Page 92 of The Lost and Found Girl

And that was just something that she couldn’t... She honestly could not wrap her head around. Or begin to deal with. She felt like a walking knot of resentment. Resentment at Mac. Resentment at the past. At the present. Resentment at Chase, because she had been so irritated with him being around, and then for all that, she realized that she had come to depend on him. And his kiss had rocked the foundation that she was standing on, no matter how she had pretended that it was reluctant. No matter how she had convinced herself that it was reluctant. She didn’t know what to do now. She didn’t know... Anything. But she had promised the kids that they would go down to the museum. She had promised Ruby that she would come check out the exhibit.

She met Marianne at Spruce Coffee, along with Hunter, who was just as excited about the museum as Riley and Hazel, though, as a preteen, was dedicated to pretending that he wasn’t. Because a general store display was not supposed to be exciting when one was twelve years old.

“I need a triple shot,” Marianne said. “I am dragging.”

“Me too,” Lydia said. “Where is Ava?”

Marianne sighed. “She is at home in bed and she didn’t want to come out with us and sullen door slam.”

Lydia gave her sister a sympathetic look—at least, she hoped it was sympathetic.

She hadn’t been sleeping. She had been avoiding Chase like the plague, even when he came over to do work. It was just a mess.

“You okay?”

“You always ask me that. What about you?”

“I don’t know. I... I thought I was fine,” Marianne said.

They got their coffee and walked out of the coffee shop, a brisk breeze picking up and blowing leaves across the brick sidewalk in front of them. The kids started ahead, hopping up on cement curbs and the tops of tree planters. In general making a ruckus, as they should do. It gave them time to talk.

“You thought you were okay?”

“Yeah.” She did not look okay.

As a teenager, Marianne had been completely closed off. But she’d changed since then. Meeting Jackson had changed her. She’d talked of escaping and acted like living in a small town was prison, but she’d never said anything like that since meeting him. But this... Her hesitance. It reminded Lydia more of how Marianne used to be.

Marianne closed her eyes. “Jackson lied to me the other day,” Marianne said. “And since then I’ve been paying extra close attention to everything he does. He’s on his phone a lot.”

“Marianne,” Lydia said, feeling shocked down to her soul. “Jackson wouldn’t... You don’t think Jackson would cheat on you.”

“No,” Marianne said. “That’s what’s so scary about it. I don’t. I trust him completely. But then I asked him... A simple thing. And I could see that he was texting a woman. And he told me that he’d been asleep. He didn’t know I was standing behind him...Julie.He never talks about a Julie. And I know everyone in his life. I thought that I did. That’s what’s so scary. When you think you have complete transparency, and now I wonder if we do.”

Lydia had no idea what a marriage with total transparency was like. Hers was full of brick walls and no-go areas. Places where neither of them dared to tread.

Mac could’ve had a whole secret life and she wouldn’t have known. She wouldn’t have asked.

“Marianne, it’s not like you to not say something. Directly to him.”

“I know. That’s the other thing. This isn’t like me, or like us. But things with Ava have been stressing me out, and I’m mad at him because I don’t need to deal with this on top of it, and I don’t want to. I’m just... I don’t know what to do.”

“Don’t hold it in,” Lydia said. She took a sip of her coffee. Spicy and polished like the weather outside. But it didn’t do its job making her feel warm.

“I shouldn’t talk to you about this. I mean...”

“Why? Because my husband is dead so you’re not allowed to complain about yours? That’s not reasonable. Anyway, I was married for a long time. You’ve been married for a long time. Something we have in common. If we can’t talk about it, Marianne, then we’re not going to be able to have a relationship. At least not like the one we had.”

And Lydia hadn’t realized that she was holding that in. She hadn’t even realized that she thought that. But it turned out she did. It was just frustrating. Infuriating. And half of it was her own fault. It wasn’t all because Marianne was being careful with her. It was because she herself had closed off. Because she didn’t know how to talk about this.

She felt like people had expectations of how she should feel and what she should do and it made her want to show them nothing.

And so much of this crushing feeling inside of her chest had to do with just being lonely. All these walls that were up, keeping her sisters out. Keeping everyone out.

“I’m sorry,” Marianne said. “I wasn’t trying to do that. I just don’t want to make you sad.”

“Well, I’m sad. And it’s complicated. And some of... Some of me being kind of mean and keeping things to myself and not dealing with the kids...not dealing with anything...is just me. And no one can take the blame for that. It’s just me.”

“What’s wrong?”