Anymore.

Part 8

Unlike the vast majority of people alive, I had always wanted twins. Always. When I found out that I had some fertility issues, I would pray to God to just let me have ONE baby. Just one. I didn’t care if it was a boy or a girl, I just wanted to have a baby.

It seemed like God was smiling at me, in that moment. You ask for one, I’ll give you two.

Now I’ve come to regard it as basically a one-shot deal. This was my only chance.

I didn’t know it then, though. I didn’t know a lot of things.


My marriage, already strained, got much, much worse. Very quickly.

My husband decided he would get a pager. Not a lot of people had cell phones then, but pagers were pretty popular. I thought it was stupid because I mean, really? He’s not a freaking doctor. He didn’t have a job where he had to be on call. He worked at a factory, for God’s sake. What did he need a pager for?

Then, he opened a separate bank account. In his name only.

And? He stopped putting money in the joint bank account. If I asked him for money, it was like World War III. I was asking for money for things like, the mortgage payment and groceries, not shopping at Saks. If I ever asked for money he'd tell me to go get a job.

He started sleeping on the couch.

Still, none of this seemed alarming to me, really. Maybe I just didn’t really care anymore. I don’t know.

After a while, it started to grate on me. He was gone all the time. He would go to work and not come home when he was supposed to. He started smoking, which he had never done before. He was getting beeped on the pager from people I didn’t know.

One morning I went to him. To the couch where he was sleeping. I sat next to the couch and asked him what was wrong.

He was silent for a moment and then he said.

“I don’t love you anymore”



It was Thanksgiving Day.