Chapter 20 - AUBERON AND I FIGHT ABOUT THE FIVE DAYS
The worst argument between us happened in our kitchen.
Not about Fenella.
About him.
I said:
“You let five days happen.”
The sentence came out before I could soften it.
Auberon went still.
“I know.”
“No. You didn’t come.”
“I know.”
“I was scratching a door while you were reading fake texts and deciding to respect my space.”
His face tightened.
“What would you like me to say?”
“I don’t know.”
“I almost called police.”
“But you didn’t.”
“No.”
Silence.
Then he said:
“You also spent two years telling me not to call my mother every time we fought.”
I stared.
“That is not the same.”
“No.”
He rubbed his face.
“But I was trying to be different from her. I was trying not to monitor you.”
“So I was punished because you wanted to prove you weren’t controlling?”
His eyes filled.
“I was manipulated too.”
That made me angrier.
“You weren’t in a shed.”
“No.”
Good.
He did not compare.
Then:
“I failed to act when I knew something felt wrong.”
There.
Closer.
“And I am going to have to live with that.”
I cried.
“So am I.”
That was the point.
We could not make his guilt my burden.
Could not make my anger his sentence.
Couples therapy began the next week.
May you like
Not because our marriage was failing.
Because surviving together still required work.
