“Did you stay silent because you were curious what a damaged woman would do if she thought she was safe with a blind man?”
He stands now, slowly, as if approaching a frightened animal.
“I stayed silent,” he says, “because the first time you laughed with me, it sounded like you had forgotten to guard yourself. And I knew if I said your old name, you would put the walls back up so fast I’d never hear that sound again.”
Tears sting your eyes before you give them permission.
That is the problem with him. Even his worst truths arrive dressed in tenderness.
You hate that part most of all.
“You had no right,” you whisper.
“I know.”
“You should have told me the second you recognized me.”
“I know.”
“You should have told me when your sight returned.”
His silence is answer enough.
Your hands clench. “Why didn’t you?”
For the first time that night, he looks ashamed in a way that reaches his bones.
“Because I was afraid,” he says.
The answer is so small compared to the damage it causes that you nearly scream.
“Afraid of what? That I wouldn’t marry you? That I’d realize you built this whole relationship on omissions? That I’d see you clearly?”
“Yes,” he says, and the simplicity of it cuts clean.
You laugh bitterly. “At least one of us finally can.”
The sentence hangs there, vicious and shining.
Continued on the next page
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