Dialogue | Marjorie Riches

Annette stared around the empty room. She looked at the little blue clock on the wall which had its crooked hands marking 1:20. It had been 1:19 the last time that she had checked it; time just wouldn’t move. Why wasn’t he home? He had promised that he would be home early this time.
John had been coming home later and later every night from his job at the law firm. He always said that he was swamped with work, but Annette no longer knew what to believe. Tonight he had promised that he would be home in time to help her put the kids to bed, clean up that house, do all of the thing that are neglected in a house where both parents work and one of them doesn’t get home until 1 am. Something wasn’t right.
Annette sighed and decided that it was time for her to try to get some sleep. She knew that she wouldn’t be able to, but it was worth a try; she had to at least try. She got up from the chair she had been sitting at in the kitchen, waiting, and began to walk slowly into the bedroom down the hall. Just then, the front door creaked quietly open and was shut softly behind a man with dark circles under his eyes and a grim, stern face. John was home.
“Where have you been?” Annette whispered coldly. She felt like screaming at him, but didn’t want to wake the children. It had been hard enough getting them to sleep the first time.
“Out,” John replied. The sound of that one, plain word was enough to make Annette want to vomit. He hadn’t even been working. He had just been out, out with some floozy no doubt.
“Out?” she threw back at him angrily.
“That’s right.”
“I thought we talked about this kind of thing,” Annette cried out in exasperation.
“We have,” he replied bluntly. There was no hint of emotion in his voice.
“And –"
“I don’t know what you’re getting at.” Tension was growing in the room between the two who had once been so in love.
“I’m just trying to figure out what happened,” Annette whispered, her voice softening and tears filling her tired eyes.
“Go ahead.” Again, a blunt, sarcastic reply.
“That doesn’t help… You said you would help at least…” he had promised that he would help her to understand what was going on at the firm so that she would never feel that he didn’t love her, that he didn’t care. It was obvious now that that promise had been long forgotten.
John thought for a moment then shrugged his shoulders and said, “Sure.”
“Ok,” Annette threw her hands in the air as she spoke, “That’s what I’m talking about.” She reached for her jacket off of the hook that it was placed so carefully on.
“What’s what you’re talking about?” John’s voice began to crack. He was getting worried.
“That I just can’t deal with this kind of…” Her voice trailed as she looked at him. He had begun pacing around the room. It was certain now. He was nervous, and he only got nervous when he had done something terribly wrong. “Forget it,” she mumbled.
“What?” A thin layer of sweat was gathering on his brow.
“Forget it.” Annette began making her way to the door. John was looking at her as though he were puzzled at why she would go. If he couldn’t figure it out himself then they had nothing more to talk about. “Nothing, I’m leaving.” She replied to his raised eyebrow. She opened the door quickly. This was it. She was finally freeing herself from her awful marriage, from her husband who didn’t love her anymore. She wished that she didn’t still love him.
“Don’t…” It was a faint whisper, but he had still said it. He had shown some sign that he still cared. It wasn’t enough though.
“Well?” she was waiting for some huge apology that she knew would never happen, but if he said anything more, anything kind or at least caring, anything to show her that he still cared she may be willing to give him another chance. She still had her back to him with the door held wide open. She couldn’t bear look at the stern face that she had gotten so used to over the past few months. It used to be so gentle and full of life, but all of that was gone now.
“Just don’t go…” His voice was gentle, wavering, and filled with the deepest kind of sorrow. She turned around and looked at him. He had tears in his eyes and they were staring at her, pleading.
“No?” She was surprised to her that her voice was gentle as well.
“No,” came the plead again.
Annette wanted to rush to him, to embrace him and tell him all of the things that she had been longing to for so long, but she restrained herself. Instead she softly closed the door, walked over to the table and handed John the tissue box. This was good enough for him. His expression softened and the tears slowly faded away.
Annette made her way to the bedroom with John following right behind her. They hadn’t slept in the same bed in so long. She laid down on her side of the bed without saying a word and felt it sway as his body crept in beside her. Then, to her utter shock, she felt warm, strong arms embracing her; holding her as though they would never let go. He was back, her sweet husband was back, she thought as she drifted off to sleep.