Chapter 9 - The Anatomy of an Apology
In his motel room, Ryan began five different letters on the stationery left in the desk drawer. Dear Clara, I am so sorry for the misunderstanding. He balled that one up and tossed it into the plastic wastebasket.
Dear Clara, If you would just let me explain what happened with the work stress... That one joined the first.
By the third attempt, his hand was shaking so badly he tore through the cheap paper. He had spent his whole life believing he was an honorable man—he paid his taxes on time, he helped shovel the elderly neighbor's drive, he never missed a shift at the water treatment plant. How could an honorable man be someone whose wife flinched when he reached for the salt shaker?
He remembered the sound of the table splintering. He remembered the look in her eyes—not anger, not even terror, but an absolute, hollow emptiness, as if she had stepped out of her body to let him destroy the shell without her having to be there.
May you like
He didn't write a fourth letter. He understood, with a sudden and devastating clarity, that any letter he sent wasn't meant to heal her; it was meant to relieve him of the agony of his own self-disgust. It was another demand he was making on her time, another debt he was asking her to forgive so he could sleep through the night.
He walked outside into the damp evening air, found the dumpster behind the laundry room, and dropped the stationary pad into the darkness.
