Life and Other Near-Death Experiences Read Free Page A

the floor in front of the apartment door, pressing my cheek against the cool wood, and wishing that I could disappear, perhaps permanently. Tom’s confession had hit me like a sonic boom delivering shock waves: My husband is gay? “I’m trying to figure out who I am.” Even if he sort of likes men, he loves me so much it doesn’t matter . . . right? “I’m not saying this is the end of our marriage.” Maybe I can pretend I didn’t hear him. “You knew for a long time now, didn’t you?” Perhaps we can just forget this all happened and carry on as usual, at least until I die. “What is wrong with you, Libby?”
    At any rate, I was irrational enough to decide not to call Paul, telling myself he was probably on his way to the Yale Club or Barney Greengrass or who knows where to wine and dine some random investor for the hedge fund he managed. (Besides, I liked to play this little game in which I waited to see if he received the distress signals I was sending out over the telepathic twin transmitter system, whose existence I had always been rather skeptical about.) When I was finally able to pull myself off the floor, I located Tom’s sleeping pills in the medicine cabinet, took one, then decided to take another, and except for some sobbing and the frenzied consumption of an entire sleeve of chocolate chip cookies, the rest is a bit of a blur.
    I woke the next morning in a pool of drool. A bleating ring was coming from my cell phone, which I eventually located between the couch cushions.
    “Morningpaul,” I mumbled. It was still dark out, but Paul was one of those psychotic types who didn’t require more than six hours of sleep; since he had discovered prescription amphetamines, that number was now closer to four or five.
    “What is it?” he asked, as though I’d been the one calling him. (Perhaps there was something to the twin clairvoyance phenomenon, but don’t expect me to admit it out loud.)
    I contemplated whether to ask him if he wanted to hear the bad or the ugly, but even with the sleeping-pill fog still hanging around my head, it occurred to me that I couldn’t tell him about the cancer, not yet. I could hear his twin sons, Toby and Max, playing in the background, and in his own Paul way, he sounded sort of chipper. And that a life-sapping tumor would reduce our nuclear family to just two—well, that was news that needed to be delivered in person.
    “Tom is gay,” I said.
    Paul hooted. “Charlie, wake up!” he said to his partner, who was not a morning person and was undoubtedly dozing nearby. “You have to hear this!”
    “ That is your first response?” I said, tears pricking behind my eyelids.
    “Libs, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean it like that. I’m—well, I’m gobsmacked. How on earth could he do this to you? Are you all right?”
    “No,” I admitted. “I’m in a very bad place right now.”
    “Oh, Libs,” he cooed. “I hate Chicago, too. Will you consider moving out to the East Coast, preferably the United Republic of Manhattan? You would be so much happier here.”
    “Paul.”
    “Brooklyn?”
    “Paul.”
    “I’m sorry, Libs. I’m only joking because I’m upset. You know how I get. So this actually happened? What did he say? What did you say?!”
    “It happened,” I said miserably. “I might have stabbed him with a fork.”
    “Mad Libs, I love it! Though . . .”
    “Though what?” I asked sharply.
    Paul hesitated. “Is Tom okay? This must be awful for him.”
    “Tom?” I said. “Is mother-fudging Tom okay?” (One of the things I remember about my mother is that she despised swearing, so I figure the least I can do to honor her memory is scrub my vocabulary of curse words.)
    “Libs, you know what I mean.”
    “Don’t Libs me.” I sniffed, thinking of how Tom only blurted the truth out after he thought I already knew. “And yes, he’s fine.”
    “I’m sorry,” Paul said again in a way that told me we’d be revisiting the topic sooner rather