Page 29 of Across Eternity

I stumble backward, my head shaking, denying what I clearly see in front of me. I wait for Henri to explain, to deny it, but I only see apology in his eyes. Such apology.

The pain of it makes me sway, and Marie seems to realize it. Her hand goes to my back to keep me upright, while Henri stands still, pale and frozen. I was only gone for ten months. It would be bad enough if he hadn’t waited that long but…from the looks of it, he didn’t wait at all.

My mouth opens. I want him to tell me this is not what it looks like. That he didn’t move on right after I left, while I spent month after month doing anything I could to get back to him. Tell me she’s carrying someone else’s child. Tell me you did the honorable thing because I wasn’t coming home. My brain whirs with the possibilities, but no…she crosses the yard to us and he steps away from me. She takes his hand.

And he allows her to do it.

“What in God’s name is happening?” she asks.

Henri’s mouth opens as if to speak and then closes. It’s Marie who recovers first. “Our cousin Amelie has come for a visit,” she says through a dry throat. She flinches hard. “Amelie, this is Yvette, Henri’s wife.”

Henri’s wife.

I knew, somehow, but the words…the words still take all the air from my chest.

My knees wobble and the weight of the journey descends, as I knew it would. For the first time ever, I’m glad to go unconscious.

* * *

When I wake it’s dusk. For a single moment I hear the sounds of the farm, feel the pulse of country air through the window, and I am happy.

Then I remember, and the pain of it turns me inside out. There’s nothing left to me but this ache, a single sharp wound I feel in every nerve ending. I turn face down and cry, stifling my sobs with my pillow.

It doesn’t feel real. It can’t be real. Yet it is.

After everything I lived through, everything I endured to get back to him, I never dreamed the most painful moment would be arriving here. I am stripped down to nothing, empty. I should never have jumped out of the window to escape. Dying there would have been easier than this, painful but brief. Over already.

That I have returned to discover I’ve lost him is too much to bear. But the betrayal—that is the part that cuts knife-sharp. I loved him with my entire heart. I thought what we had was inviolable and perfect. Worth any sacrifice. But he didn’t wait. He didn’t wait a year. He didn’t even wait months.

I start doing the math, wanting an answer that won’t hurt, though I know I won’t find it. She looks like she’s almost due, which means she’s been pregnant since last winter, and surely there was some courting beforehand? A month or two at the very minimum, which means he waited weeks, or perhaps days.

I cling to the rage that thought inspires. Because rage is the only thing that’s going to get me out of this bed and the fuck out of here. I’m tired, but not the way I was before I gained my aunt’s spark. I could survive a trip home now, I’m guessing.

I could leave. I could tour Europe with Rob Chapman. Let Henri explain to his wife how I’ve disappeared. It’s not my problem.

I throw off the blankets. I feel a twinge of guilt at the idea of leaving without telling Marie goodbye, but surely she will understand. I can’t be expected to sit downstairs making nice with Henri and his glowing wife.

Except…Cecelia. I promised her.

A part of me is tempted to ignore it. I’ve sacrificed enough. I’ve given these people a year of my life and my heart and I doubt I’m getting either of them back. I’ve done enough. But then I think of the way Cecelia protected me when I first arrived, how she was willing to let me cling to her when I was scared of everyone else. She was more of a mother to me than my own mother has ever been, and this is the only thing she’s ever asked in return. And she wouldn’t have asked if it wasn’t important.

I put on the dress Marie has left. My favorite one. It was thoughtful of her, sweet to remember, except it was my favorite because of Henri. Because of the way he looked at me when I wore it, the way his eyes dipped to that small hint of cleavage like it was the Holy Land or water to a man dying of thirst. Well, let him look again. Let him get a good look at all the things he will never have again, all the things I will give away to…Rob Chapman? I want the idea of it to appeal to me but it doesn’t.

And why would Henri care? He has a wife now. He chose someone else.

I go down the stairs, fueled by my anger. They are putting food on the table, and Henri is standing there when I reach the bottom step. Our eyes hold, and lock. For a moment my anger disappears and I’m nothing but bottomless sorrow, a well of grief that has no end.

“Awake at last, cousin!” Marie says with forced heartiness, looking between us like a deer in headlights. She rushes over to usher me to the table. “You must eat.”

Yvette walks in, yawning, a hand pressed to her stomach as she stretches. “I thought I could nap, but you take the cake, Amelie.”

I hate her. She’s done nothing to me whatsoever, aside from unwittingly stealing the worthless piece of shit I fell in love with, but I hate her nonetheless.

I glance at Henri and Marie. Has Henri uttered a single word since I arrived? I’m not sure he has. “You’ve slept most of the day,” Marie says. Her smile is so feigned it looks painful. “Your journey from America must have been a tiring one.”

Yvette takes a seat, reaching for the bread. “What a way to arrive. I can’t believe they even stole the clothes off your back.”

I suppose this is how Henri and Marie explained the fact that I arrived naked, but I get the feeling she relishes the idea of my hard journey, my stolen clothes.