The Year We Turned Forty

by Liz Fenton

  Grant had leased an apartment across town almost immediately after she’d told him what she’d done. Jessie still cursed herself for not pushing him to try marriage counseling. Instead, she backed off when he’d been against the idea, not feeling she had the right to demand it after what she’d done, too afraid to strain what had quickly become a very fragile union.

  “Have a great time, honey!” Jessie walked over and kissed the top of her son’s head as she pushed a tuft of hair out of his eyes and instantly regretted not getting him a haircut yesterday, knowing full well he’d return on Sunday night with a fresh cut that Janet had taken him to get.

  “Dad’s at the door, Mom. Says he wants to talk to you,” Lucas said as he wiggled from her grasp and ran into his room to get his duffel bag.

  As she headed downstairs, Jessie was thankful she’d gotten her dirty blond hair highlighted yesterday and that she was wearing her most flattering pair of jeans. And that she’d selected the navy blue top she knew not only brought out the golden flecks in her blue eyes but had always been Grant’s favorite color on her. But she still wondered, as she often did, when she’d stop caring how she looked when she saw him. They’d been officially divorced for eight years, yet he always lingered in the background of her thoughts, just a heartbeat away from stepping out of the shadows.

  She’d stood there helplessly after her confession, watching their entire future crumble, Grant’s lip trembling as he fought back the tears. After he’d left, she’d clung to the memories of their wedding day like they were a thick tree trunk in a windstorm, remembering what they’d once been: deliriously happy newlyweds, him dabbing, not smashing, a tiny piece of cake on her nose; frightened new parents leaving the hospital with twins, Grant never accelerating above fifteen miles per hour; excited first-time homeowners, joking as they shared a bottle of wine that they hoped they’d make the mortgage each month. But just four words had changed everything. Four words had instantly trumped all the fights, the months without sex, the names they’d called each other. Just four words ruined their thirteen-year marriage.

  Lucas isn’t your son.

  “Hi,” Jessie said, her voice sounding too high pitched.

  “Hey.” Grant ran his hand over his smooth head. He’d finally been forced to shave it, his thin hair refusing to grow even with Rogaine. But somehow the baldness suited him. He’d started playing tennis in the past few years and he was tanned and toned. He looked better than he ever had. “Did Lucas have fun yesterday?”

  “He did,” Jessie said, thinking back on the birthday sleepover he’d had with his friends. “But be prepared, he might be up late tonight because he’s so excited to officially be in double digits tomorrow.”

  “I’ll be ready,” Grant said. “And I wanted to talk to you about something real quick.”

  “Oh?” Jessie arched an eyebrow as she watched her ex-husband’s eyes dart around the foyer. He probably wanted to ask her if Lucas could stay with him an extra night. He’d had to travel last week for work so he hadn’t seen Lucas on Wednesday. She’d be tired from Vegas anyway, and a night alone would be nice.

  “Where’s Lucas?”

  “Right here,” Lucas said as he bounded down the stairs two at a time, his lanky legs curling up with each stride, reminding Jessie of a grasshopper’s.

  “Hey, buddy, will you go out front and kick the ball around? I need to talk to your mom for a minute,” Grant said.

  “Sure,” Lucas said, smiling at Grant with pride. His club team had just won a national tournament and his dad’s approval meant everything. Jessie couldn’t help but smile on the sidelines, watching him search for Grant in the crowd each time he sunk the ball deep into the net of the goal.

  But she stiffened as she watched Lucas bouncing the ball on his knee now. He still didn’t know the truth. And with each passing day, every camping trip with Grant, every Father’s Day, every time he asked for his dad—Grant—Jessie hoped she would never have to tell him. When she and Grant did argue, this was the hot topic. Should he or shouldn’t he know who his real dad is? And if so, when? Jessie leaned toward no, Grant toward yes, arguing Lucas had a right to know, even if his biological father had made zero effort to be in contact. And while Jessie agreed that it was Lucas’ right, she worried it might destroy him. Or worse, her relationship with him. And she couldn’t even begin to think about how the girls would react.

  Her infidelity had been a secret she and Grant had held close, blaming their split on having grown apart. And in many ways that was true. Their marriage had slowly shifted from giddy laughter on lazy Sunday mornings while they read the paper and sipped their coffee to strained voices and clipped tones from too many sleepless nights once they’d become a family of four. But that was okay. Jessie understood that they wouldn’t always experience the highs of new love, that fervor that came with the knowledge you’ve found the person who completes you. She knew that time eventually wore passion down to its nub. But what she hadn’t anticipated was Grant’s declining sexual interest in her after the twins’ arrival.

  They’d always had an active sex life. Jessie had felt almost smug as she’d listened to her married friends with new babies complain about their husbands nagging them to do it when they just didn’t want to. Jessie was sure that would never happen to her and Grant. She craved him the way someone might want chocolate or a glass of wine. She needed to feel him pressed against her, to smell his skin. They’d often joked during their first year together that they might be addicted to each other.

  The changes in Grant were subtle, developing over several years. He stopped kissing her as deeply, his tongue no longer lingering, his hands no longer moving down her hips clearly wanting more. He stopped looking at her with a hunger in his eyes, and began almost looking through her. They stopped taking weekends away. Their sex, when they did have it, became predictable, then stale, and finally, infrequent. And at some point, it stopped altogether.

  She remembered lying in bed, willing him to touch her, seething as she heard the sound of his first snore. She reached over and nudged him. Hard.

  “Hey,” Grant mumbled.

  Jessie rubbed his naked back and worked her hands downward. “I think you forgot something before you fell asleep,” she teased. She hoped she sounded confident. That she wasn’t betraying the insecure corners of her mind—the same ones that had made her slightly obsessed with Sadie, his new assistant.

  “Babe,” Grant began, “I’m so tired. I promise I’ll make it up to you tomorrow night. We’ll get the kids to bed early.”

  Jessie snapped her hand back. “That’s what you said last time. And the time before that.”

  Grant rolled over. “You really want to discuss this now? When I’m half asleep?”

  “When the hell else are we going to talk, Grant? You’re never here!”

  Grant sighed. “Is that what this is really about? You’re pissed off that I work too much?”

  “No, this is about the fact that we haven’t had sex in three months. Do you even realize that?”

  Grant sat up. “There is no way it’s been that long. What about after Claire’s dinner party?”

  Jessie remembered that night. He’d rubbed her thigh under the table while she’d stroked his leg. In the cab on the way home, Grant had slyly reached his hand up her skirt and she’d pushed herself into him, wanting to savor the moment. Yes, it had been amazing. But he hadn’t so much as patted her ass since. “Grant. That was three months ago.”

  Jessie watched as he did the math in his head. “Really? I’ve been so busy at work, the time has passed in a blur.”

  “Because of Sadie?” Jessie asked, thinking of her gorgeous long red hair, her young fresh face. “Does she make the day fly by for you?” Jessie wasn’t proud of it, but she’d recently Google-stalked her. It had been yet another night when she’d sat alone in their living room, the clock ticking past 8 p.m., her imagination running wild with reasons why Grant wasn’t home. And when she’d discovered several images of
Sadie modeling lingerie, her stomach dropped. Had he seen those? Of course he had.

  “What does she have to do with this?”

  “Well, you clearly don’t want to have sex with me. So I’m wondering if it’s because you’re getting it somewhere else—if that’s why you hired a model to get your coffee and make copies?”

  “Do you really think I’m cheating on you? Because I’m not!”

  “Well, you’re hardly ever here. And when you are, you act like I’m invisible!” Jessie choked on the last part.

  Grant reached for her. “I’d never do that to you or the girls. Do you really feel invisible?”

  “Yes.” Jessie wiped a tear away. “I do.”

  “I’m sorry, Jess. I feel so much pressure at work. And when I am home, it feels like survival, you know? Like in between sports and homework and baths and dinner, there isn’t much room left for us.”

  Jessie nodded.

  “I’ll try harder. Okay?”

  “Okay.” Jessie brought her lips to his and hoped they’d stumbled back onto the right path.

  But another three months went by without Grant reaching for her and she felt her insecurity turn to anger all over again. When he didn’t even kiss her when he walked in, she would pick a fight about a crack on the countertop or the gas bill, all while shattering inside. He must find her lumpy and unsexy and boring. Otherwise, he would want to have sex with her. The constant rejection was like her shadow, following her everywhere, eventually leading her to look for that validation outside her marriage. And ultimately to Lucas. But never back to Grant.

  Her life changed on the last Thursday of August 2004, Jessie’s night to meet with her book club. They’d all had way too much wine as usual, and after they’d managed a short and boring conversation about the novel most of them hadn’t read, a few of the women had walked to a bar close by for another round. That’s when she’d seen him: Lucas’ future father. But at the time, he was just Peter, a dad whose son was in the same fifth grade class as Madison and Morgan. She’d first met him when they’d both volunteered at a Halloween party at the school, Jessie reluctantly dressed as Cinderella after her daughters had given her a guilt trip about attending in costume. She’d had a laugh with Peter, who was dressed as Batman, and whose son had given him a similar spiel. A former semipro soccer player, Peter stood just a few inches above Jessie’s own five-foot, six-inch frame. But she couldn’t help but notice the way his broad chest was stretching the fabric of his costume and that his deep olive-green eyes sparkled through the small openings in his mask. She’d heard from the other moms that he stayed home with his son, but worked on the side coaching the local club soccer team and running a summer sports camp. As they crafted cobwebs out of cotton balls, he told Jessie that his wife, Cathy, was an investment banker who spent more time traveling to Tokyo, London, and New York than she did at home.

  After the class party, Jessie bumped into Peter regularly, laughing as they’d slammed their car doors shut and clenched their dry cleaning bags or stood in line together at Starbucks. They’d often chat in the school parking lot long after drop-off had ended, Jessie leaning against her van as she spun her hair around her finger, wanting to prolong the moment. There was something about the way Peter remembered small details from their conversations, how he lobbed compliments effortlessly her way. The effects of seeing him would buoy her for hours after, making her step bouncier, her mood lighter. He made Jessie feel like she was interesting and sexy, that she could take on the world.

  When she noticed Peter at the bar that night, shooting the eight ball into the corner pocket, and he’d looked up at her, she should have turned and gone home. They’d been teetering on a fine line between friendship and flirtation for months, Jessie forcing herself to push thoughts of Peter aside several times a day or to stop herself from emailing him with yet another wry observation on a topic they both found funny. But when he walked over with a vodka martini piled high with green olives, the drink she’d once told him she loved, and challenged her to a game, she agreed. She’d barely seen Grant lately. He’d been working thirteen hours a day and was so tired when he arrived home—long after dinner was eaten and the leftovers stored in neatly stacked plastic containers in the refrigerator—that he barely had the energy to listen to the girls practice their reading, let alone have a conversation with Jessie. She would often discover him asleep in one of their beds, a chapter book on his chest and one of his daughters snoring softly beside him. And she was sure that if she’d gone home right then, that’s where she’d find him.

  “Loser buys a round,” she’d proclaimed as the other women she’d been with called it a night and started to leave.

  “I’ll give her a ride,” Peter had said, smiling innocently at the moms, whom he also knew from school. He’d come up in conversation more than once among the women, everyone agreeing he was smoking hot, but also that he seemed very happily married. But Jessie knew from her private conversations with Peter—the ones that had eventually transitioned from light bantering about their kids’ never-ending homework and rigorous sports schedules to heavier topics like politics and the fragility of marriage—that it was mostly for show, which was very similar to the one she and Grant had been performing lately. Together but not connected—a very precarious place for any marriage to perch.

  • • •

  Jessie understood now that she’d been a big part of the problem. That she’d let herself, and ultimately her marriage, become a victim of her own insecurities. At some point, she had shifted the responsibility to fix their relationship onto Grant’s shoulders, making it even easier to think Peter was the answer to the question she had been secretly asking. At the time, she thought her marital problems were overwhelming, that her dissatisfaction was unique. But what she wished she could tell her thirty-nine-year-old self now was that even though their love wasn’t as shiny as it used to be, it didn’t mean that it didn’t have merit. She realized too late that falling in love was the simple part—it was staying in love that seemed to elude most people.

  After Jessie lost the third consecutive game of pool, Peter had whispered in her ear, “Want to get out of here?”

  Jessie froze. It was one thing to flirt. To fantasize about this moment from the safety of her own bedroom. But to have it within her grasp? It felt surreal. She set her drink down and followed him before she could change her mind.

  They drove in silence to a Quality Inn while his warm hand rested on her upper thigh. After securing a room, Peter had offered to buy her another drink in the sad little bar off the lobby, but Jessie shook her head and moved quickly toward the elevator, not wanting to lose her courage, the months of flirtation and lack of sex propelling her on.

  Once in the room, she tried to ignore the worn carpet and peeling wallpaper as he did what she imagined him doing for months—ran his hands through her hair and touched his soft lips to hers. One kiss wasn’t the end of the world, she told herself as she leaned into his full mouth. When he slipped his hand under her shirt, she reasoned that she wasn’t going to let it go any further than that. And when he nudged her to the bed’s edge, pulled off her jeans and underwear, and started to make his way inside her, she’d wanted to rip herself away. But she couldn’t—not because of how he felt, but because of how he made her feel—beautiful. In that moment, she felt like the layers of her life had been peeled back, exposing the girl she used to be. She felt young and alive.

  But that feeling vanished as quickly as it came. As she lay on the bed in Peter’s arms, her jeans still bunched around one of her ankles, Jessie wiped a tear from her eye.

  “This was a mistake,” she’d whispered. Guilt was already fogging her perspective, and what had felt fantastic just moments ago now felt dirty and wrong. It was like a spotlight had just been switched on, a neon sign pointing out the obvious: she’d fucked up. “I need to go home,” Jessie said as she frantically put herself back together, Peter watching her silently.

  On the drive back, Jessi
e started making promises to herself. She’d be a better wife to Grant, a better mom to the girls. She’d become an active participant in her life again. Maybe she’d even confess to Grant. She’d read somewhere that telling your spouse you’d been unfaithful only alleviates your guilt, but can hurt them irreparably. And she didn’t want to cause Grant any pain. Jessie made a pact with herself. She’d turn her marriage around. Starting the second she left that filthy hotel.

  • • •

  “Bye, Mom!” Lucas said, the front door slamming behind him.

  “Bye, honey!” she called after him as he dribbled the soccer ball in the front yard.

  “So what’s up?” Jessie asked after the door closed, watching Grant shift his weight from the balls of his feet to his heels. Grant’s face had always revealed his emotions, as if they were being painted on with brushstrokes. He knitted his brows and looked at his feet. “Janet and I are getting married.”

  Six words.

  In just six words, Jessie felt her world collapse all over again.

  CHAPTER THREE

  * * *

  Gabriela pushed her large sunglasses on top of her head as she approached the TSA agent, holding her driver’s license in one hand and her carry-on in the other. She averted her eyes from the adorable little girl pulling a bright pink Disney princess suitcase in front of her, focusing on the date on her boarding pass instead.

  Almost ten years ago to the day, Gabriela had rushed home from the hospital, her mind sharp and her body energized even though she’d been up twenty-four hours, Lucas’ birth injecting new life into her. Something had happened when she’d nestled a swaddled Lucas against her chest for the first time and touched his nose lightly with her fingertip. She’d been hit hard by a thought, one that hadn’t occurred to her when Jessie had the girls or when Claire gave birth to Emily twelve years ago. She realized that having a baby wouldn’t be her biological choice for much longer. Soon, her body would be making that call.