They make small talk; they have bagels together on Saturday mornings; they share a car. While they are watching TV, one of them might say, "By the way, have you gotten a moment to look at the divorce papers?" They make jokes like "Don't break that dish—it's not yours, it's mine." Still, "It's a tiny house and it seems to get smaller every day," Fern says. She longs to get away from Rick—whose emotional dependence on her makes her feel guilty—and get on with her life.
This is the best of all possible live-in divorces. More typical is the mean version. But there is one practical solution: If living together becomes too uncomfortable, the partner staying behind can pay his mate to move out. Deborah Sterne* is doing that. A 42-year-old costume designer making $60,000 a year, she's spent eighteen months living with the man she's divorcing, 44-year-old Mark*, an actor.
He came up with the standard hassling techniques: bursting into her room constantly to dress and shower, pursuing her around the apartment, even shoving his way into her room against her attempts to shut the door. Sharing responsibility for their five-year-old son and eight-year-old daughter, they communicated mostly by notations in the Metropolitan Museum datebook by the kitchen telephone.
Their lawyers advised them to stay, but Deborah eventually caved in. She has agreed to borrow heavily to pay Mark his share of the equity in their $600,000 Village co-op. Will the high interest payments be worth it? She tosses her mane of ringlets and beams a meltdown smile: "Yeah!"
