Chapter 1
Franklin Stafford smiled proudly as he perused the greeting cards he and Laney had received in recent weeks. He hung them from the mahogany mantel and taped them to the hand carved spindles on the staircase. He dangled a few from the chandelier over the kitchen table, and plastered some on their bed posts. “It’s not Christmas,” Laney would say. “You’re right, dear,” he’d reply. “This is much bigger.” Franklin added three more that day.
“I’m ready,” called Laney as she walked briskly down the stairs. “How long will you be?”
Franklin stood in front of the full-length mirror in their dressing room. He’d settled on the grey pin-striped suit because it had always been Laney’s favorite. He was sure once upon a time it fit. He frowned at his belly hanging over his waistband, like a cooled lava flow. He ran his fingers through his salt and pepper hair, trying to decide. He returned to his dressing room, removed the suit jacket, then pulled a black, silk dress shirt off a hanger and put it on. He opened his trousers, tucked the shirt in, then put the suit coat on again.
“Soon, I promise!” he called. Laney responded, but he couldn’t hear what she said. “Okay, okay,” he said.
He stepped back, his eyes closed, and then dared to look. Thank God for the color black, he thought, it hides so much. He sat on the stool and reached for the black wing-tips he hadn’t worn in months. He walked back and forth across the room several times, but kept clunking the tips on the floor. He took them off and tossed them back on the shelf put on his New Balance sneakers, black leather, the ones he used to wear to work every day, the ones that helped him keep his balance.
He heard Laney’s voice again and replied “Okay!” to whatever she was saying. He looked in the mirror, then unbuttoned three buttons on his shirt, revealing a nest of graying hair. He smiled, visualizing who he once was.
He dug through his bedside table for the gold watch Laney had given him on their tenth anniversary. It had been replaced by his iPhone long ago. He found it in the back corner of the drawer behind a broken reading lamp, three used wallets, and an array of small stones. Nothing exotic; stones he’d pick up on vacations or walks in their nearby park. He would keep them on his dresser until Laney would complain— “Franklin, really?”—and then he’d toss them in their daisy garden or in the drawer.
He pulled one out, a flat stone that fit perfectly along the ridge of his pointer and thumb, making it the quintessential skipping stone. There were thousands of them on the Presque Isle beaches. He remembered the day. He found a different perfect stone, rolled his pants up, waded into the water, then leaned over and threw it flat, like a frisbee, and watched it skip one, two, three, and finally eight times. Pretty damn good, he thought. When he turned around, hoping to see an admiring smile on his wife’s face, she had already headed back to their towels. How long ago was that?
He slipped the watch onto his wrist and buffed it with a tissue.
When he came downstairs, Laney was sitting on the platform rocker in the living room tapping its arm with one stiffened finger. She stood and smiled. She looked elegant in her silver duster coat which draped gracefully to her knees. Under it she wore a white V-neck tee accented with a simple silver chain. Her skinny jeans tapered perfectly to a pair of black ballet flats that had a perforated dreamcatcher design. She wore her silver-streaked hair in a short bob with feathery bangs. Franklin couldn’t have been happier with his beautiful wife.
He crossed the room and hugged Laney. He leaned in to kiss her, but she turned her cheek. “Lipstick, darling.” He kissed one cheek, then the other.
When Franklin pulled his cardinal red Beemer into the Grayson Inn and Restaurant parking lot, an attendant, hands clasped in front of him, pulled down his mask and smiled.
“Hello, Mr. Stafford.” The attendant bowed slightly.
“How are you, Christopher?” He reached out to shake Christopher’s hand, a twenty nestled in his palm.
“Thank you, sir; special night, I hear.” Christopher took Franklin’s car keys and then opened the door for Laney.
“The news is out, I suppose,” said Laney, as she reached for Christopher’s hand.
“Congratulations, both of you.”
“Thank you, Chris,” said Laney.
Alexander Grayson, a massive man with a striking black toupee and clunky rings on every finger, met them at the door. “Come’ere, the both of you.” He took them in his arms and shook them hard. “I love you! What a night, what a night!” They stood for a moment before entering the dining room. Several tables had been removed to comply with the governor’s Covid rules for spacing. He led them to their favorite corner table where a bottle of Dom Perignon and two crystal flutes awaited them.
“You shouldn’t have,” said Franklin.
“How many pairs of shoes have you given me over the years, Italian leather, no less?” said Alexander as he poked Franklin’s belly. “This is a special night for my two favorite people in the world.”
As their server seated them, Alexander struggled with the champagne, his face like a tomato about to split. After more strenuous grunting, the cork popped, and then he poured. “Enjoy!” he said, retreating to the kitchen.
“Hard to believe,” said Franklin.
“What’s that, darling?”
“Forty years. I mean, do we know any couple who’ve lasted that long?”
Laney removed her mask.
“Husbands die early.”
“What?”
“Husbands tend not to make it to the fortieth anniversary.”
“Okay, well…a toast.”
Franklin, beaming now, raised his glass and reached across the table to clink Laney’s.
“To lasting love; may the next forty years be as wonderful as the first.”
They both sipped their champagne. Franklin put his glass back he table while Laney took another sip and then another.
“When I met you, Jesus, I thought, ‘Is she gorgeous, or what?’ I mean, even now when you enter a room, any room, all eyes turn to you.” Franklin breathed out a prideful sigh.
“Aw, that’s sweet,” she said, and sipped more champagne.
It was true. Franklin had just opened his second shoe store when she arrived at his office door unannounced, a little breathless, pink cheeks, arms swinging at her side. Those eyes, that hair, the only word he could think of was aura, a certain undefinable something. He closed his mouth. She stuck out her hand. “I’m Laney Marcus, Mr. Stafford, and I would like a job.” She raised her chin as she said this, then laughed and patted his arm.
Laney didn’t come with a resume, but she left with a job.
“We don’t really need someone, do we?” said Wilson, his business manager.
“Not really.”
“So, what’s she going to do here?”
“I’ll think of something. Maybe her job will be to fall in love with me.”
“I’ll see if I can work up a job description.”
“I’m serious, Wilson.”
“Tall order, Franklin. She’s what, a generation younger than you?”
“Say what you want, but I’m going to marry that girl.”
At first, they had bag lunches together in the back room. Then they graduated to the corner coffee shop for BLTs. One night when they both worked late on inventory, he suggested they have a bite at the only place in town that was still open—the Copper Kettle, an actual sit-down-and-be-waited-on restaurant. He didn’t know what she thought, but in his book, this was an official date. When their waitress referred to them as a “couple,” it was clear to Franklin that the die had been cast.
She was polite on the way home. “I just loved that place. I was starving. Thanks,” she said, cocking her head. He offered to walk her to her apartment door, but she said, “No need, my roommate’s home.” She stuck her hand out, much as she had the day they met. He took it and held it an extra beat, the extended handshake substituting for the kiss he’d hoped for. As far as he could tell, no die had been cast in Laney’s heart.
“I was thinking back to our courtship,” he said.
“Oh?” Laney studied her menu as if preparing for a test.
“Did you ever feel like our courtship and marriage happened too fast?” What he wanted her to say was, ‘Absolutely not!’ Instead, she said:
“We went as fast as we went.”
At the time, he worried their ten-month courtship was brief, maybe too brief. It wasn’t until the fourth date that he kissed her and touched her. She breathed deep and pressed herself against his searching hand. A week later, her roommate was away for the weekend so she invited him to stay over. When he eventually asked her to marry him, pulling his grandmother’s engagement ring from his pocket as he kneeled, she said, without hesitation or enthusiasm, “Sure.”
He’d beaten the deadline. He’d promised himself to settle down before turning thirty. He had made it with a month to spare. A Justice of the Peace officiated the ceremony, and they honeymooned in Hawaii. Then they returned to the life they’d live for the next forty years.
“I’ll have the salmon, thanks.”
“Eggplant parm, for me.” Franklin looked up, surprise on his face. “Salmon. I don’t think I’ve ever seen you eat salmon.”
“Branching out, spreading my wings.” She looked up from the plate, a bite of French bread in her mouth, then raised her eyebrows.
“Never too late, I guess,” said Franklin.
“No, never.” She wiped her mouth with the linen napkin, folded it, and placed it carefully beside her plate. She cleared her throat and leaned forward. “It’s easy, though.”
“What’s easy?” Franklin raised the Champagne, Laney nodded, and he poured.
“It’s easy to believe it’s too late. When you’ve been walking up and down, back and forth on the same path for so long, you forget there might be other paths to follow. You just accept the one you’re on, you know?”
“I know exactly what you mean. I’m so happy that we found a good path, the right path for our lives together. Till death do we part.” Franklin raised his glass again, and downed the remainder of his bubbly. “That’s how you stay married for forty years.”
Laney topped off her glass and gulped the pink elixir.
“I mean forty years! Who stays married forty years?” he asked.
“The Campbells. The Campbells have been married fifty-two years. And the Arensons, forty-two years, and—”
“You know what I mean. It’s rare. Couples stray, divorce, die. They lose the will to stay on the path they’ve created for themselves. And when they do…well (he shrugged), disaster follows.” Franklin leaned forward to put another slice of eggplant in his mouth.
Laney gouged her salmon with her fork. “I think lots of people, even people who’ve been married forty years, I think they stay on the same path because it’s a habit; it’s just the thing they’ve always done. They’re not cruising along, they’re plodding, like they’ve given up but don’t realize it.”
“Given up?” Franklin picked a roll from the basket and waved to their server for more butter.
“Yeah. Take Brad and Felicity, they’re not too many years behind us. Would you believe she cooks the same meals every week? Monday, meatloaf; Tuesday, hot meatloaf sandwiches; Wednesday, pasta of some sort; Thursday, ham; Friday, chicken; Saturday, pizza takeout; Sunday, roast beef.”
“What’s wrong with that? Wouldn’t you love to know what you’re going to cook each week. It’d make grocery shopping easier. It’s planful, dependable.”
“They’ve given up. Their tastebuds, and their lives, have atrophied. What would happen if they had mac and cheese on Sunday?”
“I like mac and cheese.”
Laney’s face was sour as she laughed. She looked at her plate and then forked another piece of salmon.
A couple entered the restaurant without masks on. Franklin watched them, hoping Laney wouldn’t notice.
“Look at these two,” she whispered. Laney put her fork down, sat back, her arms folded, and glared at the couple as they walked by. “Imbeciles.” Franklin wasn’t convinced that “government mandated bullshit” would work, but Laney was. Out of respect for her, he wore a mask (not an N95) when she was around but never over his nose, a personal statement.
Their Covid Cold War had been like 2016 all over again. When the election results were finalized, she burst into tears and glared at Franklin, as if he was responsible for electing “that moronic liar.”
“America has spoken,” he had said, shrugging and trying to suppress a grin.
They didn’t watch the news for four years, at least not together. Avoidance, by any other name.
Franklin dove deep into his apple pie a la mode, ice cream dripping from the corner of his mouth. Laney sipped yet another glass of champagne and shook her head at the spectacle unfolding across the table.
Franklin, crust sticking to his teeth, shifted a mouthful of pie into one bulging cheek. “My God, this is good.”
“Would you like me to ask for a trough?” She sat motionless, except for her thumb and pointer gliding up and down the wine glass stem.
“You okay?”
“Couldn’t be better.” She smiled again, and this time it looked real to Franklin.
He finished the pie and scooped the pool of melted ice cream and bits of soggy crust left behind. “Delicious.” He his wife if she wanted coffee and she nodded no. He waved to the server. “Coffee, black, nothing for the lady.”
Laney put all her utensils and her napkin on her plate and pushed them aside. She finished her fourth glass of champagne and put the glass beside the plate, along with her half empty glass of water. She swept a few remaining crumbs onto the floor. Her palms were on the table top now, as if she was going to do some push-ups.
“Franklin, thank you so much for this lovely dinner.”
“You’re very—”
“And thank you for everything.”
“Well—”
“I think we’ve done a good job.”
Franklin sat up straight and put his coffee cup on the saucer.
“What good job?”
“Forty years is quite an accomplishment. I mean, it’s half a lifetime. Actually, it’s been two thirds of my life. By any measure, that’s a long time.”
“What are you saying?”
Laney was standing now, clutch in hand. Her skin wasn’t as smooth as it once was, there were lines across her forehead, some extra flesh dangling from her arms, but dammit, thought Franklin, she’s still a beautiful woman.
“I’m saying—enough. Forty years is enough. I think it’s time we put a period at the end of this sentence.”
“A period at what?”
“I’m leaving you, Franklin.”
“What do you mean?”
“Just what I said. If I wasn’t clear, I can say it again.”
“Absolutely not.” He looked at the surrounding tables to see if anyone was watching. “What’s going on? Is this some kind of joke?
“Do I look like I’m joking?”
Laney didn’t blink, her mouth didn’t move, her nose didn’t twitch.
“This is…surely we can talk about whatever is bothering you.”
“You think so?”
“Come on, really. Every marriage hits some bumps in the road. We could see that therapist again, what was her name, always wore Birkenstocks, didn’t like me.”
“Dr. Rothman.”
“We could see her again. I could be more friendly.”
“You are the way you are, Franklin. And it works admirably well for you. But not for me.”
Chairs at other tables were turning.
“But I can change.”
“It’s not about you. At least not completely. It’s also about me. I need to do this for myself. Call it my Declaration of Independence. Life, liberty and, more to the point, the pursuit of happiness.”
“Happiness?”
“Yes.”
“Who said marriage was about happiness?”
“And here we go.”
“After forty years, who thinks about happiness? You’re just thankful every night that you have someone beside you, someone to pick up the yoke of life with you each morning so you can keep going. Otherwise, what’s the point? You can’t live a decent life all by yourself.”
“Franklin, did you know that over one third of adults in this country never marry? Did you?”
“That makes total sense to me. I mean, who’s kidding who? Have you ever looked at people? When I used to walk to work, every third person I saw was ugly, or unreasonably fat, or clearly stupid. Who would marry them? They don’t even want to marry each other? But the rest of us should be married and stay married.”
“My God.”
“What? I’m being honest.”
“I’m going to leave now, Franklin.” Laney put on her mask, the one that said, “I Don’t Want to Die Because of You.”
“Is it because I’m older than you? I can tighten things up, hit the gym, you know, ten thousand steps a day, the whole deal.” A confident smile curled the corners of his mouth, as if he’d stumbled onto an irresistibly tantalizing solution.
“You were ten years older than me when we married. I didn’t forget that for forty years and then suddenly remember today. Age was never a problem, Franklin.”
Franklin’s shoulders tightened and his toes curled. What’s going on? Maybe it’s menopause. He knew that could make a woman episodically crazy, but Laney didn’t look crazy, at all. She looked calm, focused, reasonable. She had a faint Mona Lisa smile on her face. Maybe it’s another man, he thought. A younger, more viral type (Of course age was an issue! When he had leg cramps during sex and they had to stop, she’d say, “It’s just an age thing, I’m sure.”).
“Is there someone else?”
“What?” said Laney, her brow furrowed.
“Another guy, a younger guy.”
“God, no.”
This is worse than being left for another man. Laney is leaving him, because he is him. His friend Randy’s wife left him. She said it was because she couldn’t bear the sight of him for one more minute. This left Randy in a terrible way. Two months later, he found out that Carol, his ex, had been sleeping with another guy for six months. The relief on his face was palpable. It’s better to be left because of someone else than because of yourself.
“Then why?”
“Like I said, forty years is enough.”
Franklin chewed what was left in his mouth, swallowed, cleared his throat, and coughed into his fist. He smiled at Laney, but she wasn’t looking. His neck pulsed like a snare drum, as he placed a hand on his chest.
“Laney, don’t you love me anymore?”
Laney had hoped she’d get away without hearing those words. She steadied her gaze and wished she felt sad.
“No, Franklin, I don’t.”
“Jesus, God.” Franklin stared at Laney, his mouth wide. “Did you ever love me?”
“Of course, I loved you.” She nestled the clutch under one arm. “Until it was gone.” With that, she headed for the door.
Franklin watched her walk away, now fully aware of what was happening.
“Wait, you need a ride,” he called.
“Uber,” she said over her shoulder. “Remember to mask up, Franklin, it’s dangerous out there.” Then she walked out the door.
All eyes were on him. He said, “Show’s over folks. Move it along; nothing to see here.” He used the British accent that Laney never liked. Everyone laughed and turned back to their meals while Frank Sinatra sang “My Way” in the background.
Franklin slumped in his chair, balancing his coffee cup on one leg. It had been a long time, maybe twelve or thirteen years, since Laney’s last departure. She had also left shortly after their twentieth wedding anniversary. And after their honeymoon. He wasn’t sure the first time counted, because she was gone for only two days, and Laney was very convincing when she said, “I’m just so overwhelmed. This is a whole new life, a different one than…” They made love that night. Twice. Laney did things she’d refused to do in the past. It wasn’t make-up sex, more like guilt sex, but it was good, very good.
This time felt different to Franklin. In the past, she’d leave without a word. Then she’d call from some motel saying she was okay, just needed space, and so on. Always the same script. She felt hemmed in, stifled, smothered, muffled, and her favorite descriptor, suffocated. She’d stay away for a week or so, checking in each day, but never letting him know where she was.
He stared at the muddy water in his coffee cup as a server approached.
“Would you like me to box the rest so you can eat it later?”
Franklin bristled and glared at him like he was an idiot.
“Of course, box it up.”
When Franklin turned onto Oak Leaf Lane, he saw Laney getting into her Mercedes. He sped up but was too late. He waved and beeped as the car passed.
Declaration of Independence, my ass.
Once home, Franklin sat on the back patio in his favorite lounge chair listening to the high-pitched chirping of katydids and crickets, all those desperate males trying to attract a mate. Attracting them had nothing to do with keeping them, thought Franklin. He hadn’t learned the right chirp for that.
He didn’t worry excessively for the first five days, but when he reached seven and eight, his sleep waned, his appetite soared and even ibuprofen, taken liberally, couldn’t touch his persistent, thumping headache. He called her cell multiple times a day and only got her sing-songy message: “I’m on an adventure. Don’t expect me to reply. That means you, Franklin.”
He texted: “Where are you?” “Why are you doing this?” “Are you safe?” “Are you staying with someone? What’s his name?” “Come on, Laney, this is ridiculous!” “Okay, okay, suit yourself; two can play this game.” He went two whole days without trying to reach her. That would show her. Then: “At least let me know you’re alive!” “I’ve decided to paint the house black.” “I met one of those street walker ladies, and she’s moving in.” “Where do you hide the plunger? Toilet emergency.” “Goddamit, Goddamit, Goddamit! How could you do this!”
Soon thereafter, he gathered all the Covid masks together, piled them on the back patio, burned them, and toasted a marshmallow over the embers. His Declaration of Independence. No longer would they dangle from one ear like a strand of spaghetti when he tried to make a phone call. No longer would his glasses steam up in the checkout line. No longer would he have to scratch his nose every five minutes because of those fucking little fibers. He could take deep breaths. He could take deep breaths everywhere he went without a certain someone pointing at him, scolding him, shaking her head in disgust.
A week later, when he opened his eyes in the pre-dawn darkness, he could barely breathe. The quilt he had pulled up to his chin felt like a lead blanket. He struggled to move his arms. His mouth and throat were parched and sweat ran in rivulets across his shoulders and down his back. With great effort, rolled over and slid onto the floor. But there was no use trying to stand, his legs lay lifeless in front of him.
He was exhausted and lay still for a few minutes. He woke up twelve hours later, wondering why it was so dark. Then fell asleep for twelve more.
