Family Affair by Caprice Crane Page A

me, Brett,” she says, and she doesn’t look happy, so I decide to bite the bullet.
    “I thought we were talking about us. About maybe taking a break.”
    “A break?” she repeats with disgust. “We’re not Ross and fucking Rachel! We’re married. Say what you mean, Brett.”
    “A separation?”
    “Unbelievable,” she says through gritted teeth. She’s shaking her head, clearly shocked.
    “I think we have a miscommunication here,” I say, trying to backpedal or at least soften the situation.
    “No, we
had
one. You just cleared it right up.” Then she whips out that crazy stuffed owl she’s had since I’ve known her. She shakes it at me. “And to think…”
    But she doesn’t finish her sentence.
    “I’m sorry. I thought we were on the same page.”
    “We’re not even in the same book,” she says. “Not even in the same library!”
    “No kidding. We aren’t. Because I thought I got the book that had a happy ending. Not the one where my wife and I lose touch and she becomes such a part of my family that she may as well be my sister!” I snap.
    “Hardly, because your sister doesn’t like men. She’s
smart.”
    “So what does that make you?” I snap. “Because you…you
love
men. You’ve loved men since … how long exactly?”
    “I’m not sure what you’re asking me. How long have I loved you?”
    “Yeah, I’m not sure what I’m asking you, either,” I grunt. “How about this: Who’s the first person you had sex with?”

layla
    So now you know. I lost it at fifteen. To say it was a rough patch in my young life would be understating things: It was like being dragged over a bed of nails in a nylon body stocking.
    Why didn’t it come out earlier? At first it was because I didn’t want to blow things with my new boyfriend at the time—Brett—who just assumed that I was a virgin, too, and that we would lose our virginity together. For that reason I said nothing about my first and certainly only meaningless sexual encounter, which happened in the basement of Doug’s house, drunk. It was our first time drinking, too, a silly experiment with Jim Beam that got way out of control. (It was as horrible as you might imagine, and worse—contrary to his confident assertions, his mom was upstairs folding laundry nearly the whole three and a half minutes.) I said nothing to Brett through high school and college because I feared the news would poison our blossoming relationship, even as I comforted myself with the rationalization that it wasn’t a big deal. Funny thing about big deals: What looks like one to me doesn’t always look like one to you, and vice versa. Better just to let the other person get a look and decide for himself.
    Shame has a habit of snowballing, and by the time Brett and Iwere married, I was positively terrified of telling him, though doing so at any time before he stumbled on the truth by himself probably would have defused the whole situation. Instead,
ka-boom
.
    But I didn’t take the vow “’til death do us part” with the intention of dying before I turn thirty. And the vow was “’til death do us part,” not “’til uncomfortable truths do us part.” And since Brett and I are both alive and plan to be for some time, I am not parting with my husband.
    Marriage is about commitment. And compromise. And if need be, change. If things aren’t working the way they are—and clearly they are not—then I am willing to do the work necessary and/or make changes. But until I know what needs to be changed, I can’t know how to work. So just before Brett and I get home, each not talking out of anger and sheepishness, I swear to him I’ll make an emergency appointment for us with a marriage counselor for tomorrow night. Brett says he’ll go, but he sleeps on the couch.
    • • •
    I walk into the office, and Brett is already there in the waiting room, seated by the window. There’s an air conditioner jutting out of the wall, dripping condensation on a pile of