore over Chuck and usually I didn’t. Self control was what I needed to get him over these girls.” She looked into the mirror across from her and focused on Michael’s reflection, seeing the side of his thin head. “I never thought he would keep finding new ones,” she continued. “He always said he’d never do it again and I always thought that I’d finally won. Sonya’s not one of these young girls. I couldn’t stop crying. I still can’t. We’ve been together thirteen years.”
“Sonya and I were only married four years,” Michael interjected.
“I cried for myself,” she continued. “Geeze. I cried because I should have done something a long time ago. I’ve wasted so many years on him. I never got to practice law. I kinda want to now. Did you know I went to law school just before the kids came?”
She wiped away the only tear on her cheek with a pillow and put the pillow against the gold headboard to lean against. Michael noticed she was looking at the room and at him through the mirror. He looked back through the mirror and smiled. She was in his gray bathrobe and her black curls had stretched out so that her hair dripped down her neck.