My future wasn’t as bleak as I once thought it would be.
She sighed. “Okay, I have to get back to work. I think I was supposed to be in a meeting five minutes ago.”
“With who?”
“Kellar and that kid that flooded the boy’s locker room.”
I snorted a laugh. “Good luck with that.”
“I don’t need luck,” she mumbled on her way out the door. “I need someone else to flood a locker room so I don’t have to go.”
I watched her leave and waited another minute before I pulled my phone from my purse. I opened my text messages with every intention to text Nick. I had to tell him…
Something.
I didn’t know what, I just… what? I needed to hear from him?
But why?
My fingers hovered over the screen. I didn’t have anything to say to him. I was supposed to be furious with him for causing so much trouble during mediation. I should have wanted nothing to do with him.
And yet I couldn’t stop myself. It was like my body was possessed by the ghost of Christmas past.
Or a demon.
A demon that couldn’t get over her ex-husband.
Cheese and rice, there was something wrong with me.
I tossed my phone on the desk and crossed my arms. And my legs. And tapped my foot.
When I couldn’t stand it anymore, I picked it up again and scrolled through old messages. Finally, I settled on texting my mother. That was safe.
Need me to bring anything for dinner on Sunday?
Three minutes later, she texted back: Just be on time.
Oh, my god. Mom. I needed boundaries with my family. They were literally going to drive me over the edge if I didn’t put a stop to this.
The bell rang and I breathed a sigh of relief. I could lock my phone away now and I wouldn’t be tempted. At least not very much.
I bent over and unlocked my bottom drawer. But then, as if I was actually possessed, I pulled up Nick’s number and texted: Do you think there was more we could have done?
I pushed send and my heart stopped beating. I lost all my breath and I wanted to immediately take it back. I wanted to delete it and unsend it and erase this moment from time completely.
I needed a time machine or the Doctor or freaking Michael J. Fox and the DeLorean.
I dropped my phone into my purse and slammed my drawer shut. Idiot. I was such an idiot.
I didn’t look at my phone until the end of the day. Until I’d gotten into my car and turned it on.
Then finally I allowed myself to see if he’d texted me back.
He had.
Of course, he had. I had never doubted that he wouldn’t.
Yes.
That was all he wrote. A simple, world-changing, confusing, mind-boggling, frustrating Yes.
Chapter Twenty-One
28. I can’t do this on my own.
Spring came overnight. One day I thought my toes would fall off if I stepped outside my house and the very next day the sun rose warm, bright and ready to melt every ounce of snow from Illinois.
It was amazing.
I had never been more ready for a change of seasons. This winter had been the darkest, gloomiest yet and I didn’t think I could survive much more of it.
Thank god, I didn’t have to.
The beginning of March brought all kinds of hope and anticipation for what was to come. I felt my heart swell in my chest and my spirits pick themselves up off the filthy ground. It was a new day, a new dawn and if I had the voice of an angel like Michael Bublé, I would have sung the shit out of it.
Instead, I decided to take Annie for a walk after school. I wore rain boots so we could stomp through melting piles of snow. She loved every second of it. I knew I would have to bathe her as soon as we got home, but we’d been cooped up in the house for so long that I didn’t care.
We just needed to breathe freely and move our winter-atrophied appendages.
Walking was beyond therapeutic. I didn’t just have cabin fever from being indoors for months; I had it from being in my own skin… in my own head. I was exhausted from myself.
But today felt different. The end of the school year was in sight, the end of my divorce was too. Maybe.