Page 72 of This Broken Heart

Pretending like there isn’t a pleasant ache to my body, an assertive reminder of who was inside me hours before.

His gaze meets mine and I let mine slide on by.

It never happened.

Everything is fine.

I’m fine.

48.

Josh

I love that Erin loves my kids.

But I kind of wish she wasn’t so selfless.

She might be able to compartmentalize that night, but I feel like I’m living with constant temptation.

Everything she does commands my attention.

It’s pure torture, but it’s a welcome distraction. A good kind of pain. Thinking about how cute her ass looks in jeans is a hell of a lot more enjoyable than thinking about the holidays.

Because, the truth is, this is a really hard time of year for me.

It’s only our second year without Ana and the memories are crystalized in all the traditions, the rituals. Even though food.

Last year, I coped by spending a lot of late nights at the bar with the guys. The kids had a lot of sleepovers at grandma’s.

This year, I make it all the way to Christmas Eve without thinking about getting smashed. I haven’t gone to the bar since Erin moved in and that’s no coincidence. I can’t stand to be alone with my ghosts. I love my kids, but I obviously can’t burden them with my sorrows.

Erin fills the house with so much noise—laughter and singing—it crowds out all the sad memories. But Christmas Eve rolls around and not even Erin can blot out that pain.

Trace is getting older, and this year, his preschool class is in the Christmas Eve service. I can’t skip again, as much as I want to. My head is in a fog all day. I’m trying to be a good dad, trying to stay in the moment with my kids.

But it’s hard.

Thank God for the people around me.

I don’t know, maybe Erin sensed it.

Maybe she’s running from her own ghosts. But she offered to stay through Christmas Eve. I said she could go home if she wanted to, but the truth is, I need her here. She keeps everything on the rails.

We go to mom’s for lunch, opening presents and sitting down for a meal that rivals Thanksgiving. But I have no appetite. It’s a struggle to keep up with the jokes and the stories. The more I withdraw, the more my family crowds in, trying to pull me out of this quicksand I’m stuck in.

At some point, Erin’s fingers brush across my shoulder. I glance up at her, focusing on her steady expression. “When do you want to go back? Maven’s going to need a nap and we still need to get the kids ready for the Christmas program.”

I launch at the chance to escape. “Yep. We better take off.”

Maven falls asleep in the truck and I carry her inside, feet slowing when I step inside. Memories, like a faded film reel, play in front of my eyes. I’m lost in thought when I hear Erin struggling in behind me. Trace must have fallen asleep, too. I lay Maven down, doubling back to take Trace off her hands.

When I come back to the living room, she’s curled up on the couch. She holds out a beer and I accept it, slumping onto the couch beside her. “What are we watching?”

“Krampus? It’s got David Koechner in it.”

“Who the hell is David Koechner?”

“What, are you some sort of heathen?”

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