Даниэла Стил - The Affair

So he had thrown away his future and a solid life and marriage for something that glittered for an instant in the sunlight and blinded him briefly. And now he had to pick up the pieces of his shattered life every day. He couldn’t think about writing right now, couldn’t concentrate, and although he realized that his current anguish might make a good book one day, he didn’t want it to be a modern-day tragedy. He wasn’t ready to end the affair with Pascale, it wouldn’t be right with her pregnant, but more than anything, he didn’t want to lose Nadia and their marriage. So he was running between the two women, trying to placate both, begging Nadia’s forgiveness, so she wouldn’t give up on him before he had time to clean up his mess. He thought that he’d be able to ease out of the relationship with Pascale sometime after the baby was born, if Nadia didn’t divorce him first. And whatever Nadia did, he knew the affair with Pascale wouldn’t last, but the baby would.

Pascale wanted him around to play and sleep with, until they got tired of each other, which she fully expected to happen sooner or later. As she put it, you don’t choose a partner for life at twenty-two. But he had at twenty-six, when he’d met Nadia, and it had worked wonderfully for sixteen years, eleven of them married, until he ruined everything with the affair with Pascale. He was an interlude for Pascale, a chapter. Nadia was his life. He told her he realized that more than ever now. But extricating himself from Pascale wasn’t easy. She fully expected his constant presence now, at least until the baby came.

He and Nadia talked about it again on Friday night, after she put the girls to bed. Dinner had been strained, although Nadia was determined to put a good face on for the girls for as long as she could bear it, but it was becoming harder each day, knowing that Nicolas was still with Pascale, at least some of the time. She had inherited her mother’s stiff-upper-lip genes, never airing problems in the presence of others. Sylvie had asked her recently why she cried so much and was in such a bad mood, and she had said that some of her decorating clients were giving her a hard time. Sylvie had asked her then if she and Papa had had an argument. Nadia had smiled through her tears and denied it, and made an extra effort to seem cheerful and pleasant when Nicolas came home for dinner that night.

Nicolas appreciated what she was doing, and knew full well that another woman would have thrown all his belongings out on the street, although they both knew that many French women put up with their husbands having affairs and mistresses. It was part of the culture, even for some people their age. And many wives in France weren’t faithful either. After eleven years of marriage, many of the men they knew cheated on their wives regularly, and some of the women did the same. It wasn’t how either Nadia or Nicolas wanted to live, and wasn’t their vision of marriage. After his one earlier slip, Nadia thought that that was over for him, which made this all the worse now. This had blindsided her completely. She thought they were happy and settled forever, and now their whole life had blown up in their faces.

Nadia was having a hard time getting through it, and he felt terrible about that too. She looked tired and strained, had dark circles under her eyes, and had lost at least ten pounds, which she couldn’t afford. She looked sick. She was still working as hard as ever and taking care of their daughters admirably.

“I’ll spend this weekend at home. We’ll do something together,” he promised with a mournful look. Guilt was his constant companion now, whichever woman he was with.

“You can’t,” she said in a small sad voice. She knew she should be angrier at him, and at times she was, but most of the time, she was desperately hurt. Anger hadn’t had time to set in. At first she had been shocked and numb, and now she felt crushed by what he had done, living with it every day, as he went back and forth between the two women like a metronome.

“Why can’t I?” He looked panicked. So far Nadia hadn’t forbidden him to come home or spend the night, although she had threatened to, but she did make him sleep in their guest room now when he stayed, and warned him not to let the girls see it. She refused to share a room with him, and they had had no sexual contact since she learned of the affair after the Film Festival. And Nicolas wisely didn’t try to approach her.

“My mother is coming for the weekend. She’s arriving early tomorrow morning,” she said simply. He groaned.

“Oh Christ. Why now?”

“Why do you think?” Nadia gave him a dark look and he nodded.

“She knows, of course,” he said glumly, as they sat at the kitchen table.

“Obviously. The whole Western Hemisphere knows. It’s been in every tabloid in the world and on the internet. There are dozens of pictures of you with Pascale. We’re just lucky no one has told the girls yet.” But sooner or later, it would happen. His books were sold and successful in translation in many languages and countries around the world. And Pascale had already become famous with her previous film, which was why they had hired her for his latest one. So they were fodder for gossip around the world.

“Did you tell your mother?” he asked her.

“I didn’t have to. She heard it in an editorial meeting, when they wanted to put Pascale on the cover of the September issue, along with an interview with you.”

“I told you, Nadia, I won’t give any interviews. I know I started this horrible mess, but I don’t want to make it any worse than it is.” It was too late to stop the tidal wave of press, but he didn’t want to contribute to it. He was still hoping she would forgive him one day. But he also knew that although Nadia had lived in France for half her life, and in many ways had become very French, at the root of it, she was American and so were her sisters, and the four women were extremely close. He felt sure they must be trying to convince her to divorce him. He couldn’t really blame them, given how it looked, but he was still hoping to stem the tides of disaster, although that didn’t look promising at the moment.

Nadia had retreated into her shell since the announcement of Pascale’s pregnancy, and was saying very little to him about her plans. They were living in a tenuous status quo at the moment, and he doubted it would hold for long. Just long enough, he hoped, for Pascale to have the baby, and for him to make some kind of arrangement or agreement with her, then return to the fold with his wife and daughters before their life burned to the ground. He knew it was a race against time as to how long Nadia would put up with the misery he was causing her. He was fully prepared to try to make it up to her for the rest of his life, but he didn’t know if she would let him, or if the damage was reparable for her. She wasn’t letting him near her, and avoided him when he came to the house, except when their daughters were in the room. Then she pretended to be friendly with him, although not affectionate, which they had always been before. Nadia was a warm, kind, gentle woman, and their relationship had been very close. He wondered now if it ever would be again, no matter what he did to make amends. She was a forgiving person, but he knew he was asking for the extreme. She was living with personal pain and public embarrassment of the worst sort for any woman, her husband openly involved with another woman and having a child with her. He himself cringed when he thought about it, as sanity returned.

Everything about their life had seemed so perfect until now. She always talked about how lucky they were to have such a good life. They lived in a beautiful apartment overlooking the Seine on the Quai Voltaire on the Left Bank, in the seventh arrondissement, with the spectacular monuments of Paris spread out before them like a movie set, and the Eiffel Tower visible from their terrace and sparkling on the hour. Nadia had decorated the apartment with her usual exquisite taste, with a combination of unusual modern pieces and family antiques Nicolas had inherited. It was a warm, comfortable home, and at the same time a showplace when they entertained. They and the children had been happy there.