it really pissed her off. Not to mention the obliviousness about the night before. So instead of the conciliatory, helpful approach she had envisioned, she spoke more sharply than she meant to.
“I was happy we were able to get past our fight,” she began. “I do think that is important…”
Craig had noticed a pattern in the previous couple of years: they would get close, make love, then, inevitably, the next day she would be distant, even hostile. His provisional theory was that she had a chronic fear of closeness. She was happy to let down her emotional defenses, but then she got angry at being vulnerable. Still, he couldn’t help taking it personally, and, trying to deliver the line as a joke, he said, “I take it you’re saying that the sex wasn’t too great.”
Incredulous, Alice said, “Would it be possible even for a minute for me to finish what I have to say without it being interpreted—wrongly in this case—and summed up by you?”
“I’m sorry,” Craig said. “I shouldn’t have interrupted. And it was a stupid thing to say.”
She was quiet for a moment, and then, showing that she hadbeen awake during their couples therapy sessions, too, she said, “Thank you,” and they were back on track. A year and a half earlier they would have gone all the way down that rabbit hole, arguing about how they argued, increasingly angry with each other.
“I want us to have a serious discussion about what we are doing with our lives,” she went on. “I don’t like having to evacuate my house a couple times a year, take my children out of school, leave and not know what will be left of my house when I get back…”
“ Our house,” Craig offered, firmly.
“Dammit,” Alice said, “can I finish my sentences without having them corrected or edited by you?”
“Not if you are going to write me out of the script.”
It took a moment, but she went on, with a harder edge in her voice now. “I don’t like getting called into school because our daughter is using words like ‘motherfucker.’ And I don’t like worrying whether I am going to make it alive from our car to our house when I come home after dark. I don’t like hearing about our friends being held up and wondering when it is our turn. And above all, Craig, I don’t like not even being able to voice these concerns to my husband without getting into a fight every time.”
“Where would you like to live, Alice?”
“You know…” she said, leaving the sentence dangling, pressing her lips together and looking out the window. She shook her head. “That’s not even the point.”
“Then—listen to me, Alice, please—I need to know what the point is. This is our life. I have a really good job here that provides for us and our children. We have a house that we love. Our daughter is in a great school, a block away from our house, along with the children of our neighbors, whom we also like and have a community with. We have friends all over the city, great food, music when we want to hear it, and our children are exposed to other children from all kinds of backgrounds. Yes, the city has a lot of crime, but so do most cities…”
“Not like this.”
Craig stopped speaking, with his eyebrows raised, and after a moment Alice said, “I’m sorry.”
Craig went on. “Yes, we have to evacuate occasionally, but it doesn’t take all that much, we have a nice two-day vacation in Oxford, and then we’re back. We have a life here. I’m trying to figure out what it is you really want, realistically. We’ve had this conversation at least a dozen times…”
“A dozen?”
“…and I never know where it leaves us,” Craig went on, letting the interruption pass. “We’ve had good times here, haven’t we?”
“Of course,” Alice said after a brief hesitation. “We…”
“Then—bottom line, then I’m finished—I need to know what it is you want, what you really want. Otherwise this is just like picking at a scab. If we’re
“I was happy we were able to get past our fight,” she began. “I do think that is important…”
Craig had noticed a pattern in the previous couple of years: they would get close, make love, then, inevitably, the next day she would be distant, even hostile. His provisional theory was that she had a chronic fear of closeness. She was happy to let down her emotional defenses, but then she got angry at being vulnerable. Still, he couldn’t help taking it personally, and, trying to deliver the line as a joke, he said, “I take it you’re saying that the sex wasn’t too great.”
Incredulous, Alice said, “Would it be possible even for a minute for me to finish what I have to say without it being interpreted—wrongly in this case—and summed up by you?”
“I’m sorry,” Craig said. “I shouldn’t have interrupted. And it was a stupid thing to say.”
She was quiet for a moment, and then, showing that she hadbeen awake during their couples therapy sessions, too, she said, “Thank you,” and they were back on track. A year and a half earlier they would have gone all the way down that rabbit hole, arguing about how they argued, increasingly angry with each other.
“I want us to have a serious discussion about what we are doing with our lives,” she went on. “I don’t like having to evacuate my house a couple times a year, take my children out of school, leave and not know what will be left of my house when I get back…”
“ Our house,” Craig offered, firmly.
“Dammit,” Alice said, “can I finish my sentences without having them corrected or edited by you?”
“Not if you are going to write me out of the script.”
It took a moment, but she went on, with a harder edge in her voice now. “I don’t like getting called into school because our daughter is using words like ‘motherfucker.’ And I don’t like worrying whether I am going to make it alive from our car to our house when I come home after dark. I don’t like hearing about our friends being held up and wondering when it is our turn. And above all, Craig, I don’t like not even being able to voice these concerns to my husband without getting into a fight every time.”
“Where would you like to live, Alice?”
“You know…” she said, leaving the sentence dangling, pressing her lips together and looking out the window. She shook her head. “That’s not even the point.”
“Then—listen to me, Alice, please—I need to know what the point is. This is our life. I have a really good job here that provides for us and our children. We have a house that we love. Our daughter is in a great school, a block away from our house, along with the children of our neighbors, whom we also like and have a community with. We have friends all over the city, great food, music when we want to hear it, and our children are exposed to other children from all kinds of backgrounds. Yes, the city has a lot of crime, but so do most cities…”
“Not like this.”
Craig stopped speaking, with his eyebrows raised, and after a moment Alice said, “I’m sorry.”
Craig went on. “Yes, we have to evacuate occasionally, but it doesn’t take all that much, we have a nice two-day vacation in Oxford, and then we’re back. We have a life here. I’m trying to figure out what it is you really want, realistically. We’ve had this conversation at least a dozen times…”
“A dozen?”
“…and I never know where it leaves us,” Craig went on, letting the interruption pass. “We’ve had good times here, haven’t we?”
“Of course,” Alice said after a brief hesitation. “We…”
“Then—bottom line, then I’m finished—I need to know what it is you want, what you really want. Otherwise this is just like picking at a scab. If we’re
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