Unending Silence

The moments seemed to drag on. The words hanging in the air and sprinkling towards the ground as the silence continues to stretch. I nearly scramble to put them back, rewind the clock until I can stop myself from speaking. I know this is impossible. I have put this out there. I am vulnerable and naked in front of the man that I love. I just don't know if love is enough. Not with this. Not with our entire lives hanging in the balance.

The tears are still streaming down my face. I cannot seem to stop this purging of everything that I have pent up for so long. All of my doubts, fears, shortcomings are on display. I can’t take this.

My day has already stripped away all of my dignity, why is he hesitating? Doesn't he get how important this is? It is one question! I want to pace. I want a fucking cigarette. Anything to stop the trembling that is racking my whole being.

I have worked in a job that I hate for seven years. Seven years that have come to a head today. Another weekend taken away by the leech that pays our bills. I know that there are responsibilities that I face. I know that the cost of this failure is on my shoulders.

My kids are screaming in the background, they have felt the slow draining of their mother for far too long. My mother steps in to do what I should be doing and attempts to soothe them. To do what I should be doing. What I am too lost to do. It is enough. Enough. But can I do it? How can I turn my back on everything?

I must. I must leave now, while there is still something of me left to leave. Yet he still has not answered. The silence has become a tangible thing a film that has separated us. My fingers itch to turn into claws and rip this film into shreds.

The tears, the screams, and the silence from my husband, it is all echoing in my head. Where once words and pictures and light filled every corner is now a great void that would make the grand canyon look small. I need myself back. I never knew how much I needed those words. The ones that drove me to madness at times and at others poured out of me like a lullaby for my fears. If he loves me, he would want them back. He would know that the words are me and that to lose them is the loss of his best friend.

I have not been excelling. Somehow, I can not trace it to a certain point, but I began slowing dying. I was unable to sleep. Unable to eat. My new shadow this unending silence. I want to scream.

I realize that I have been staring at my trembling hands. I clench them together and look at my husband. I brace for anger, for fear. I do not brace for the sadness I see. His eyes are filled with understanding. He has not answered my question, because he feels it. That loss of words, the emptiness that is staring back at him from the woman he loves.

I see now the pain that he has felt in watching me wither right before his eyes. The scrambling that he has done to hold on to me. He pulls me into his arms, and I crumble. The sobs coming freely.

“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.” I say on repeat. I do not know how to begin making amends for all that I have done. For all that I have dragged our family through.

“You have nothing to be sorry for. I love you so much” He whispers the words into my ear. The words do not echo. Instead, they soothe and they fill. The first drops in a bucket. The drops that will become the foundation for all that I must rebuild.

I pull back to look into those brown eyes. They search me. I wonder if he can see what his words have started. For awhile we just stare. The silence not separating but bringing us closer. He says volumes with his silence. Stories of us. Of our love. Of all that we have built together. I see the start of all that we will continue to build. A life of happiness that we will all share. Most importantly, I still see that understanding. 

We had fought about it recently. The loss of who I am. The best friend that seemed to have walked away from him when he needed her most. How could I have thought for a moment that he would not understand? How could I think that he would doubt me or what I needed to do next?

I know that we are about to take a plunge. A terrifying one. But if we step off this ledge together. If we hold all that is dear to us close to our heart we might just fly.  I might just fly. 

There is a truth about families that I learned from my parents. One that I must use now, and again as my compass when the doubts creep in. Families feel together. When one starts to crumble under the pressures of the world the rest of the family feels it and tries to share the weight. Knowingly or not. My husband and children were beginning to crumble with me. It must stop. 

I know what I am asking. I know that it is a lot. We must be absolutely sure before we take this plunge. There will be no going back once we do.

“So, will we be ok if I quit my job? If I leave today and never go back, will we be ok?” I ask the questions again. A bit more confidently than before.

“Yes.”

We both know that this is a simplification. That there isn’t a simple ‘yes or no’ answer to this question. This is a question we will have to ask every day. Every day we will have to decide that we will be ok. Every day we will have to fight to make that a reality. But as the word is added to the bucket alongside the words of love, I know that we will do just that.

So, I quit my job. We do it together. Just as we will for every step of this new journey.