“No, you don’t.”
“Julia, I do love you, and I would like to be as we were?sweet and bawdy and dark?but now there are so many people.”
“You hate me.”
“I don’t hate you, Julia.”
“You have no idea of how much you hate me. I think it’s subconscious. You don’t realize the cruel things you’ve done.”
“What cruel things, Julia?”
“The cruel acts your subconscious drives you to in order to express your hatred of me.”
“What, Julia?”
“I’ve never complained.”
“Tell me.”
“You don’t know what you’re doing.”
“Tell me.”
“Your clothes.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean the way you leave your dirty clothes around in order to express your subconscious hatred of me.”
“I don’t understand.”
“I mean your dirty socks and your dirty pajamas and your dirty underwear and your dirty shirts!” She rose from kneeling by the suitcase and faced him, her eyes blazing and her voice ringing with emotion. “I’m talking about the fact that you’ve never learned to hang up anything. You just leave your clothes all over the floor where they drop, in order to humiliate me. You do it on purpose!” She fell on the bed, sobbing.
“Julia, darling!” he said, but when she felt his hand on her shoulder she got up.
“Leave me alone,” she said. “I have to go.” She brushed past him to the closet and came back with a dress, “I’m not taking any of the things you’ve given me,” she said. “I’m leaving my pearls and the fur jacket.”
“Oh, Julia!” Her figure, so helpless in its self-deceptions, bent over the suitcase made him nearly sick with pity. She did not understand how desolate her life would be without him. She didn’t understand the hours that working women have to keep. She didn’t understand that most of her friendships existed within the framework of their marriage, and that without this she would find herself alone. She didn’t understand about travel, about hotels, about money. “Julia, I can’t let you go! What you don’t understand, Julia, is that you’ve come to be dependent on me.”
She tossed her head back and covered her face with her hands. “Did you say that I was dependent on you?” she asked. “Is that what you said? And who is it that tells you what time to get up in the morning and when to go to bed at night? Who is it that prepares your meals and picks up your dirty clothes and invites your friends to dinner? If it weren’t for me, your neckties would be greasy and your clothing would be full of moth holes. You were alone when I met you, Francis Weed, and you’ll be alone when I leave. When Mother asked you for a list to send out invitations to our wedding, how many names did you have to give her? Fourteen!”
“Cleveland wasn’t my home, Julia.”
“And how many of your friends came to the church? Two!”
“Cleveland wasn’t my home, Julia.”
“Since I’m not taking the fur jacket,” she said quietly, “you’d better put it back into storage. There’s an insurance policy on the pearls that comes due in January. The name of the laundry and the maid’s telephone number?all those things are in my desk. I hope you won’t drink too much, Francis. I hope that nothing bad will happen to you. If you do get into serious trouble, you can call me.”
“Oh, my darling, I can’t let you go!” Francis said. “I can’t let you go, Julia!” He took her in his arms.
