Part Fifteen
There was no time to talk as we rushed to ready ourselves four our return to work. After a hasty, blushing kiss, you departed first, leaving me alone in my unused house to recall the three little words you whispered to me half an hour before.
My mind was reeling. You loved me.
You loved me and what could be done? I stared sightlessly into the room, impeccable now, thinking this. Thinking of how it changed everything. But had it, really, changed anything? Certainly, it would have, before. Before I got married, for instance. Before I committed myself to a woman who thought only the best of me, expected the best of me.
I had always loved you, it's true. But that didn't take away the love I still felt for my wife. It baffled me. How could I love two people at once? Was it even possible?
I returned to work in a daze. I finished dictating my report, mindlessly. Soon, it was time to go. And so I left. I went home. I was greeted by Ginny and a warm meal on the table. I was quiet, which suited her fine. She talked. She told me of her day with Bill and Fleur and their little girl. Her eyes shone with a happy kind of jealousy.
It hurt to see that. How could I give her that now, after this?
What could I do? Was there a way to make this easy? Was I supposed to choose? How could I go on deceiving her? How was that fair to anyone?
And I thought of how Ron had finally proposed to you. You never told me what you had said to him. What if our clandestine meeting at lunch had been your way of bidding me and us a final farewell?
And that thought tore through me. I felt nauseous, terrified, hurt. How could you do that? How could I?
If only I could see you, talk to you. But when did we ever talk these days? And how could you love me if we never spoke? Did you even know me anymore? Did I even know you? I could hardly admit to knowing myself at this point. Never before had I imagined being so incredibly untrustworthy. Never did I believe myself capable of betraying two of the people I cared most about in the world. Nor would I have ever imagined you doing the very same thing.
Who were we? And being such villains, how could we love anyone?
I felt the anger again. It returned to me with a vengeance. Indeed, it had never left me. It seemed set on a perpetual simmer, just beneath the surface. Now, it was boiling. I was angry with you. I was angry with me.
I needed to talk to you, but it was late at night and time for bed. Who knows if you'd even be home? I didn't even know if you had accepted him. I didn't know anything. And I ground my teeth as the anger rolled through me. How could I not know these things? How could I not know anything about you? What kept us so fucking silent?
And I realized. For the first time in so long, I feared not only fear. I feared us. I feared the power of us. I feared the devastation of what could be. I feared you. I feared myself.
I went to bed and gently refused her advances. I told her I was tired. Still, I didn't sleep.