Page 80 of Fever Dream

Chapter Forty-Two

Grace

“My life is over,” Charles says, hobbling around like a caged animal.I visit him that evening, despite the fact that all I want to do is climb into bed and pull the covers over my head.

“You and Darcy,” I say.It’s not a question, and yet it is.“How could you?”

“It was a mistake.”

“A mistake?Well, that’s comforting.”

“What?”he sighs.“What do you want me to say?”

“I’m not going to put words in your mouth,” I tell him.“I’m just a little disappointed that’s the best you can do.”

“It just happened, Grace.”

“Nothing just happens.”

I spent a large part of the afternoon and the entire drive here trying to figure out how I could have missed it when it was right in front of my face.Darcy mentioned her husband rarely.I was under the impression the two of them were estranged.Everything makes so much more sense now.

“Is that why you wanted to sell the house?Because he found out?”

He shakes his head.“Darcy started getting too close.”

“Yeah, the cops say she tried to make it look like I was losing my mind.”I scoff.“It worked.”

“It’s not her fault, Grace.All this…”

“Is that so?”

“I mean…her husband was crazy.”His eyes widen, and he shakes his head.“A real psychopath.”

“Believe me when I tell youI know.”

“I’m sorry,” he says, and I don’t know if he’s apologizing for the affair or for Jay Branson or for everything.Not that it matters.

“You were right,” I say.“I can’t forgive you.Not ever.”

“I understand.”

“No, Charles.I don’t think you do.But you will.”

Three days later,I pack up Charles’s belongings and drop them at his mother’s.It’s the opposite direction of where I intend to go from there, so I keep the exchange brief.

“He’s fallen into a deep depression,” his mother tells me.She seems beside herself.“He won’t speak to anyone.Won’t eat.He just lays there in that bed.”

“He’ll get over it,” I say.“It just takes time.”

“He’s not talking to us,” his father says.“He isn’t trying to get better.He’s giving up.”

“I’m sorry to hear that.”

“I can’t stand to just watch him slip away, Grace.Two days ago, I visited his room, and he was just laying there.He was still there when the nurse came back to check on him hours later.He was still there the next morning.”

“It takes time,” I say, thinking of the asylum.

“The nurse called this morning.He is still laying there.Still refusing to get up.”