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Shiv remembers in almost cloudy nostalgia that one late night when Tom first confessed to loving her.
They were eating two day old Chinese takeout on the barren hardwood floor of Tom’s new apartment.
Shiv remembers how she was deeply embarrassed for him and, despite herself, strangely intrigued. She didn’t say it back, but she did laugh at the joke he cracked only minutes after, and that seemed just enough for him.
***
The trip home from Italy is filled with stilted silence. Tom looks as if it's some great task to hold back whatever he’s thinking, like every swallowed syllable fills him with some sharp pain. Shiv doesn’t ignore the small sliver of satisfaction this awards her.
When they finally cross the threshold back into their apartment, now faced with the one place that has only ever been shared, the boundless resentment falls over Shiv in sudden isolated clarity.
She crosses into the kitchen and slips her coat off as Tom sits on the other side of the island with faraway eyes. Shiv waits with impersonal patience at the farthest corner of the kitchen. She has enough generosity left in her to give him the opportunity to have the first word. Tom looks at his shoes, his hands, and not her of course.
Looking at him now, immeasurably small in the wake of his own actions, she wonders if he has any inkling of what he owes her. But what she knows, more intimately than anyone, is that he won’t ever be able to compensate, he can’t even make his voice work right.
He is a pathetic thing even with a knife bloody in his hand.
“You know,” Shiv says, setting her jaw. “You have this horrible habit, Tom.”
“Do I,” he asks, a sly smile playing on his lips and Shiv thinks he might even be trying at humor. She still finds herself amazed at his affinity for optimism. She would call it charming if it wasn’t so pitiful.
“Yeah,” She says leaning across the granite counter, arms crossed and eyes steady. “You never look me in the eyes while you fuck me.”
“Honey,” he tries with the audacity to look confused.
“I wish sometimes that you would’ve hit me instead,” she continues.
“ What ?”
“The classic move,” she says calmly. “That you would have done something out of passion and stupidity. That at least it would have some honest heart. But that would mean you would have to face me as you did it, so.”
“So,” he echoes. She raises her eyebrows daring him to continue. Tom begins to step towards her and Shiv curses herself for instinctively stepping back.
“Shiv,” he’s practically begging and her stomach is curdling at the sight. “If you gave me a moment to explain—”
“I’ll give you fifteen minutes to gather your things and then I want you out of my sight.”
Tom stares at her lamely, mouth hanging open like a door off its hinges. “Siobhan.”
“I’m not going to repeat myself twice,” she says with shaking hands betraying her.
Tom rubs a hand over his mouth, takes a breath, and begins making his way upstairs tail tucked between his legs.
She keeps her back to Tom not wanting to watch, just listens as he shuffles around collecting what he can. She doesn’t allow herself to give until she hears the slamming of the front door.
Then as she sits in her sterile white apartment finally alone, she thinks, they should've bought more art.
***
There is a flicker of life left in the hollow echoed walls of the apartment. The jingle of the dog chain and the click of his nails. Shiv wishes this is a comfort.
It was another example of one of Tom's blindpspots when he thought the best thing to surprise Shiv after an endlessly long business trip to Washington was an eight week old puppy running around on her newly finished marble floors.
They had a long talk . Shiv ordered the crate the next day.
Now as she rests on the sofa, Mondale whines at her.
She sits up slightly and meets the dog’s eyes. He barks sharply, startling her.
“What,” she asks, realizing she has reached a point in her life where she now talks to dogs. They had put Mondale through seven months of obedience training (which was essentially highway robbery in Shiv’s eyes) for him to not act like a spoiled little brat.
He of course lets another high pitched yelp.
“That’s it.” And Shiv grabs his leash and unclicks the crate.
She brings Mondale to her car and practically has to demand her chauffeur let her drive her own fucking vehicle for once. Shiv knows this is not a task to call upon, this is one she needs to wrap her own fists around.
She drives and drives until she comes upon a comically mundane upper middle class residential area. There she finds a luscious and vast sports park, bustling with adderall subdued children hanging off of a structure that doubles as both a playground and a piece of modern art (failing deeply in both regards). There is an opioid induced glow to near every mother’s face and each dad dotes a diaper bag as well as earpiece.
She walks Mondale far enough from the street, runs her fingers through the silk like fur along his neck, and unclips his leash.
He darts, expectedly, through the park overwhelmed by the smell of trees and the feeling of overgrown grass. A few children chase after him excited to see something so wild.
And with that Shiv turns around sharply on her heels, and begins to make her way back to her parked car, the commotion disappearing behind her.
This is a small mercy, she thinks as she is halfway back to her apartment. A net positive for all parties. He’s KC registered for chrissakes someone will find worth in the animal.
Once back home she tells her chauffeur to order a deep cleaning for the car, she’s already sick of seeing the red hair scattered on the pressed leather.
She throws the crate out herself.
***
She had never let anger fester like this, long enough to spoil into sadness. Now suddenly in the wake of a forest after fire, she is overwhelmed in landscape grief.
So she makes a decision with part of her heart that hasn’t changed since age eight. She knows its stupid and she’s only going to feel worse but there is some naive part of her that craves.
“You’re free right,” she asks, stepping into Roman's apartment.
“Like you’d give a shit either way,” he answers, holding his front door open for her.
“Fair.”
She makes her way to the kitchen rifling through the bottles displayed on his counter. Brandy, a bottle of red, rosé, some imported chardonnay. “Rome, where do you keep the real shit. Not this decorative pansy catalog?”
“What?”
She grabs him by his shoulders shaking him slightly “Booze. Alcohol. The kind that’ll pickle your dick til it falls off.”
“Uh.” He’s looking at her with a pinched face, cocking his head to the side. “Under the stairs.”
“Oh, just like at mommy’s house,” Shiv says over her shoulder as she grabs a bottle of bourbon. “You were always so nostalgic in a disturbing way.”
When she comes back around, Roman has a look on his face that is too akin to concern that makes her skin crawl.
“Shiv, c’mon liver cancer isn’t a cool look after a failing marriage,” Roman says, trying at humor and failing.
She bites her cheek instead of throwing the bottle at his head. “Well then you better split this with me to make sure I don’t down the bottle,” she says, already taking a swig.
“Fine.”
***
“I’m leaving my husband,” Shiv finally says after two bottles of silent drinking. They end up on Roman’s sofa three bottles in. “How embarrassing is that?”
“Well not as embarrassing as him leaving you,” Roman says after taking the bottle Shiv offers him.
She laughs at that sharply.
“You want me to kill him?”
“Fuck off,” but she smiles as she says it.
“I will.” He takes her hand excitedly. She throws her head back and rolls her eyes. He only ever gets touchy like this when he’s had one too many. “I’ve been dying to wrap my hands around his thick neck since the moment you brought the little bumpkin home to get right under pop’s skin.”
Shiv frowns, suddenly thrown by the direction of the joke. “Roman, c’mon.”
“Shiv, you can drop it,” he says. He rolls his eyes at her, and she thinks he might be trying at endearment.
“Drop what?”
“ Shiv. ”
“ What ?”
“It’s okay, tinman.” Roman pats his chest and pouts his lip. “You don’t have to pretend you have a heart anymore.”
“You know what, fuck you. I.” Shiv has to pause. She crosses her arms against her chest and tries to sit up straighter. She is, she registers a little too late, getting hysterical.“I love him. Loved. I—”
“See, see. There you go, putting on the whole song and dance. But you’re slipping .” Roman’s laughing with his whole chest now. He pushes himself up so he’s sat cross legged and facing her, spilling his drink in the process. “The guy who you don’t even give two shits about fucked you with a rusty nail, and now your crumbling.”
“Jesus, Roman. Could you be more detached from reality right now?” She shoots him a withering look, hoping to nip whatever moronic tangent he’s about to delve into in the bud. “And don’t act like you’re the well off one here, when your Jocasta left you for the dogs as she screwed some old sad sack.”
“Says the bitch who saddled herself to Judas. Do you genuinely think I care about that shit?” One corner of his mouth quirks up in hollow amusement. He’s bullshitting, she knows, but— Well that’s it. But. “Do you see me crying and running away to my twin’s house to wallow? No, because I know it’s a fucking game. I know how to play. You never did. You care too much, Siobhan.”
“Ugh, you are unbelievable.” Shiv pushes herself up off the couch, to put some distance between herself and the conversation. She stumbles for a second and Roman laughs again. Her head throbs in response.
“And I’m taking this with me, asshole.” She snatches the bottle out of Roman’s hand and swiftly exits.
***
She sits in the lobby of Roman’s apartment as she waits for her ride to arrive. Sometime while she was up in his room it had begun to rain, almost torrentially. She can’t tell if it's 8:00 PM or the middle of the night.
With her hand that isn’t currently holding a stolen bottle of gin, she dials a number that she wishes she would forget.
He doesn’t pick up and Shiv is forced to listen to Tom’s voicemail greeting: “ Hello, you have reached Tom Wambsgans, President of ATN News. If you can’t reach me at this number, please leave your details with my assistant Greg Hirsch .”
Shiv groans at the beep.
“Listen to me, you pathetic prick,” she says rushed and pained. “You are nothing but a scared little cornered invertebrate, who lives out of people's palms, and you think all of sudden you can bite the hand that feeds you. You think you’ve gone and grown a spine, but you’ve only learned to puff out your chest.”
Then suddenly brought to near silence, she whispers into her phone, “I miss you, you bastard.”
She deletes the message.
***
Once in the safety of the backseat of her car, Shiv folds.
She chokes down a sob as she rattles out the address to the driver. The bottle of gin rolls around on the car floor, the noise almost numbing her.
***
As she stands outside the door to Tom’s hotel room, she wants to ask herself when her life became some comical scheme against her.
When the door clicks open she's almost excited. It's all very mortifying.
“I know this would be much more romantic if I was wet from the rain, but you rather like this sweater so I thought I wouldn’t ruin it with some gesture,” is what Shiv says quickly before Tom realizes what’s going on. He’s got an old college sweatshirt pulled over a pair of sweats and there’s an enormous cowlick in his hair.
“Shiv,” he says, and he looks at her with a hardness that Shiv has never seen directed at her. But it doesn’t reach his eyes, she realizes, there's only confusion. She can work with that.
“Hi, Tom,” she says, smiling softly. He doesn’t return her softness, which continues to startle her.
“I’m sorry did you call?” He rubs a hand over his eyes and she notices belatedly that he had been sleeping. “What's this about?”
“No, I didn't. I came by to um, I just needed to—” She feels caught suddenly with her hand in the cookie jar, and without thinking she stutters out, “Mondale’s runaway.”
“ What ?”
“The walker, who we pay an obscene amount by the way, came back with a broken leash and no goddamned dog.”
“Well, uh,” Tom starts. He looks so suddenly saddened, Shiv wants to slap him. “Have we tried looking?”
“Yes, I issued a search warrant and the police are doing their due diligence.” Shiv rolls her eyes.
Tom sighs and runs a hand over his mouth. “Well thank you for uh, informing me— Have a good rest of your night, Shiv.”
“Wait,” Shiv says, grabbing the door so Tom couldn’t close it any further, then kicks herself internally for how pathetic she’s acting.
Tom looks at her with such a tired expression, something deep in her flinches.
“Can I please come in for just a bit,” she asks. And Tom opens the door.
***
Tom is helping her out of her coat when he says, “You’ve been drinking.” He doesn’t frame it like a question and Shiv feels her face grow warm.
“Tom, I—”
“Please don’t lie to me.”
She nods lamely.
“Alright, give me a second.”
Tom sits her down on the small sofa bed in the center of the room, and disappears around a corner, leaving her to fiddle with her thumbs.
He comes back with a glass of water just as she manages to kick her shoes off, and she suddenly feels embarrassed by how easily she has gotten comfortable.
Tom offers the glass and says, “You should drink this.”
Shiv reaches for it, but instead finds herself sliding her fingers up his wrist. Tom inhales sharply, but doesn’t move, even when Shiv finds his pulse point with feather light fingers. She pulls gently, and Tom lets her lead him onto the sofa next her.
“Can I tell you something?” She asks softly. She moves her hand from his wrist until she’s cradling Tom’s hand.
Tom exhales. He sets the glass on the coffee table across from them and asks, “What?”
Shiv feels wrecked, like she’s apart at the seams, like her heart is crawling its way up through her throat. Tom is softened by the overhead light and in the haze of late night hysteria and stale alcohol she feels almost safe.
And then he’s taking his hand out of her’s and startlingly the rest of the world and ten pounds of history falls back onto her.
“You make me sick to look at,” Shiv starts everything falling away. “And you’ve ruined everything. Completely and utterly fucked this relationship and my trust and— God, I’m so tired of this fucking script— Just will do the one thing your capable of— Jesus Christ. Hold me.”
And Tom, without any coaxing, quickly folds her into himself. She crawls into his lap, adjusts his hands so they fit snugly against her sides, and finally tucks her head below his chin. He holds her like an oversized marinette, her emotional support robot.
She lets out a labored sob and she prays he doesn’t notice.
“Shiv, honey—”
“I don’t want you back at the apartment,” she says quickly, not looking at him.
“Okay,” he says slowly, as if he’s testing out the word. “I can understand that.”
“But I wanna still try at this,” she says, sitting up a little. She feels Tom still below her, so she continues hoping he’ll understand, “We were never meant for the falsified mess of an institutionalized marriage. It’s a fucking self imposed prison.”
Tom makes a choked off noise. So she grabs the hand that he’s resting on her hip and brings it to her lips. “But you're part of me, baby. Can’t we just pretend it’s five years ago and I'm sneaking away to your shitty little penthouse to hide under your covers. No one was looking at us with microscope eyes. When everything was unexplored and simple. I need my own space. But I need you just as much”
“Yeah,” Tom says quietly, he meets her eyes but he's looking past her. “Okay, so seperate houses, and separate lives. But still married, still together, in a metaphorical sense.”
Shiv nods, biting her lip. She runs her finger through his hair, brushing his bangs off his forehead.
“Kind of like,” Tom says slowly, with the closest thing to a smile Shiv has seen since Italy. “Weird long term foreplay,”
“Fuck, sure, yeah.” And she kisses him hard and fast. Half hysterical, half earnest . She finds herself laughing, genuinely laughing, as she pulls away to say, “We were never meant for that anyway, we’re too cool for that shit.”
“Too cool,” Tom half-heartedly mocks. He tangles his fingers with the hair at the nape of her neck, and something warm pools in her stomach.
“When we moved in together that wasn’t for us, that was for dad and the press and my image. But all that is gone now. Its fucking debris. It’s just us.”
“Just us,” Tom echoes.
“I’m so glad that you get me.” And she kisses him again.
***
They settle into a routine. It’s touch and go, but it's comfortable. She even has a drawer for her things at the hotel now, which makes her feel a decade younger.
Tom keeps informing her of half the shit Logan has him doing, acting once again as her inside man (Tom’s words not her’s). It’s out of guilt she’s almost definite. The same guilt that keeps her staying in his bed until morning. Just another small thing they owe each other.
And so the transaction continues.
***
Around two weeks in, Tom offers making spaghetti from scratch. Shiv had only been there ten minutes, and Tom no more than fifteen. She looks at him like he’s grown a second head. “Honey, you had a long day, don't you wanna relax?”
She walks up to him and places a searching hand under his collar to rub his chest. He laughs putting a hand over her’s to still it. “This will be relaxing— It’s an old Wambsgans recipe I know by heart. My dad would make it when I got sick.”
“Tom, seriously?”
“I’m deadly,” he says in the least serious way he can muster.
So they make spaghetti for dinner, with semi-comfortable silence in a hotel kitchen. Shiv works on chopping the vegetables while Tom makes the meatballs.
“You like your meat spicy, right,” Tom asks her. She turns around to answer him, only to find Tom rubbing an itch in his eye.
And then Tom is cursing rather loudy.
“What,” Shiv asks concerned. “Oh shit did you get something in your eye?”
“Apparently so,” Tom says, blinking furiously.
“Well, do something .”
“I can’t really while I am currently missing the ability to use one of my eyes,” he snaps, and then looks at her apologetically. “Shiv, just get the milk? Please .”
“Milk? Tom, what the fuck are you—”
“Honey, I know what I’m talking about, trust me. Just get me milk and a washcloth.”
She moves around Tom, who is actually tearing up now, to prop open the fridge. “It looks like you only have half and half, that okay?”
When she turns around Tom has his face under the faucet. “For fuck’s— Yes that’s fine,” Tom sighs.
Shiv ushers over the half and half, picking up a dirty washcloth from the counter on her way. She presents them both to Tom expectantly. “Here.”
“Can you do it please,” he asks, almost whining.
“Do what, exactly?”
“Jesus,” Tom winces and turns off the sink. “Milk on cloth on eye. Now, pretty please.”
Shiv has something like a eureka moment and begins to soak the end of the washcloth in the creamer before placing it somewhat forcefully on Tom’s stinging eye.
“Thank you,” he sighs, body going slack.
“Sure thing.”
“Did you miss this?” Tom asks, removing Shiv’s hand from its place on his eye.
“Soaking your eye in half and half”
Tom rolls his eyes. “No, silly.”
“Tom,” Shiv asks genuinely. “When have we done anything remotely similar to this evening,”
“Well then I guess I should be asking,” he says jovially, scooping Shiv in his arms and burying his face in her neck. “Do you want to do this again?”
No , Shiv answers silently to herself, belatedly over less than average spaghetti.
***
Shiv doesn’t know why she thought it would be a good idea to sneak her way into Tom’s suite to wait for him before he gets home. But as she hears the door unlock and two sets of footsteps instead of one, she gets cold feet.
“No, and then he’s like—” And that is not Tom’s voice, no she recognizes it in sickening clarity. Greg .
Shiv was slowly beginning to realize that Greg was a presence that now more than ever is inescapable.
Now that they are buttbuddies in crime, Shiv has to suffer through long conversations with Tom that spin on the axis of what Greg said to who, or what Greg did when, or just frankly Greg in a general sense.
Tom’s laugh startles her, deeply genuinely and obnoxiously loud.
When they turn the corner Shiv locks eyes with Tom, she doesn’t miss the slight panic that washes over him.
“Shiv, what’re you—” Tom stops himself like he’s correcting his tone, and quickly turns sickeningly sweet. “I mean hi, honey. Hi.”
“Sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt,” She says mindlessly, getting up from her spot on the sofa and making her way to Tom’s side. “I just thought I would surprise you.”
“And surprise you did,” Tom says laughing jarringly as he bops Shiv on the nose.
“Hello, Shiv,” Greg says awkwardly like he’s forcing out forgein symbols, he’s halfway across the room and hasn’t moved since he saw her.
“Greg,” Shiv acknowledges.
“Oh this could be fun,” Tom says, clapping his hands together, his eyes bugging out wide making him look near deranged. “We could, I don’t know, put on a blockbuster movie and play Twister, like a group normos.”
“Lovely,” Shiv says.
Then Shiv’s hearing the opening notes of One Week by the Barenaked Ladies blasting out of some crappy speaker. “Shit,” Tom curses looking at his cell.
“Listen, I have to go out and take this call, then I’ll be right back,” He bends down and places a dry kiss to Shiv’s forehead and she only flinches slightly.
The moment Tom is out of the room and ear shot, she turns on Greg.
“Okay, I see you,” she starts, squaring up to him. “I fucking see right through you’re little act.”
“What, um, exactly are you implying here, Shiv,” Greg fumbles.
“Oh, Tom . Let me make your latte just right, as I bat my gargantuan lashes and tell you how super duper tough you are, ugh” Shiv mocks, rolling her eyes. “You’re stringing him along, you pathetic little weasel.”
“I don’t—”
“He’s attached to you,” Shiv pauses running her hands through her hair. “For whatever odd reason. Maybe some fucking midlife crisis— Now more than ever and I’m not gonna watch you use him for whatever short lived idiotic power play you have in mind.”
“I’m,” Greg starts, looking at his shoes. Then suddenly, with a cock of his head, he meets her eyes steadily. “I’m sorry I took your job.”
Shiv sees hot melting white. “Get out of my fucking house.”
“This isn’t even—”
“Oh fuck off, you no what I mean— Shoo scram. Fucking make yourself useful where you’re fucking wanted.”
Greg all but scurries out the room like a prey animal falling from its hunters jaws.
And all of a sudden Shiv just about feels like the cat that caught the canary.
***
Tom comes home late with an oddly distant air about him. Throughout conversation over dinner he seems far away, stranded on an island Shiv can’t quite reach.
After their dishes have been left to sit in the sink and they’re halfway through their glasses of wine, Shiv finally cracks. “Is something wrong— Is it dad? What did you do?”
“No it’s not Logan— and I didn’t do anything it’s just—”
“What then?”
“Greg left,” he says sharply, eyes farway.
“Huh,” Shiv gawks.
“Greg fucked off,” Tom begins pacing rapidy around the tiny kitchen, hands flying in every direction. “Ran away. Fucking ditched— he’s in buttfuck boonies Canada, the little prick.”
Tom lets out an indignant, strangled noise after he throws the rest of his wine back, wiping his hand across his mouth like a barbarian.
“He what— quit?” Shiv is getting to her feet, confusion flooding her system and overriding logic for a second. “He can’t fucking quit he’s Cousin Greg— he’s not allowed—”
“Well he did,” Tom snaps. “Slipped away in the night like a shame ridden mistress without even leaving a note.”
“What did he say to you exactly?”
Tom laughs like a maniac, as he grips the kitchen counter and hangs his head, body shaking erratically. “ Jack shit is what he said to me. The bastard told Willa .”
“Well okay— he left,” Shiv says, slowly collecting herself. “Change of plans.”
“Did you hear me, Shiv? Willa. The fucking horror of Babylon—”
“Look at me, Tom.” She grabs his face with open palms, her body vibrating from excitement. “This isn’t— This is something we can work with. It’s one last mouth you have to feed, think about, you're free of your shackles. This is yours now— Logan has to rely on you. This is good fucking news, Tom.”
“I yeah, maybe.” He takes a sobering breath and looks at his shoes. “Yeah, you're definitely right, Shiv.”
“I’m glad you finally realized,” she jokes gently. “Do you want me to pour you another glass—”
“Shiv I think I, uh.” He looks at her and there is such a poignant sadness to him, Shiv almost feels herself wilting in response. “I'm tired, honey. I think I’m just gonna head to bed.”
“Oh.”
Something shifts that night. Alone tucked in on a hotel sofa bed, Shiv experiences in shocking high definition the deep seated grief that lays dormant inside her, always.
***
It took Tom eight more months to leave.
Shiv came to visit his room to find him sitting at the dining table surrounded by packed bags. He never did find a proper apartment and that, Shiv thinks now, should have clearly been a sign.
He says something about needing space and Shiv finds herself nodding. Tom gets up to kiss her cheek, and she allows it.
She hears the click of the door close and she knows it's over.
And in that moment the only thing she feels truly upset about is the fact that she should have used these last few months to prepare. She looks out Tom’s massive wall of a window, out onto the flashing cityscape, and feels suddenly and coldly terrified.
***
It takes six more months for Shiv to reach out again.
She texts Tom because that seems like it has the best success rate compared to possible shame factor.
After mulling it over half a bottle of red, she sends him three messages:
Hey Tom
I think we should get together sometime. Talk about legalities. All that fun stuff. How’s lunch sound on the 22nd?
I’ll forward you the address.
He sends back a simple sure , three days later.
***
There’s a kitschy little dinner up in Albany with fairy lights stuffed into lanterns outside and menus with plastic on them. It was the first place that came up when Shiv googled “cheap food Albany”.
It’s thankfully barren on a late Tuesday afternoon, except for the two old ladies taking advantage of the senior specials at a corner booth and a dad and his daughter sharing a sunday at the counter.
Shiv has a weird flutter in her stomach that’s a mix of dread and curiosity as she waits at a bright red booth with a window view. She forces herself not to look when she hears a jingle from the bell hanging from the entrance.
“Hey! Bangs,” is the first thing Tom says to her as he slips into the opposite side of the booth. He has his classic comically large smile plastered across his face as he greets her. She has to admit there is something horrifyingly charming about it.
Tom is wearing a squash colored knit sweater with a white button up poking out of the collar over a pair of honest to God blue jeans. She has to force herself not to actively stare.
“Huh, oh yeah,” Shiv answers back, self consciously pushing aside her new haircut. “Sorry about the location, but I thought it would be a bit more discreet. Though come to think it's a little more your style now, anyways.”
Tom had told her he was living vaguely upstate now over the sparse messages they sent each other leading up to lunch.
“Oh, um. No need to apologize,” he says awkwardly, picking at the peeling plastic of his menu. “It’s really good to see you, Shiv.”
“You too, Tom,” and she finds herself being genuine.
Their waitress comes soon after that and takes their orders, Shiv orders a small caesar salad that will most likely cause her a small stomach issue, and Tom gets himself a french dip.
***
After simple and stilted conversation and their plates have been mostly emptied, a long moment of silence falls over both of them. Tom takes sips of his coffee looking out their window at the small patch of woods just outside, the midafternoon sun dancing shapes across his face. Shiv picks at her food that has slowly grown to be more and more unappetizing, her near empty stomach beginning to tighten again with nerves.
“I’m in the process of selling the apartment,” she says, if anything just to break up the quiet. Tom looks at her quizzically and Shiv shrugs. “It was just getting to feel a bit too big for my liking.”
“Since when is anything too big for your liking,” Tom asks, quirking his eyebrows.
“Fuck you, too,” Shiv shoots back, but she’s smiling. “But don’t go thinking this is a personal thing. It has nothing to do with you.”
“Shiv—”
“It’s— nothing,” Shiv says, tucking loose hair behind her ear. “I’m talking nonsense.”
Tom sets his coffee down and looks at her with something so close to pity; it makes Shiv want to duck and hide. “Siobhan,” he says. “I know you have the tendency to dissect the bird to find the song, but I want you to know, me leaving— this was never because I loved you any less.”
And Shiv makes a sound like he’s stepping on her throat.
“I don’t think I can learn to unlove you,” Tom continues and he lets out a hollow laugh. “I think there will always be something in me that is rooting for you— but if we keep doing this—”
She puts a hand over his to stop whatever awful thing is about to tumble out of his mouth.
Tom just sighs.
***
It’s one of those places where you have to get up to pay, and while they’re waiting for their cards to get processed Tom orders a slice of cherry pie to go.
“I thought you hated cherries. I’d like to think I was a good enough wife to notice that detail,” Shiv jokes, then is immediately frightened of the possible honesty of his answer.
“Oh, no I still find them deeply nauseating,” he says as he folds up a straw wrapper, then flattens it back out. “It’s, uh, for a friend.”
Shiv raises her eyebrows and tries to breathe evenly. “Tom, have you met someone?”
“That’s definitely one way of putting it,” Tom says with some awkward humor to his voice. “Well that actually touches on why I’m glad you reached out because, well, I think we should finally finalize the divorce.”
Shiv inhales sharply. Tom cocks his head. “That is why you wanted to meet up, right?”
“Of course,” She bites back while shoving her hands deep in her coat pockets. “Yep right on the money, Tom.”
“Shiv,” Tom starts but then their waitress is bringing back their checks and Shiv is taking it as an exit strategy.
“My lawyers will talk to your lawyers,” she says, quickly wrapping her scarf tighter around her neck. “How is your mom by the way?”
“ Shiv .”
“Sorry, uh,” she says with a heavy guilt like feeling settling into her chest. She’s learning to play nice. “Take care, Tom.”
He hugs her then, possessively in a way she never realized how much she craved. She goes still and then exhales, tension draining out of her shoulders in relief. In her ear Tom whispers, almost gently, “We aren’t meant to be this, despite how much we want to be.”
He pulls back, keeping her just out of arm's length and nods. Then he’s walking out the door as easily as he came in.
And all Shiv has to look forward to is the long drive home.