He didn’t tell anyone where he was going when he left work. He hadn’t figured out what to say to them yet, and he wanted to tell his children first.
He ran into Renee in the hall as he was leaving, and she looked at him. He looked pale and serious. “Are you okay?”
“Yeah. I’m fine. I have a headache. I think I’m coming down with a cold.” She didn’t believe him. He looked worse than that, but she just nodded, and he left. He had no one to talk to about it, and he didn’t want to tell his parents yet and upset them. A divorce would be a big deal to them and was to him too.
By six o’clock, he had a three-bedroom furnished apartment in Tribeca in a decent building. The master bedroom looked out at the river, and it had afternoon sun. The two other bedrooms were small, but he didn’t know how much time his kids would be spending with him, probably very little, but this way they could come whenever they wanted. The kitchen and bathrooms were brand-new, and the furniture was plain and inoffensive. It looked more like a fancy hotel suite than a home, but it was what he needed now. It had a small study, a dining area, and a big living room. And there was a gym with a pool in the building, which Mike thought the kids might like if they stayed with him.
The building manager explained that the owner had bought the apartment as an investment to rent, and had never lived there, which was why it seemed so impersonal. It was all he wanted now, a place to stay where no one hated him or was angry at him all the time or reminded him of past sins. It looked like a clean slate, which was all he needed. He packed that night. He took a lot of his clothes, and asked Maureen if he could take four pieces of art, paintings he had bought, and she said she didn’t care. And he took some framed photos of the children from the living room, and one of him and Maureen when they were younger. She was smiling in the photograph. He hadn’t seen her look like that in years.
He hired a van and driver in the morning, dropped everything off at the apartment, and then went to work. He was smiling when he walked in.
“How’s your cold?” Renee asked him when she saw him. “You look a lot better today.”
“I am,” he said. He felt lighter. He didn’t tell anyone at work. He wasn’t ready to. And he booked a ticket to San Francisco for the weekend, and told Jenny he was coming out. He said he had work in San Francisco, and she said she was free for dinner on Saturday and could spend time with him in the afternoon too. He dreaded telling her, fearing she’d be upset.
It went better than he expected. They took a walk on the Stanford campus on Saturday, and they sat down on a bench under a tree. The weather was warm and it was a beautiful day.
He hesitated for a minute before he told her, and then he jumped in.
“Your mom and I made a decision,” he started seriously, and she finished the sentence for him.
“You’re getting a divorce,” she said quietly. He searched her face to see if she was heartbroken, but she didn’t look surprised or upset. He thought Maureen had told her and didn’t warn him.
“Yes.” He had made the decision to divorce and not just separate in the past few days. Maureen agreed. “Your mom told you?”
“No, Dad. She didn’t. It’s been coming for a long time. I’ve been expecting it since I was about fourteen. It’ll be better. Can I stay with you when I come home?”
“Don’t you want to stay with your mother? It’s your home.” He was surprised by her question.
“I can go back and forth. Mom and I fight a lot. She thinks I’m on your side, and I guess I am. She’s so mean to you.” And she often was to Jenny too. It struck him as sad that there were sides at all.
“I don’t want to tell Zack till he comes home,” he said, and Jenny nodded. She was tall with jet-black hair like his, and she had his smile and blue eyes. It was all so reasonable. “You don’t have to take sides, Jen. None of this is your fault. Our marriage just died a long time ago. I wasn’t home enough, for any of you.”
“You were busy, and you were great to us when you came home. Don’t let Mom tell you that you weren’t. She’s always mad at something or someone. She’s an unhappy person. Maybe this will be good for her. She’ll have to figure out her own life and stop blaming you for everything.” Jenny was fair about it, and he was impressed by how mature she was and how well she had taken the news.
“I hope you like the apartment. There’s a gym and a pool in the building.”