Page 92 of Heartless

“No. You just said a younger version of you.”

“My little sister who was ten years younger than me.”

“What?” I screech, choking on the muffin.

Claire reaches over and pats my back gently. Nodding, she says, “Yep. That sure stung like a pissed-off bee trapped in your bra.”

I shake my head and reply, “That was foul.”

“It was.”

“I’m guessing you and your sister don’t have a relationship anymore.”

“You’d be guessing right.”

“And are they still together?”

“They are. Last I heard, though, she was cheating on him.”

“Serves his ass right. But she needs to be punished, too.”

“Oh, honey, karma’s a bitch. I’m sure she’ll get hers in time. But I don’t sit around waiting for it. I move on with my life and let them live theirs. I regret nothing about my marriage, including his cheating. It made me a stronger, better woman.”

“He sure screwed up losing you. You’re a very intelligent and insightful woman, Claire.”

“I’ve got Clyde to thank for that, honey. He taught me lots of valuable life lessons. I’ve been jotting down a lot of notes since you’ve been here about my experience with Clyde and all. I think I’ll write a book someday.”

Beaming at her, I say, “I’ll be the first one in line to get my autographed copy.”

She smiles at me, and we rock, drink tea, and polish off the rest of the muffins.

***

I leave the post office with the mail that I’ve picked up. I’ve had all my mail forwarded to the PO Box that I set up not long after moving here to the island. I finally gave Onyx the PO Box in case he needed to send anything to me.

There’s an envelope in there from him.

I recognize his scrawling writing.

I walk to the car, toss the mail onto the passenger seat, and drive back to the cottage. Every few minutes, I glance at the passenger seat at the envelope, and it feels like it’s staring at me.

I don’t want to open it now.

Is he writing to me to tell me that he’s not waiting for me?

I haven’t taken his calls in the last two weeks, and I’m thinking that he’s tired of waiting. What if he’s writing to tell me that he and Sharla are going to try to make it work?

Fear pounds my insides, and I realize that I truly want to make my marriage work. I don’t want to let him go despite what he’s done wrong.

After I arrive back at the cottage, and I’ve removed my groceries and set the other mail aside, I grab the envelope from Onyx.

I walk down to the beach and take a seat in the sand. I glance down at my long legs stretching from the short denim cutoffs that I’m wearing and notice I’m getting a tan. My normal copper skin is a deeper, richer, burnished bronze. I’ve obviously not been eating healthy or getting enough exercise because my denim shorts are a little tighter.

I slide my finger into the envelope, thinking about an exercise program, and a picture falls out.

It’s an old Polaroid picture of Onyx and me on bikes outside of our home. I smile, recalling when that picture was taken. We had just ridden home from going to the market. I have a bigstraw hat on my head with a large sunflower at the front of the hat.

Onyx had told me that the hat was ugly when I was looking at it. The moment that I bought it and stuffed it down on my head, he said it was the most beautiful hat he’d ever seen.

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