She’s waiting for me to start a conversation, something I hate forcing, but I can tell she isn’t going to give up on this. And after the way our morning went, I should probably just say fuck it and do what she wants.
Bridgitte hates silence and will talk just to fill it. She immediately mistakes my silence for something more. I’m angry at her, annoyed, something is bothering me, I have nothing to say to her, we’re growing apart; the reasons she thinks I don’t speak to her are endless. Funny though because it’s never any of those things.
I like silence. I like the quiet stillness of a room, and if you just listen, silence speaks volumes about people. It can tell you more than words. Silence makes me think of Nora though.
“Are you good with the September wedding?” I ask and she exhales softly as if it’s a relief to her that I’ve finally said something.
September wasn’t Bridgitte’s first choice. It wasn’t even her second. If anything, it was the last choice she would’ve chosen.
Sometimes I think she blames me for her forced September wedding date. I fucked up the engagement, and there have been several times, in her annoyed mutterings, that she’s admitted if I would’ve proposed sooner we wouldn’t be in this miserable situation. She’s the one who claimed it as miserable in the heat of all her drama over selecting a venue for our wedding.
I’d proposed late in June, but it turns out it was a few months too late to book a summer wedding for the following year. Clearly this was something Bridgitte felt was common knowledge. Wedding venues book up more than a year in advance and summer dates were akin to scoring Lollapalooza tickets. You strike while the iron is hot. I let the iron get cold and all that was left were a few dates in late September and December.
“It works now,” she says but I still hear that hint of defiance in her voice. I tried to appease her with visions of fall tress and picturesque landscapes and all kinds of bullshit that I couldn’t give a fuck about. If it were up to me, we’d be married on a beach somewhere, preferably alone. Obviously that isn’t going to fly, because we just tasted cake in the city.
She proceeds to ramble on about photography options and locations, none of which I know, but she never tires of talking about it all. The conversation is in full swing with Bridgitte doing most of the conversing and me adding in a few choice words that make it sound like I’m enthralled. I’m anything but, which might sound rude, but the planning of the wedding is of little interest to me.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m happy to marry Bridgitte, yet at times it feels like too much. Not marrying Bridgitte, but the planning and the perfection it seems to be morphing into.
She leans over and kisses me quickly before she hops out of the car, wiggling her fingers in a cute wave as she maneuvers through the people and the patches of water that dot the sidewalk outside her building. I watch her buttery blonde hair whip around her and she pulls her trench coat up around her neck, shielding herself from the drizzling rain that has just started. Right before entering the building, she turns back and waves again, a beautiful full smile on her lips, her wide blue eyes shining, and for a second my heart skips. She really is quite stunning.
I’m now sitting at my desk in my quiet home office finishing up a conference call dealing with an acquisition that has been going on for months and I couldn’t give zero fucks right now.
My mind has suddenly been consumed with that constant what if question that plagues me: My stupid obsession with finding Nora. I’ve told myself more times than I can count that I need to give up, move on. It’s over. But I still come back to it.
With the planning of the wedding in full swing and Bridgitte’s need to focus solely on it, my mind seems to wander to thoughts of finding Nora.
I spent the first year after I met her at the party looking for her, but technology wasn’t what it is now. With only a first name and a city to go on and little money, I couldn’t really devote much effort to it. After that first year, I tried to drop the idea, but it was always there, in the back of my fucking mind, nagging and annoying. I opted for what seemed the least crazy, the least obsessive, and I began leaving a note at the lifeguard tower. When I moved to Chicago a year later to start school, I was only able to leave the note at random times, but I still did it every year.
I’ve always known it wasn’t enough, but I figured I’d eventually tire of looking for her and say fuck it. It hasn’t happened and with my marriage to Bridgitte nearing, I’m finding it hard to forget Nora.
After my call ends, I text Matt and his response is exactly as I expect.
Me: I’m going to try to find Nora. Like really try to find her.
Matt: You’re a fucking idiot. It’s a terrible idea.
Me: I know, but I need to and I’m going hire a PI to see if I can find her.
My phone rings a few seconds later and of course it’s Matt. He doesn’t even bother with a greeting, immediately saying, “You’re gonna fuck this up with Bridgitte,” as soon as I answer.
“I feel like I need to find her in order to marry Bridgitte,” I say and he falls silent on the other end.
“This is a terrible fucking idea. You’re making a huge mistake. What are you going to do if you do find her? Leave Bridgitte? What if she’s married and doesn’t even fucking remember you?” Matt’s voice is growing louder with each question, until he’s more pissed off than I expected him to be.
I have played a thousand scenarios over in my head, attempting to foresee every possible outcome, and honestly, I have no idea what I will do if I find her. It’s such an abstract concept. It’s almost impossible to predict what could happen. In saying all that, I’m still compelled to find her.
Matt doesn’t stop. He doesn’t even give me a chance to answer before he’s berating me again. “Are you going to tell Bridgitte? You need to. You can’t just go off on some fucking pilgrimage to find some girl you met when you were nineteen.”
“Settle the fuck down,” I tell him, exhaling hard into the phone. I didn’t expect him to throw his support in wholeheartedly, but I didn’t expect him to lose his shit. “I’m not going on a pilgrimage. I’m going to hire a PI, give him the information I have and see what happens. Bridgitte doesn’t even need to know.”
“I gotta go, dude,” Matt says, utterly pissed off with me. “I don’t want to be a part of this because when Bridgitte finds out, the shit is gonna hit the fan.”
“Bridgitte won’t find out,” I insist as Matt hangs up on me.
Chapter Thirteen
It only takes me a couple of hours to locate a private investigator that’s willing to work quickly and start right away. I did some research, contacted some people I work with and I had compiled a pretty good list. The large corporation I work for tends to use PI’s for investigative work before we decide whether to go through with certain acquisitions and mergers.
No one questioned why I needed a PI and I was prepared to explain should the need be, but it didn’t arise.
A couple of hours later, I had my guy. I gave him what little information I had and he told me he would get to work immediately. Before hanging up I asked him the likelihood of finding Nora and he explained that while I gave him very little to work with, he’s found people when given even less information.