“Do you want to get dinner on Friday?” I ask her. “At the Mexican place?”
She looks surprised but pleased. “I would love that.”
“I know you’re not my mother. I know that. But I really enjoy your company. Even if the circumstances are a bit strange, I like you.”
Susan puts her arm around me and kisses me on the head. “You’re one hell of a woman,” she says to me. “I’m lucky to know you.”
I laugh shyly. I think I am blushing. “Me too,” I say, nodding, hoping it’s clear just how much I mean it.
She shakes her head to avoid crying. “All right!” she says, slapping me lightly on the back. “Get in the car! Go home. If you need me, call me. But you can do this. You got this.”
“Thanks,” I say. Our hands lightly touch. I squeeze hers and then I walk away. I’m only a few steps from her when I turn around. “Hey, Susan?” I say. She turns around to see me. “Same goes for me. If you need me, just call.”
She smiles and nods. “You got it.”
I take the coastal highway instead of the interstate. I look out the window more often than I should. I try to appreciate each moment that I have. At one point, a song comes on the radio that I haven’t heard in years, and for four minutes, I let myself forget who I am and what I’m doing. I’m just me, dancing in a car heading north on Pacific Coast Highway and it’s not so bad. It’s not so bad at all.
When I pull into my driveway, my apartment looks bigger and higher up than I remember. I get the mail and search through it for the marriage certificate. It’s not there. However, in the mail is a check from Citibank addressed to me. I go up the steps and I let myself in the house.
It smells familiar. It’s a scent I didn’t even know I missed until I smell it. Everything is where I left it. It was frozen in time while I was in Orange County. I breathe in deeply and I don’t smell Ben here. I just smell myself.
I sit down on my couch and organize the rest of the mail. I clean up some old dishes. I make my bed. I clean out the refrigerator and then take out the trash. As I come back in, I stop and look at the envelope from Citibank. It feels petty to be thinking about how much money I’ve just inherited, but I have to open the envelope at some point. So here we go.
Fourteen thousand, two hundred sixteen dollars and forty-eight cents, paid to the order of Elsie Porter. Huh. I don’t know when I stopped considering myself Elsie Porter Ross, but it seems to have been some time ago.
Here I am, six months after I got married: husbandless and fourteen thousand dollars richer.
MAY
The gazebo ceremony takes place outside in the . . . well, gazebo,” she said to me from behind the counter. She was about fifty and appeared to be putting on a fake southern accent. That or she was just from the deep, deep South. Ben was in the bathroom and had left the planning up to me.
“Oh, it’s a bit cold, right?” I said. “I think just the simplest thing you have is fine.”
“You only get married once, honey. Don’t you want to make it special?” How did she not understand that this was special? Pomp and circumstance meant nothing to me as long as I got to be with this man. She must not have understood how lucky I was to have him. She must have thought I was marrying just anybody and I needed a gazebo to make it spectacular.
“I think we are good,” I said. “What’s this one? The simplicity package? We’ll take that one.”
“Okay,” she said. “How about rings? Do you have an engagement ring that we should match it to?”
“Nope!” I said proudly. “No engagement ring.” Honestly, the thought hadn’t even occurred to me.
“We’ll be getting her one though,” Ben said, and he came toward us.
“Oh, stop it,” I said.
“Well, do you two want silver or gold?” she asked.
“Gold,” I said, but Ben said, “silver,” at the same time.
We both quickly swapped our answers to match and missed again.
“Baby, I just want what you want,” he said to me.