A Good Marriage

by Kimberly McCreight

It’s so simple at the beginning. You meet someone gorgeous and smart and funny. Somebody who’s better than you—you both know it, at least on some level. You fall in love with them. But you fall even more in love with their idea of you. You feel lucky. Because you are lucky. Then time passes. You both change too much. You stay too much the same. The truth worms its way out, and the horizon grows dark. Eventually all you’re left with is somebody who sees you for who you really are. And sooner or later, they hold up a mirror and you’re forced to see for yourself. And who the hell can live with that?

though I was the one who called them, for Christ’s sake. I think

“That’s the hardest part about marriage, isn’t it?” Zach went on. “Somebody else’s problems become your own. It doesn’t always feel fair.”

In a blackout, a person—your husband, for instance—stays completely ambulatory, going through all the regular motions, albeit clumsily. He does not seem “passed out” in the least, though he is not “there” either, because the most essential portion of him—the him you love—has effectively vanished. Leaving you speaking to someone who looks like your loved one and sounds like your loved one but is not him in any meaningful way.

Forgiveness is a side effect of love,” he said finally. And sadly, almost. “If you are going to be married, share the ups and downs of life. What other choice is there?”

People have absolutely no idea how exposed they are, or why. You want to know how I learned? Working in logistics. An industry the average person has probably never even heard of. If they have, they think it’s just about shipping. But we knew everything about hundreds of thousands of people—we knew when they had a baby because they started ordering diapers, when they were going on a long trip because they ordered power converters, when not to buy their home because they’d bought a whole bunch of mold removal products. And here people think they’re just ordering stuff. It’s not just stuff, it’s who they are. As soon as people realize how dangerous this could be, they’ll be falling all over themselves to pay the hundred-dollar yearly subscription for my family cybersecurity app.”