Cameron Chapman

Here’s chapter one from my first complete novel, Hold My Hand. It’s contemporary women’s fiction, roughly 62,000 words. I may post excerpts from other works-in-progress soon.

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I still don’t remember hearing the wine glass hit the marble tile floor. I don’t remember the feeling of it falling from my hand. What I do remember is a wretched feeling in the pit of my stomach. I remember cleaning up shards of glass and the red wine stain in the grout between the tiles. It wouldn’t come out. I scrubbed the floor for hours but the stain just stayed put.

That was the night I found out Liam was having an affair.

The evening started normally enough. He’d had meetings after class that day–Liam was a science teacher at a private high school–and so we both got home late. We ate Chinese takeout, our usual routine under the circumstances, and then he told me. He just blurted it out.

“I’m having an affair.” His voice was almost entirely devoid of emotion. He didn’t look at me.

I couldn’t take my eyes off him.

I think that’s when I dropped the wine glass, but I’m still not entirely sure.

Looking back, I guess I should have realized what was going on. I should have seen the signs, the constant meetings, the fact he never answered his cell and always claimed he’d forgotten to charge it. But I think I was in denial. I don’t think there was any way I could have come to terms with what was happening.

“What?” I’d heard him just fine but it was the only thing I could think to say and I felt like I had to say something.

He stood there with his head hung.

“How long has this been going on?” I tried to remember when all the late meetings had started. It had been months.

“I don’t know. Six months?”

How could he not know how long he’d been cheating on his wife? “Is it someone I know?”

He shook his head. “Just someone I work with.”

I felt numb. I was suddenly aware of the broken glass covering the floor and I grabbed a towel from the sink. What else were you supposed to say when the man who’d promised to be faithful to you for the rest of your lives change his mind?

“Leilah…” his voice trailed off and he said nothing more to me.

I heard Liam’s footsteps as he left the kitchen. It was only when I heard the front door close that I let myself cry. He was having an affair and now he was gone. Would he come back? Was he going to stay with her?

I pushed those thoughts out of my mind and focused on the glass shards on the floor. They were everywhere, a million tiny pieces of crystal sprawled across the imported marble. The floor had been a wedding gift from my father. He’d paid for the installation and everything. He knew I’d always loved marble, that I’d adored the marble in the kitchen of the house I grew up in. It was my favorite wedding gift.

What was going to happen to our house? With the wedding-gift marble floor? It was my floor, dammit, and I didn’t want someone else to have it. But even then I knew I’d never be able to afford it on my own. Houses that close to Boston weren’t exactly cheap.

I reached for a large shard of glass–what had once been the stem–and sliced my palm open. “Shit.” I hated to swear out loud but I couldn’t help it. It hurt like hell and there was blood dripping onto the floor, mixing in with the red wine still there. I went to the sink and ran my hand under cold water and pressed a towel to it. And then I sobbed–wracking, horrible sobs that made my ribs hurt–unable to hold back the flood of emotion brought forth by sudden physical pain.

I slumped to the floor and kept sobbing. When the tears finally stopped–half an hour later? An hour?–I got up from the floor and finished picking up the glass. I scrubbed at the wine stain until my fingers ached so much I could barely hold the towel but it still wouldn’t come out of the grout. I stood up and looked down at it, the permanent, physical manifestation of Liam’s betrayal. I suddenly hated that floor.

***

Our king-size bed had never seemed so large, so foreboding, so empty. I stood near the foot, looking across its expanse. I didn’t want to get into that giant bed alone. Falling asleep before he came home was one thing–I’d done it plenty of times before. But the idea I might wake up and still be alone scared the hell out of me. I didn’t want to face that reality. Not yet.

I went to the guest room and grabbed all of the pillows from the bed there. I piled them up on my own bed, hoping to somehow make the immensity of it more manageable in my mind. I didn’t bother to take my clothes off or put on my pajamas. I lay down and hugged a pillow, trying to imagine it was Liam.

We’d spent three years together in that bed. We’d bought it–and the house–right before we got married. I thought back to the beginnings of our marriage, to how happy we were. We’d gotten married a month after my college graduation. I’d considered going on to graduate school, to get a Masters in graphic design, but I’d given it all up when Liam proposed. I’d given up my dream to marry him. I hugged the pillow harder and closed my eyes.

Sleep didn’t come for hours. Every time I heard a car go by I prayed it was Liam coming home. Every time I heard a noise somewhere outside I hoped it was him. I didn’t want my marriage to be over. I didn’t want to feel this betrayal. I wanted to have a happy marriage, the marriage I’d always imagined I’d have.

Why had I expected so much? My own parents had gotten divorced when I was ten. Liam’s father had left when he was just a baby and his mother had been married three times since. Why should our marriage be any different?

I remember the clock reading 2:13. Sometime after that I finally fell asleep. When I opened my eyes the next morning the house was silent. And I was still alone.