Page 97 of Now That It's You
But the possibility of children had always been there, right up until the moment Meg had walked away.
She hadn’t realized she was holding her breath until she rounded the corner and saw the color of the walls. “You painted,” Meg said on an exhale. “The gray is really pretty with the yellow curtains.” She turned to look at Chloe, whose eyes flickered with a touch of pride.
“Thank you,” Chloe said. “He let me decorate it however I wanted. This was going to be our baby’s room someday. I was going to start stenciling little giraffes around the border when—” She broke off there, her eyes clouding with tears.
Meg hesitated, then reached out and squeezed Chloe’s hand.
“It would have been beautiful,” she said, meaning it with every ounce of her being. “I can picture it in my head, and it’s perfect.”
Two hours later, Meg sat cross-legged on the floor with an empty teacup and a distinct sense that she wasn’t going to find anything useful here. As if on cue, Chloe strolled in wearing a crop top and yoga pants Meg suspected were chosen for actual yoga, unlike her own.
She looked down at her own stretchy pants with a tiny bleach spot on one knee. She’d donned them that morning because they were the closest thing to wearing pajamas. Her T-shirt seemed appropriate, too, with its large bubble letters that read, Exercise? I thought you said extra fries.
“Any luck?” Chloe asked.
Meg shook her head. “Not really. I appreciate you letting me go through it all, though.”
“It’s fine.” Chloe performed a hamstring stretch that left Meg wondering if the other woman could put her ankles behind her head. Then she thought about her father’s mistress, the one who’d sexted him those photos, and she couldn’t decide whether she wanted to laugh or cry.
“I have to take off for my class in about thirty minutes, so maybe you could wrap things up?” Chloe said.
“Of course.” Meg got to her feet with the empty teacup in one hand. “Thank you for letting me stay as long as I have.”
“Sorry you didn’t find anything to help.”
“I guess I can’t feel too disappointed since I didn’t really know what I was looking for to start with.” She shifted the teacup from one hand to the other, looking down at it for inspiration. “Can I ask you something?”
“Sure.”
“Why are you being so open about this? About letting me come in here and sift through the file cabinet?”
“I have nothing to hide.” Chloe pulled up the other leg up for a stretch. “All of my stuff’s in another room, so these are just Matt’s files. I’ve already gone through it all, so I know there’s nothing dark and scary or threatening to my relationship with him. If it could give you closure, why not?”
“Closure,” Meg said. “I didn’t really get that, but I appreciate it anyway.”
Chloe nodded, studying her for a moment. “He really was doing well,” she said abruptly. “These last few months? He was happy. I know he was.”
“I believe you.”
“He was eating right, seeing a counselor, getting his physical and mental health in order.”
“I’m glad,” she said. “I could never even get him to go in for a checkup.”
“He left me this house,” Chloe said, her voice breaking a little. “And a life insurance policy that covers the whole mortgage. I wasn’t expecting that.”
“Congratulations,” Meg said, not sure what else to say.
“Thanks. Now I can pour everything I have into opening my kombucha company. He knew that’s what I wanted more than anything, so he made it happen for me.” Chloe’s eyes filled with tears, and she looked up at the ceiling to hold them back. Putting both feet on the floor, she swiped her thumbs beneath her lower lashes. “Anyway, I guess that gave me the closure I needed. Knowing he was looking out for me?”
“I’m glad,” Meg said, meaning it. “He must have really loved you a lot.”
Chloe looked at her like she was trying to gauge whether Meg was being serious or patronizing. “Truly,” Meg added. “I know there were a lot of us over the years—lovers and girlfriends and flings who had some place in Matt’s life. But for what it’s worth, I think he really loved you.”
Chloe blinked harder, no longer pretending she wasn’t stifling tears. “Because of the life insurance?”
“No.” Meg said. “Because he let you paint the room gray. Because he cared about being healthy for you. Because he invested in your career. Because I’ve never seen him smile the way he’s smiling in that photograph right there.”
She pointed to the framed image on top of the bookcase, and Chloe’s gaze followed the direction of her finger. She looked surprised for an instant, then thoughtful. “Kyle took that the day we announced to the family that we’d gotten engaged,” Chloe said softly, turning back to Meg. “Sylvia just kept saying, ‘Thank you for making him so happy,’ and I swear I didn’t stop smiling for a week.”
