Erica's grief

It was a cold December afternoon in Hoboken, New Jersey. Erica sat down with her cup brimming over with piping hot coffee, looking out the window at the majestic Manhattan skyline before sighing and looking down at her computer screen. She frowned while scrolling through a barrage of unread emails, “Frank…you idiot”, she mumbled under her breath. Erica was scrounging through her late husbands gmail inbox searching for paperwork pertaining to their mortgage. 

It had been over a year since Frank had passed and as much as Erica liked to believe she had moved on, she had in fact compartmentalized her grief much like the resentment she felt towards her husband through all of the 10 years of their unhappy marriage. Theirs was no fairy tale, They met at church in their mid 20s and their respective catholic parents thought it was a match made in heaven. Before she knew it, Erica was a wife and while she felt no spark in her matrimonial life or butterflies in her tummy like her girlfriends told her she would, she grew to love him over the years, even though she was too stubborn to admit it.

As she carefully read the subject of every email, she heard a bling and watched as the prompt of a new incoming email popped up on screen which read “SUB: I’m sorry…”. A friend? Erica thought to herself, perhaps someone Frank hadn’t spoken to in a while? Was he cheating on her? She clicked on the prompt swiftly and waited impatiently as the email opened up on her screen. It read:

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SUB: I’m sorry…

Dear Mister Dankworth,

I hope this email finds you well.

I am Evelyn, your dear friend Nathan Jones wife. I write to you at the Behest of my husband…

Now, I understand that you haven’t been in contact for 10 years and you may or may not care to know anything about my husbands life, however Nate insisted it was imperative I write to you. He is sick. He has been for a while… was diagnosed with stage 3 HIV a few months ago and things aren’t looking up. The doctor says he has a month at best.

He came out to me about always having liked men, when he was first diagnosed. As you can imagine it is taking everything in me to write to you. I know now that our marriage was a sham, but looking beyond the betrayal and lies, Nate has been a great father to our kids and has loved me in his own way and I owe him.

The last few days Nate has been incessantly demanding that I reach out to you. He spoke very fondly of you often, telling me of your tempestuous yet forbidden college romance…and how much you loved each other before things went south. He confided in me that you were what he considered, “the love of his life” and wanted you know that the biggest regret of his life was to turn you down when you asked him to elope, because he was ashamed of himself.

Mister Dankworth, I’ve felt all kinds of emotions these last few months, I’ve pitied myself, I’ve felt anger and spite towards Nate, I’ve felt broken, betrayed and confused, but what eats away at my soul every night when I go to bed is the realization that this man is at deaths door having lived every single minute of his life hiding his true self from the world and that is truly a horrid way for anyone to live. 

I do not know what your life is like and I do not wish to meet or know you. I do not know if this means anything to you even, but if you ever loved this man, please write back. Hearing from you would mean the world to him.

Thanks,

Eve

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The silence that had engulfed Erica in the moments after she had absorbed this email, felt overwhelming. She wished this deafening silence would end, she wanted to do so much — cry, curse at Frank, throw things around — but instead, she just sat at her desk looking out the window from her 20th floor apartment, watching as the fog engulfed the empire state building. I’ve moved on - she thought to herself, reiterating it multiple times in her head so it sticks, but the truth she had been running from for years was knocking down her door. She could no longer live in denial. She looked around her room gasping for air as she felt a tear roll down her cheek, desperately seeking anything that would distract her. 

Something in the periphery of her eyesight caught her attention, on the shelf above the fireplace was a small wooden picture frame, holding a picture Frank had once shown her. It was a picture of two young men, with their hands over each others shoulder smiling sheepishly, one of them was Frank and the other was a lean boy with curly brown hair. It brought back a memory to Erica, a vague one, of Frank and her drinking wine as the fire in the fireplace crackled. It was one of the good memories she had of their time together. Frank was reminiscing of his time with friends at school. “Who is this?” Erica had asked looking at the picture. Frank had grabbed the picture off of the shelf and looked at it for a while — which Erica thought was odd — before he looked into her eyes and said “Just someone I knew”. In that moment she saw something familiar in his eyes, something she couldn’t put a finger on. Thinking back now, Erica realized she had seen longing in Franks eyes, an emotion so familiar to her, that it almost seemed stupid that she couldn’t recognize it. She had spent her entire marriage yearning for Franks affection. 

As the pieces clicked together in her head, Erica stood in Franks room, sobbing holding the picture close to her chest. She allowed herself to feel what she had been resisting for so long. Grief. Pain. Anger. She knew she’d opened the floodgate and this was just the beginning of a long journey, but she now had the courage to walk this path. Wiping away her tears after a good long sob, she sat down at the desk again looking at the computer screen with blurry bloodshot eyes. Setting the picture frame down at the table next to the laptop, she clicked on the small turn around arrow reply icon on Evelyns email thread that opened an empty draft. She took a deep breath, as she swiftly typed a concise message. She wrote:

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RE: I’m sorry…

I forgive you.

Frank Dankworth

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Erica clicked send, shut the laptop, and took a big gulp from her coffee that was no longer warm, and looked out the window as the fog cleared and the magnificent Manhattan skyline came into view again. She muttered “Frank… you idiot” as she smiled.