Alex
Chloe didn’t waste any time in letting me know what I had inadvertently told her. At first, I was upset, because with Marie’s name she now had more ammo. Do you miss her? Chloe asked first. Do you still love her? Do you wish you could fix things with Marie? My first instinct was anger, I lashed out at her for picking at me over this same issue and soured our trip. She didn’t speak to me for nearly a week after that fight and I found myself panicking all over again, terrified that I had done it this time and she wasn’t going to come back.
I don’t know if it was the bouquet I sent or the five voicemails, but something eventually made her call me again. I begged for her forgiveness – I wasn’t given it, but I still asked for it. Slowly she began letting me in again and I tried as hard as I could to make things easier. That meant telling her why were getting divorced.
The conversation was difficult and Chloe immediately tried to apologize for dragging it up. I kept assuring her that she didn’t need to apologize, but it didn’t make her feel any better. It hurt to say the words out loud, to say Marie cheated and finally speak those words into existence. At the same time, it felt freeing to finally stop tiptoeing around it. I didn’t tell Chloe that I knew there were other men before Mike, I didn’t even tell Marie what I knew, it was just easier to say it was him the entire time. It was less embarrassing.
Chloe still wrestled me for information now and then but I’d mostly satiated her hunger for the time being and we moved on. Now we were approaching Christmas and I was faced with having to play Santa once more. I was determined to make this a memorable holiday for both of us, and that meant having gifts that weren’t just easy buys like clothing and jewellery.
“What does she like?” Amelia asked again. “Come on, you have to have some idea.”
“She likes pretty things,” I offered extremely unhelpfully. “Sparkly things. Diamonds.”
Amelia rolled her eyes and turned to me with her arms crossed. “From what I heard, you’ve bought her more than enough of that sort of thing. You need to dig a little deeper here, Zander, it’s your first big holiday together!”
“Don’t say it like that,” I complained. “You’re making it sound like more than it is.”
“No, you’re just downplaying it to pretend you don’t have emotions.” She jabbed her finger into my arm. “She likes you, so stop being so stubborn about this and admit you want to get something she’ll actually like.”
I huffed but stayed silent. I hadn’t even expected Chloe to be able to spend Christmas with me – not while she still lived at home and was close with her family. When she told me that they wanted to visit their extended family in Greece, I began plotting how exactly I could accidentally run into her, but then she said that she was staying behind and I immediately set to work on booking us a holiday. I had everything; a cabin in Iceland just outside Reykjavik, transportation was ready, every little detail was taken care of except for the gifts.
I had been paying Chloe regularly with cash as promised, but I wanted to give her something that she could rely on more often and would be less conspicuous than a large amount in bills. I was approved several years ago for my AMEX Centurion when I partnered with a few other people to expand my real estate business, the cost of buying, flipping, and reselling the houses had quickly landed me an offer from the company and I accepted. Marie begged to be added to the card but it was the one thing I held back on and instead just gave her my visa instead. But with Chloe, while her eyes had gotten as big as dinner plates, she never asked about it. I couldn’t wait to see her reaction when she opened the Christmas card to find it waiting for her.
That gift was nothing, it was simple enough to get and not personalized to her, and I needed something more, something that proved that I did listen and I knew what she liked.
So why was it so goddamn hard to think of anything she liked?
“I’m at a loss,” I told Amelia reluctantly. “Everything I think of, she already has.”
“Like what?”
“Poetry books, clothing, jewellery…”
“Come on, get a little less shallow here,” she said with a roll of her eyes. “What hobbies does she have?”
“She has a lot of plants, they take some time to take care of.”
“Unless you’re buying her a greenhouse, don’t concern yourself with the plants.” She stopped and stuck a sticky tag to the frame of a painting, marking it for removal. “What else?”
“She blogs and uses the computer a lot,” I offered.
She scoffed. “Oh, yay, a MacBook for Christmas, how original.”
“You know, I am trying.”
“It doesn’t seem like it.”
I huffed and turned away while Amelia snickered to herself and continued tapping at her iPad. She was a good friend, but absolutely brutal at times. I’d come to L.A. specifically for her advice on shopping because I had absolutely no idea what to get Chloe. Jewellery had been my go-to, but I wanted to give her something with a little more importance as well.
As I looked around at the paintings, I couldn’t help but think maybe she would like one. At the end of the hall was a large painting of a tree that had captured my attention from the beginning; a willow on a small island surrounded by choppy, dark water with the branches weeping into it. The swirling greens and blues against the pink and orange sky made me think of her and I knew she would like it as much as I did, but I doubted getting a painting for her that was six feet tall would be feasible. But the tree did give me another idea.
“She likes photography,” I remarked. “She has a small collection of old cameras that she likes to use.”
“Vintage?” Amelia asked.
“Yes.”
“Hm.” She tapped her lip with the pen and turned with a bright smile. “There’s a shop I pass every day that buys and sells old cameras, they have film and repair parts too. Why don’t you take a look down there?”
It sounded perfect. “Do you have long here?” I asked. “We could go together, or I could pick you up afterward for dinner.”
She shook her head. “You go, I have things to wrap up here. I’ll text you when I’m done and you can pick me up.”
I agreed and bolted for the door as the excitement overtook me. A camera, how hadn’t I thought of it before? It wasn’t the most meaningful, but it was a hobby I knew she enjoyed and I wasn’t looking to overshadow what I had made her.
I didn’t tell anyone about the music box, it was a personal gift that I had spent the past two months on and it was somewhat embarrassing to mention to Amelia or Zamir. I ordered special wood, nice paints, and had the cylinder for the music custom-made. I wasn’t sure what had urged me to do it besides being in my workroom when Chloe called one day. And I hadn’t made anything for someone else since before Marie and I were married, so I was a little on edge about it.
She’d noticed that – Marie, she had seen how much time I was spending in my workroom and all it did was make her more irritated by the hour. I was afraid that one day I would come home to the door chopped down because she wanted to know what I was doing all day. Thankfully the carousel was now wrapped and tucked safely away into my luggage where she couldn’t see it.
I laid back in my seat in the car and watched through the tinted window as other vehicles crept past. People shopping, couples fighting, teenagers fooling around, and all manner of people packed the streets. I wondered how many of them knew the pain of divorce – or that first holiday without your partner. That feeling of tension during your last holiday together, knowing it was over and wishing you had done more to fix it before reaching that point. The resigned acceptance of seeing a new face at the table, the physical manifestation of the end of your marriage.
I wouldn’t have to see Mike this Christmas, I wouldn’t have to watch Marie run to him excitedly or see Peter give him a hug. Instead, I would wake up next to Chloe, in another country, away from everything that haunted me. Marie might never forgive me for missing this holiday, but I couldn’t handle another Christmas locked in the house with them, watching them act like the family we never were. And if she was allowed to flaunt her happiness, I should be too.
I knew it still hurt her that I spent so much time with Chloe, I knew that was why spending so much time with my tools made her angry because in her eyes I was making all the same mistakes with a woman half my age and risking her happiness as well. But Marie wasn’t my mother, and soon enough she wouldn’t be my wife either – it was time that I let myself embrace that.
Moving on meant letting myself get closer to Chloe, and I think, on some level, I was ready for that to happen.