Stunned silent, I watch him stand. He looks the page over briefly before his eyes find mine. The molecules in the room seem to still while he walks the single sheet over to me. For the next few seconds, we face each other, saying nothing. I have the wild impression he might kiss me.
He doesn’t, of course. In one rushed movement, he shoves the page into my hand. “I’ll be up for a little while,” he says. “If you want to . . . discuss this.”
I nod, searching his expression. Something is different. I feel I’m on the edge of a precipice I can’t see, just waiting to step into open air. Whatever waits past the drop I know instinctively is nothing Nathan will say out loud. He’s returning to his desk, closing his journal.
The single page feels hot in my hand.
51
Katrina
• PRESENT DAY •
I’ve been sitting in the swing on the front porch for the past hour, watching the road. Chris has come and gone. He took his ring with him.
When he got here, we walked into the front room, where we sat in some sort of mutual understanding that our conversation wouldn’t be fit for the friendlier, more private rooms of the house. My bedroom was his bedroom no longer.
I was prepared for the conversation to be unpleasant. It was, but not in the ways I’d expected. Chris had donned professionalism like a shield. Sitting up straight, his large frame nearly filled the front window. While my shorts and shirt were nothing out of the ordinary, I noticed how precisely he’d dressed, a lightly patterned button-down under his linen blazer. The only cracks in the façade were the dark rings encircling his eyes when he removed his gold sunglasses.
He wasn’t emotional. He didn’t try to change my mind. Voices were never raised. It hurt a little, how he wouldn’t even fight for me. But he hadn’t fought for me in years. If he had, we’d be married, or maybe just happier. I definitely wouldn’t be in Florida, writing a book with Nathan. It’s pointless to imagine the possibilities.
When Chris and I had said everything we needed to say, the room went quiet. He stood up from the couch. I walked him to the door, where I gave him the ring with dry hands. Not following him onto the porch, I let the screen door shut behind him.
For someone who’s explored divorce and infidelity plenty in fiction, I was surprised to feel like I learned something from the end of my engagement. But I did.
I learned sometimes relationships don’t die. They just don’t grow. Kept from sunlight, from nourishment, they never flourish. Nothing is different today from how Chris’s and my relationship has been for years. He was an easy presence in my life, someone who gave me the appearance of contentment. A walking résumé for a husband. He was successful, handsome, and smart. He was involved in my career—which wasn’t hard since he was my agent. Above all, I knew he would never leave me.
I didn’t know then what I do now. Never leaving someone isn’t the same as loving them.
I lean into the swing, letting my head rest on the cushions, soaking in the sun. More conversations are coming, past curves in the road I can already make out from here. About our house in Los Angeles, what involvement he’ll have in my literary career, the untangling of four years of life with another person. The prospect doesn’t worry me, doesn’t wind knots into my stomach or leave my muscles sore from stress. Chris was a future when I felt like I had none. Now I’m realizing I have as many futures as I want. I’m free to focus on one I’ve chosen, not one I’ve clung to like a life raft.
Hearing Nathan’s car pulling into the driveway, I open my eyes. I smile when he cuts the engine, the Porsche’s growl going silent. A lifetime ago, I sat right here, waited for and watched Nathan drive up exactly this way. It strikes me how many versions of us this neighborhood has seen. Younger writers tackling something new together, friends unsure how their relationship was changing, spiteful former colleagues forced into each other’s company—and finally, whatever fragile, hopeful thing our relationship is now.
Nathan gets out of the car. On his way up to the porch, he skips the middle step. His eyes find me. When I beam, he physically relaxes, like he honestly thought I could be feeling any other way right now.
“Tell me you’re not smiling because Chris won you back and you’ve set a date for your wedding,” he says.
I hold up my ringless hand. “With that imagination, you should be a writer,” I reply.
He laughs. It’s loud, joyous, real. The sort of laugh I find myself caught up in—enough I nearly don’t notice when he gently catches the hand I held up. Our humor subsides into soft smiles while he holds my fingers firmly in his.
“He’s going back to LA,” I say.
He nods. “What about you?”
Nathan’s question holds several unsaid others. He wants to know if I’ll be okay, if I’ll have to endure nights down the hall from my ex-fiancé. There’s more, though. He’s feeling out what I want my future to look like.
My eyes leaving his, I glance to the house above us. “I’ll have to move properly eventually,” I say, “but for now, I might stay here for a while.”
“Tell me when you want me to leave,” Nathan says. There’s no hidden spite in his voice, only understanding. “I would never want to impose.”
I look right into the ocean blue of his eyes. “I think we have unfinished business first, don’t you?”
He pulls me to my feet, which puts us very close together. His free hand finds my hip. If his eyes were the ocean before, now they’re the midday sun sparking off the waves. I feel like I’ve never seen him this happy. Not when we’ve written something he’s proud of, not when his publishing dreams started to come true.
I lean forward, pressing a kiss to his lips, marveling to myself. I get to do this now. It feels unreal, or half real, like I’m on the edge of a fairy tale. The dizzy expression on Nathan’s face says he knows the feeling. Holding onto his hand, I lead him into the house.
We pause in the living room. When his eyes find mine, I only smile. I’ve felt lucky on plenty of occasions for what a wonderful writer Nathan is. For how he pushes me, fills in for me, inspires me. I don’t know if I’ve ever let myself feel lucky for what a wonderful man he is. I let myself now. Facing me, he’s like I’ve seen him on countless other mornings, looking comfortable in his white polo and gray shorts, watching me intently.
His voice is low, unsure. “Do you want to write?”
I laugh. It’s comical how much we’re not on the same page right now. While his eyebrows crinkle in confusion, he starts to smile. I nod to answer his question, saying nothing. There’s something charged in the warmth of the room, static electricity stored in soft fabric. He releases my hand to pick up the pages he was editing this morning then sits on the couch.