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Every day since Tom left was a blur for Gemma. One day, he was there, the next he was gone.
Or that was the story she told her friends. When she went to work the next monday, when she went to the local market and someone said “I haven’t seen Tom in a while,” and when she registered Thomas for school and left the line for second parent blank. It was the simplest explanation for something that wasn’t simple.
The reality of that night is not as pretty. She had felt him slipping for months, going to those “Visionary” meetings and talking about the great things they had in store for the future of Shropshire. But it was okay, she knew he got invested in things heavily and he needed friends since they moved to the village. And most importantly, he was still there when she and Thomas needed him.
Until that night.
---
Gemma came home from a late night at work with some take-away, preparing to stay in with her boys and watch the new Pixar movie that came to streaming. But when she came home, Thomas was on the couch, hugging his teddy bear that she and Tom helped him build like it was about to run away.
“Mummy, Daddy is scaring me right now.” He mumbled to her.
Instantly, she dropped the food on the coffee table and kneeled next to him, cupping his face. “Stay here Thomas. I love you.” She kissed him on the forehead and ran upstairs. “Tom? Tom?”
When she heard no response, Gemma ran into the master bedroom, dreading the worst. And yet what she did see was so much worse.
Tom was frantically shoving clothes into his old suitcase, but turned to her once he heard the door open. “Gemma, you’re finally home. Thats good. We can go together.”
“Go? Go where? Thomas said you’re scaring him.”
A light hit Tom’s eyes. “To help shape Shorpshire into our vision. To be one with the High Visionary.”
That was when she saw in his eyes what had been scaring their son. A look that lacked all the warmth and love of the man she loved. A look of a man in too deep to even want to get out of wherever he was. A look of someone she didn’t know.
“Tom, what are you talking about?”
He went up and softly grabbed Gemma’s shoulders. “The High Visionary asked me personally to help him bring the Visionary Force to more people. You, me, and Thomas can all create a new future for Shropshire. Together.”
“No, Tom! I have a life here! Thomas is starting school soon! We can’t just leave everything behind!”
“But the life that the High Visionary offers is a better one. One where I can do something with my life!”
Gemma grabbed Tom’s arms, holding on for dear life. “We have done something. We built this family together. We’ve made a home here. We don’t need anything else.” She looked up at his eyes. “Please, Thomas. Please.”
“With this, we can be even more.”
That was when she threw his arms away. “Leave, Tom.”
“What-”
“Pack your bags, and get out of the house.”
“But Gemma-”
“NOW, THOMAS.”
Without turning back, she went downstairs and sat down on the couch.
“Mummy, is daddy okay?” Thomas asked her when she got downstairs.
She hugged him from the side. “Daddy... is going for a while.”
He didn’t ask anymore questions, and for that she was grateful.
A few minutes later, she heard Tom struggle to bring his suitcase down the stairs. Normally, she would be the one to bring things down since the staircase was a bit tight given his height. But she didn’t want to look at him.
Once the struggle stopped, Gemma heard the suitcase stop behind where her and Thomas were sitting.
“Can I say goodbye?” She heard him say softly.
Gemma looked down at their son, who gave her a small nod. She removed her arm from around him and he ran up to his father. Whispers came from them but they were indecipherable. Before she knew it, the front door opened and the suitcase rolled out with a series of footsteps.
---
That was the last she heard from her husband.
And if it weren’t for Thomas, that would’ve been where time stopped for her. Her nights were filled with that fight playing back, the look on Thomas’ face when she got home, and the eyes she desperately searched for her husband in.
Time kept moving for everyone else though. Whatever he told Thomas when he left was enough to calm him down, so Gemma did everything she could to give him a normal childhood. She watched movies, read books, and did chores with him.
If anyone were to ask Thomas (and many people did), he had a fairly normal childhood. Gemma was a great mom and Tom would be back eventually.
But that was just Gemma shielding him. She dropped him off at school, then let her mind go blank in the car. She left photos of Tom up so their son wouldn't forget him, but would swear at them as if he could hear her when no one else was around. She put him to bed, kissing him goodnight on the forehead, then sobbed looking at the empty half of the bed. Gemma let Thomas love his father while wishing she herself would stop loving him.
So when Thomas finally asked the question she’d been dreading for two years, she snapped.
“Mummy, can I finally go and see daddy?”
“No, you can't go and see your father because he’s joined a fucking cult!”
Gemma never swore in front of Thomas, but she had been hoping she’d never have to lay the truth bare in front of her son like this.
Tom was gone. And he had chosen a fucking cult over his own family.
And she could tell that the truth hurt him. And she wished she could never see that look on his face ever again.
“But Mummy, its been two years and I really miss him. He said he’d come back! He said he’d come back and show us a new way!”
Now she knew what he told him that night. A promise. Like the promise he made to her ten years ago when they got married. And another one that he couldn’t keep.
“Well he said a lot of things, didn’t he.”
---
Thomas had gone upstairs to work on his homework after the Visionary Cult member left, leaving Gemma alone in the kitchen. She had to make dinner soon, but that encounter was still playing in her head.
She decided to get started on dinner and move on, but when she went to the fridge, the drawing Thomas drew stared her in the face. And now the other incident from the night was bothering her.
He was right. The eight years of marriage and the countless years of dating before that were the best of Gemma’s life. But for the last two years, the only memories of her husband that filled her head were that night.
Before that night, their memories felt like pieces of heaven.
She remembered their first kiss.
It was when they were in uni together and Tom was walking Gemma home after class when it started raining. Gemma didn't like the rain, but it was one of the few things Tom wasn't anxious about.
So he pulled her out into the rain and the two of them danced and splashed like they were children. Of course, Tom was still clumsy and bumped into Gemma, almost knocking her over. Yet, as if something otherworldly helped him, he grabbed her.
He fumbled over an apology, and she could tell he was scared he messed up. So she reached up to the much taller man and pulled him into a kiss. And in that moment, she felt like she could fly.
She remembered his proposal, on a picnic when they traded books and he hid a ring in the back of the book he gave her. She remembered their wedding, a small ceremony and his beautiful handwritten vows. She remembered the day Thomas was born, she insisted that they name him after the smartest man she knew.
And then there were also the everyday memories. Cooking dinner together, reading together in silence, cuddling while watching movies, all-nighters at uni where they kept each other awake.
But the most vivid one was the night he left. Because even if she didn't want to admit it, every time she stayed awake remembering that night, disassociated in her car and pretended in front of Thomas that his father would come home, proved the same thing.
The night that Tom left was the only memory with him that Gemma wished she could change.