Page 113 of Woman on the Verge

He sighs. “Babe—”

I interrupt, not wanting to hear how I’m being dramatic. “We need to talk.”

He lifts the remotes, turns off the TV.

“Okay?”

His tone is resigned, like he’s just waiting for me to lay into him with my grievances.

As I’m about to say the words—I want a divorce—my phone starts blaring, the ringer on at full blast because I forgot to turn down the volume after the girls watched YouTube over dinner (the iPad was out of battery because Kyle neglected to plug it in). I’m so startled that I drop it while attempting to take it out of my pocket. It slides across the wood floor, face up so I can see that the caller is Merry. She doesn’t usually call, especially at night like this, so I have to answer.

“Is everything okay?”

There is a pause and then the sound of sniffling. She is crying.

“Mer, what’s wrong?”

My dad is dead,I think.His heart gave out. His spirit gave up. He is gone.

“He’s okay,” she says.

I sit on the bed, dizzy from attempts to keep up with my fluctuating emotional states.

“I mean, notokay. But he’s stable,” she says. “It’s just ...”

“What? What is it?”

More sniffling.

“The hospice nurse came today. She said he’s moving close to a comatose state.”

Her voice cracks on the wordcomatose. It is as if I can hear her very being collapsing.

“Okay,” I say. “Okay.”

A terrible word for the situation—okay. Nothing is okay.

“I asked her how long he has. I mean, you were just here this weekend. I don’t want you coming up if he has time. I just don’t know. She doesn’t know. It could be days. A week. Two weeks.”

“I’ll come up.”

There is no thought in the matter. I must be there. I could not live with myself if I wasn’t there.

My eyes flick to Kyle. He looks frightened, and I’m overcome with a dormant love for him. His fear makes him look like a little boy.

“I’ll get a flight first thing in the morning,” I say. “I can bring the girls or ...”

Kyle shakes his head, mouths, “I’ll watch them.”

“I’ll be there,” I tell Merry. I am about to say “Tell Dad to wait for me,” but I stop myself. I don’t want to burden him with my desires. If he needs to go, he should go. But I like to think he will wait for me.

I book a flight from Orange County to San Francisco for the next morning at seven o’clock. Kyle is in crisis mode. He thrives in thismode, this mode that allows for the practical action and problem-solving that I despise in most of our marital conversations.Don’t fix it, just listen to me—the wife’s lament.

“I don’t know how long I’ll be gone,” I say.

“It’s okay. The girls will be fine with me. I can take a little time off work. Or just let them watch a lot of YouTube.”

“No judgment,” I say, though all I’ve done lately is judge.