The Paper Palace

by Miranda Cowley Heller

I could look at him and nothing else for eternity and be happy. I could listen to him, my eyes closed, feel his breath and his words wash over me, time and time and time again. It is all I want.

I wish I were braver. But I also love the fear, the catch of breath in my throat, my thrumming heartbeat as I step out of the water.

And I thought: now there is no turning back. No more regrets for what I haven’t done. Now only regrets for what I have done. I love him, I hate myself; I love myself, I hate him. This is the end of a long story.

The shit always builds up, and surviving it is the key, but this I will not learn for many years.

The best lesson my mother ever taught me: there are two things in life you never regret—a baby and a swim.

There is no such thing as unforgivable between people who love each other. But even as I’m thinking it, I know it’s not really true.

Divorce is good for children.” She stood up and began clearing away a few lingering dinner forks. “Unhappy people are always more interesting.”

“Nice is the enemy of interesting.”

“I love Gina. But I carry you in my bloodstream. This isn’t a choice.”

I know my silence protects him. But it also protects me:

Anna’s not like me. She thrives on confrontation. She doesn’t give a shit what other people think. She doesn’t need to be liked. Anna is a warrior.

She would never, ever have allowed Conrad to get away with it. Nor would she have understood why I had allowed it to go on—that the only way I could protect myself from the shame and humiliation I felt was by denying any knowledge of it.

Knowledge can be power, but it can also be poison.

Every single time I see the ocean, even if I’ve been there in the morning, it feels like a new miracle—its power, its blueness always just as overwhelming. Like falling in love.

I wonder if he would love me if he could see inside my head—the pettiness, the dirty linen of my thoughts, the terrible things I have done.

The waiting begins early, I think. The lies begin early. But so do dreams and hopes and stories.

Does letting go mean losing everything you have, or does it mean gaining everything you never had?

Ever since I was old enough to question my own instincts, my mother has given me the same piece of advice: “Flip a coin, Eleanor. If the answer you get disappoints you, do the opposite.” We already know the right answer, even when we don’t—or we think we don’t. But what if it’s a trick coin? What if both sides are the same? If both are right, then both are wrong.

“There are some swims you do regret, Eleanor. The problem is, you never know until you take them.

This house, built out of paper—tiny bits of shredded cardboard pressed together into something strong enough to withstand time, the difficult, lonely winters; always threatening to fall into ruin, yet still standing, year after year, when we return. This house, this place, knows all my secrets. I am in its bones, too.