“I received a very polite email from her lawyer that said she’d be happy with half of your house and land and support payments.”
“She never lived in that house! I’ll call her and get to the bottom of this!”
“As your attorney, I advise you not to make contact with her. She has an attorney, you have an attorney. I’ll recommend mediation supervised by family court and you can lay it all out.”
“And just because I didn’t divorce her a long time ago, I’m going to lose my home and half my possessions?”
“I do think under the circumstances we’ll get out better than that, but there’s no question that now that lawyers are involved, it’ll be more expensive. Listen, the law is the law and believe it or not it’s written that way to protect the innocent. No-fault divorce means it doesn’t matter who does what to who and community property is simply half or whatever can be negotiated. Right now, feeling like you’re being robbed, you don’t have much empathy, but this is meant to protect men or women from falling at the mercy of powerful spouses who want to turn their backs on their responsibilities. That is not your situation. So—we’ll try mediation and fight it. Your marriage was over a long time ago.”
“I’m still going to call her and ask her why she’s doing this.”
“If I were you I’d probably ignore my lawyer’s advice and do that, too. Try very hard not to give her more ammo. Okay?”
Landry was so angry that he didn’t wait long. He called Laura on his way to Jack’s. Of course she didn’t answer. Now that he thought about it, she rarely did. She almost always returned the call. On the other hand, if he saw that it was her and he wasn’t in the middle of something important, he would answer. But clearly Laura’s life was more important than his. To the voice mail he said, “I’ve just heard from my lawyer. My lawyer heard from your lawyer. So you’re going to make this difficult and you’re asking for half my father’s property? Property that you visited maybe six times in as many years? Property that you never shared with me, but now you want it? What the hell is going on, Laura? We agreed years ago that we’d chosen to live separately and if the time for divorce came, there would be no altercation! This is altercation, my wife. I’ve given you patience, kindness, money, and now that I just want to end it, you’re going to drag every dime you can get out of my kicking, screaming body? If you’d come to me and told me you need a little help… Haven’t I always been willing to help you? But this—after you left me—”
By the time he got to Jack’s, he could barely conceal his cranky mood, though he tried. They had dinner and he hoped he’d come off as a little quiet but not much worse. Fortunately Bonnie and Gerald were talkative enough to cover his silence.
But on the way home, Kaylee said, “I get the feeling that something is wrong.”
“It’s nothing much,” he said. “I’ll fill you in later. Right now I’m stewing.”
“I hope it’s nothing I’ve done.”
“Not at all,” he said, reaching for her hand. “You’re perfect.”
When he and Kaylee went to bed, he turned off the ringer on his phone. He slept poorly, of course. He was consumed by the unfairness of it all. In the morning, he didn’t look at his phone until they’d had breakfast and gone to their separate work spaces. Then he looked and saw there were six missed calls from Laura, the last one coming in at 1:00 a.m.
He was not fooled. He couldn’t remember when she’d ever called him so late. She wanted to know if he was alone.
When he finally called her in the late morning, she actually answered.
“I take it you got my message,” he said. “Do you want to explain what it is you’re doing and why?”
“I just want a chance,” she said softly. “I want you back. Obviously you’re doing this because you have someone else now. And you know I know who that someone is.”
“I’m not even going to respond to that,” he said. “It’s not relevant. I made a life for myself. I’ve lived alone for ten years, I built myself a house and a business and you took off to pursue your dream. I helped you. I gave you money when you were behind on rent or whatever. A couple of times I took out loans for money that you were never going to repay. If you think I’m going to buy my way out of a nonmarriage, you’re crazy. I won’t give up easily and I won’t pay you off. Damn you! I would have helped you, but you had to get a lawyer to fight me!”