By the time our honeymoon arrived, I was still making excuses.
Then I boarded a plane and discovered Rita was sitting across the aisle from us in business class.
“Relax,” Rick told me. “This could be fun.”
“For who?” I asked.
Before he could answer, Rita leaned over her seat.
“I brought card games!”
I wanted to disappear.
The resort in Saint Lucia was breathtaking.
Private villas.
Ocean views.
Palm trees swaying in the breeze.
The kind of place couples dream about for years.
Unfortunately, I wasn’t arriving as part of a couple.
I was arriving as the third wheel.
At check-in, things became even worse.
Rick had reserved Rita a room right next to ours.
Not merely nearby.
Connected.
There was an interior door joining the rooms.
I turned to him in disbelief.
“Tell me that’s not what I think it is.”
“It’s convenient,” he replied.
“For what?” I snapped. “Emergencies involving grown men who need their mothers?”
Rita immediately looked offended.
“Diana.”
Even Rick frowned.
“Watch your tone.”
I should have left right then.
Instead, I stayed.
I told myself I was being unreasonable.
I told myself I could make it work.
I was wrong.
Everywhere I went, Rita followed.
At the pool she commented on my swimsuit.
At lunch she interrupted every conversation.
At dinner, our romantic meal became a party of three because Rick claimed she looked lonely eating by herself.
The most humiliating moment came when the waiter asked Rick what he wanted to order.
Before he could answer, Rita answered for him.
“He’ll have the sea bass,” she said confidently. “Spicy food gives him heartburn.”
I waited for Rick to object.
Instead, he nodded.
“Sea bass sounds good.”
Something inside me broke.
I finally understood.
This wasn’t my honeymoon.
I was intruding on theirs.
That evening, back in our suite, I confronted him.
“What is wrong with you?”
Rick sighed.
“Can we not do this tonight?”
“Your mother is on our honeymoon.”
“And?”
I laughed in disbelief.
“And?”
“She’s having a difficult time adjusting,” he said.
“Adjusting to what? The fact that you married someone else?”
His expression darkened.
“That’s disgusting.”
“Is it?”
“You’re twisting things.”
“No,” I said. “I’m finally seeing them clearly.”
Then he said something I would never forget.
“You knew how close we were before you married me.”
That night I slept on the couch.
The next morning was somehow worse.
I woke up and discovered Rita standing inside our suite holding room-service coffee.
She acted as though she lived there.
“Oh good, you’re awake,” she said. “I told them Rick’s eggs weren’t cooked properly.”
I looked at my husband.
He barely glanced up from his phone.
“Did you let her in?”
“She knocked.”
I stared at him.
Apparently, in his mind, knocking and entering were the same thing.
Rita smiled.
“I didn’t want my baby eating cold breakfast.”
Her baby was thirty-four years old.
I left without another word and spent hours alone on the beach.
For the first time, I stopped making excuses.
The problem wasn’t Rita.
The problem was Rick.
He didn’t want boundaries.
He didn’t see anything wrong.
He liked things exactly as they were.
Later that afternoon I returned to the villa to retrieve my phone.
The moment I entered, I heard laughter.
Soft.
Comfortable.
Intimate.
I walked farther inside and froze.
Rick was lying across the bed with his head resting in Rita’s lap.
She was feeding him pineapple pieces by hand.
Her fingers brushed his hair while he relaxed with his eyes half closed.
Neither of them seemed embarrassed.
Neither looked guilty.
If anything, they seemed annoyed that I had interrupted.
“You startled us,” Rita said.
Rick sat up.
“What?”
