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When I turn my eyes back to my mom, her eyes are on us both, full of anger and judgment and sadness and disappointment and it feels like someone is taking a knife to my insides.
“Mrs. Collins—” Chris starts but she puts a finger up and shakes her head.
“I wouldn’t speak.”
“Mom.”
“You shouldn’t either.” She blinks at me. “I just had to defend you because you slept with another woman’s husband? To his wife? Is that really what I’m supposed to take away from this interaction?” She shakes her head when I don’t respond. “We raised you better than that, Marissa.”
“You don’t understand—” I start but I don’t even know how to make her understand. My mom wouldn’t. Not over this. It doesn’t matter that I didn’t know at first or that she wasn’t a good wife or that they didn’t have a good marriage. I was the mistress and that’s never a good look.
“She didn’t know,” Chris says and him taking the heat for all of this definitely won’t help.
“Oh? Okay? But you certainly did.” She blinks at him. “This is not the place to have this conversation but this is absolutely not over.” She walks away without another word.
We are out on the balcony alone a few minutes later while I try to get myself together. “I’m so fucking pissed,” he says, and I lean against the railing as I take a sip of my champagne.
“Is this what it’s going to be like every time we see her?”
“No. It’s just because this was the first time, I’m sure. She probably didn’t think we’d get back together.” My lip trembles and then I feel his hands again. “Hey, look at me.” I look up into his blue eyes which look as sad as I feel. “I love you.”
“I’m going to assume you loved your ex-wife too at one point,” I hear my dad’s voice and I can already see this going terribly.
Can we just get a break?
“Dad, can we not do this now?”
“He’ll break her heart the same way he did mine,” my dad says. “That’s what your ex-wife said to me before she left.”
“I would never break her heart and I didn’t mean to break Holly’s heart if I did at all. We had been having problems for years.”
“Were you not cheating on her? With multiple women? Not even just Marissa?” Chris doesn’t say anything at first and I think he’s struggling with what exactly to say. “I think it’s best if you leave also.”
“Dad, he’s not leaving. I know how bad this looks, but their marriage wasn’t good. It wasn’t—.”
“And how would you know? Were you there? Are you just going by what he’s told you? You can’t be that naive.”
“He wouldn’t lie to me.”
My father gives me a look of derision before a laugh leaves his lips. “A man cheated on his wife for years and you think he wouldn’t lie to his mistress?” he asks. I know he didn’t say it to be harsh or cruel but hearing my father of all people use that word makes me feel worse than any other time I’ve heard it.
“Don’t call her that,” Chris says and I can hear the edge in his voice while still trying to err on the side of being respectful. “I know you don’t trust me, but I do love your daughter. It’s been her ever since I laid eyes on her almost three years ago. Since then, I haven’t been able to see anyone but her. Please don’t put her in a position where she doesn’t feel supported in loving me back.”
My father doesn’t say anything before he scrubs his hands down his face and shakes his head. “Marissa, we raised you to be honest and good and to treat people well. You’ve got the world at your fingertips and you’re going to mess it up before you even have a chance to get started. You’re only twenty-three and I can see you’re already in way over your head.”
“I know we didn’t start in the most ideal way, but he’s divorced now,” I argue, but hearing his disappointment expressed so explicitly feels lower than rock bottom.
“He’s your boss. Funny how quickly you seem to forget that.”
“I love him,”I say because it’s the only thing I can say in this moment that my father can’t refute.
“In five years, you’ll wish you hadn’t,” he says and then he walks away.
“You’ve been so quiet,” Marissa says later that night as she climbs into bed next to me.
We stayed far longer at her sister’s shower than either of us wanted to, but I knew she wanted to be there for her sister, and I wasn’t going to leave her to deal with whatever potential fallout was brewing. Her parents didn’t acknowledge me for the rest of the night and barely said more than a few words to Marissa except during pictures. From the outside, it didn’t seem like anything was off, but I could feel the tension between them, and behind Marissa’s smile, I could see how hurt she was.
“I’m sorry, baby. Just a lot on my mind, I guess.”
