The Napkin

Karl is seated at a 4-person table in the middle of the restaurant, and he chooses a seat facing the door so he is the first thing they see when his wife and son walk in. He adjust the chairs so the booster seat is next to him and his wife only has the option of sitting directly across from his seat. This way he can look directly at her when she speaks, something she’s always complained that he’s not good at. He’s trying to be better at most things he does.

Susan arrives late with their 3 year-old son and greets Karl with a tale of poor parking options and traffic on the 94. He asks her softly if next time she might mind calling, she stops short and declares something is different about him, and asks why he’s not mad that they are late. He tells her seeing them is enough for him to not be mad at anything. She smirks.

Karl still wears his wedding ring. Susan does not.

This is the sixth weekend in a row that Karl and Susan have been living apart. They hide this from their friends by only calling from their cell phones, claiming the home phone battery is always running low, and on couples night when they show up in separate cars they say Susan wanted to go to the gym after work. By the third couples night, their friends figured things out. They haven’t said anything yet.

When they were first married, Karl would come home from work stressed and angry for no particular reason at all, and Susan would listen to him vent all weekend about his co-workers, the unfairness of corporate politics, the idiocy of his clients, the pressures of success. She would calm him with her patience until one night in July the heat of his words and the summer wind overwhelmed her and she just walked out.

Sometimes we all just need a break.

Now Susan and Karl meet twice a week to share their son. It’s an awkward dance of responsibility they don’t know the steps to, so they improvise with neutral settings and the hope of reconciliation.

Regardless of what we think of our present circumstance, all of us are far more blessed than we realize. We’re lucky to have people in our lives who love us in the depths of our worst moods, throughout a series of disappointments. Even when we let years of bad days replace the optimism of our youth with jaded irritability, they really do still love us most of the time.

Susan goes to the bathroom and Karl quickly tells the waiter not to bring the check until he asks for it directly. Susan returns and 20 minutes later begins to complain that the waiter has completely forgotten they’re even there, doesn’t he realize they need the check? Karl agrees and smiles briefly, bouncing his son on his knee as he traces his hand in crayon on the napkin.