The statues stood silent, dusty and broken in a lonely storage room.
“I told you this was the wrong place,” she said. “Robert’s gallery is on the fourth floor.”
I never liked Robert Altbrook, her pretentious artist friend, the type of guy who talked about books he never read. Â But Andrea didn’t want to be late for his opening, so we got here early, but apparently on the wrong floor.
She had planned on this outing for a week, buying a new dress at Bloomingdale’s and making sure the kids were staying with friends. Â I even cancelled my tennis game.
“After Robert’s show. After Robert’s show.” Â That was my mantra to Lydia, as I kissed her breasts in her bed on Tuesday afternoon. “I don’t want to ruin Robert’s show for my wife. Â I think she is love with him.”
Lydia managed the PR department of the firm. She was ten years older than I was, but younger at heart, and what had started out as a weekly Tuesday afternoon lunchtime fuck had turned into love. Â Lydia was pressing me to ask Andrea for a divorce, and I was using Robert’s show as the deadline.
“And why would Andrea care?” I thought to myself. Â We haven’t had sex in six years. Â We had wasted fifteen years that went nowhere. Â I was even convinced that Andrea was having an affair with Robert, but I never brought it up, feeling nausea at the idea.
“I want a divorce,” I will say to her, and we will both be free to follow our hearts.
But I knew that I would not ask her for a divorce. Not before Robert’s show. Not after Robert’s show. Â I would not have the courage. Â This was my life, and there was no turning back.
“Can we go?” asked Andrea, looking over at the dead stone figures.
“These statues scare me,” she said. “Imagine if they became alive.”
I felt the statues looking right back at us.
“These humans scare me,” they said. “Imagine if they became alive.”
