The Stolen Marriage: A Novel by Diane Chamberlain

Author:Diane Chamberlain [Chamberlain, Diane]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: St. Martin's Press
Published: 2017-10-02T18:30:00+00:00

42

We were trapped, both of us.

In early May, six weeks after I lost Andrew, Ruth insisted I return to church with the family. I’d spent the past month and a half in a fog. Dr. Poole had prescribed something for my “melancholia,” and it kept me numb. I welcomed that numbness. In the past, the nurse in me would have been curious to know the name of the medication and exactly how it worked in my body. Now I didn’t care. I just wanted it to erase the emotional pain. Nothing else mattered.

For the first few weeks, Hattie’d brought my meals up to the bedroom. When she’d return a while later to pick up the tray, she’d scold me for leaving so much food behind.

“You need your strength, Miss Tess,” she’d say. “I know you grievin’ over that baby, but—”

“Andrew,” I said. I was determined to make everyone see my baby as a person.

She nodded. “You grievin’ over Andrew,” she said, “but you gonna need your strength more than ever.” She leaned close, nearly whispering although there was no one around. “You should visit our friend.”

I knew she meant Reverend Sam, and I gave a slight nod to placate her. The truth was, even the thought of seeing that dear old man did nothing to comfort me. Nothing in the universe could possibly lift my grief.

* * *

“You two should get divorced,” Lucy said a week or so later at the dinner table. “I know it’s not easy, but it’s not impossible either.” It was the second or third dinner we’d all eaten together. I wasn’t sure. My mind was too foggy to separate one meal from another.

“Completely against our faith,” Ruth said. “‘What God has joined together, let no man put asunder.’” She cut a small piece from the ham steak on her plate. “And besides, there are no divorces in the Kraft family.” She looked from me to Henry. “The two of you made your bed, now you have to lie in it.”

“I have no intention of divorcing Tess.” Henry rested his hand on mine on the table. As always, his displays of affection still occurred only when someone was watching. “She’s my wife,” he said.

“Oh for heaven’s sake,” Lucy said. “Drop the pretense. You got married because she was pregnant. That’s the only reason. Modern people find a way to divorce. It’s not a tragedy.”

“The reason doesn’t matter,” Ruth said. “They’re married. We make the best of things in this family.”

I listened to them talk around me as if I weren’t there. The conversation didn’t bother me, though. It was almost as if they were talking about someone else, I felt so unmoved by their words. My mind was still on Andrew. The emptiness I felt was both physical and emotional. When I woke up each morning it took me a moment to remember what had happened and then the sorrow would wash over me again. I would have given anything for a time machine to take

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