Page 20 of The Ex Next Door
That last year together, she and Declan were about to go their separate ways but neither one of them knew how to handle it. She didn’t want to bring up the fact he was going to Arizona with a full scholarship while she would stay in Texas. She loved him and assumed they’d get married after college. He was seventeen and hadn’t received the memo her heart sent via the “read my mind” express.
The point was she’d gotten over Declan, which had been possibly the deepest cut to her heart since it was the first. She would get over Rob too.
Just before she turned off the bedroom light and pulled the door halfway closed, Amy thought of one more thing to ask.
“Are you okay? About me and Dad?”
“No, I don’t like it. I wish we could all live together again like it used to be.”
“I know, honey. But… We’ve talked about this.”
“I know, I know. It isn’t my fault, or Naomi’s, but Mommy and Daddy can’t live together anymore. But I don’t see why not!” David threw his hands up.
Because he doesn’twant to be married anymore.
How does a mother tell her children their father doesn’t want to be married to their mother? What if they get it into their heads that he might decide he also didn’t want to be their father anymore? Amy couldn’t explain what she didn’t completely understand. For some reason, she and Rob had grown apart. It was all the traveling, all the loneliness, she guessed. When Rob was gone, she and the kids bonded and, without realizing it, they’d failed to include him.
This was obviously going to be a much longer conversation and Amy didn’t have any platitudes left in her tonight. She’d given David baseball. Now all she wanted to do was go to bed with a good book and not think about jobs, finances, teaching, baseball and far-too-good-looking exes who lived right next door. Her brain was fried. She’d like to hang up a sign that read, “Gone fishing. Try again tomorrow.”
But moms didn’t get to take vacations. Actually, she had been hoping David would say, “I’m okay,” and a rush of shame hit her. It wasn’t her son’s job to assuage her guilt. He was simply being honest.
“That’s a tough one to explain,” she summed up. “Do you know how sometimes you used to ask me and Daddy about a certain joke you heard on TV that you didn’t understand and we’d say that’s grown-up stuff?”
“Yeah?”
“Well. This is grown-up stuff, honey. I’m sorry.”
David sighed and rolled over in bed. “Okay.”
Amy pulled the door closed and strolled into the quiet of the kitchen. She wasn’t used to all this alone time in the evening, something she used to crave.
Just give me a minute alone,she used to say. Just one or two minutes in which she didn’t have demands on her time. For years, it was either the kids or Rob. He’d always been so needy, too, like a third child. If she didn’t pay Rob enough attention, he pouted and complained. But if she let go of oneof the many chores she did for him to spend time with him instead, he’d also complain. She couldn’t win.
Now she had all the time she needed and hated every second. She was truly alone. All her friends were still where she used to be: evenings were family time, and for connecting with the husband. Talking, watching movies, eating the junk food they wouldn’t let the kids have. Amy and Rob were the first in their group of friends to get a divorce, and to hear them tell it, no one saw it coming.
Why can’t you just be happy, how about that? Fake it till you make it.
Amy poured herself a glass of the Pinot Grigio that Lou and Mom had left behind on move-in day and went outside to the porch. This had quickly become her routine. A glass of wine, sometimes a book if she could concentrate, and her porch swing. From here, she had a nice view of the coastal skyline in the distance and every now and again she’d see the boardwalk’s roller coaster make its highest turn and drop. On her right, the lighthouse still beamed its rays even if it no longer led ships to shore.
Next door, the front door opened and Declan walked outside, staring into the black night, apparently deep in thought. She didn’t know if this was also his routine and had assumed the other night had been happenstance. The thought occurred she should change her routine and left as quickly as it came. She was done trying to make life easier for men. They could both be out here at the same time. It didn’t mean they had to chat.
Declan finally noticed her. “Oh, hey.”
“Hi,” Amy said and waved at him with her glass.
So much for ignoring each other.
He walked over, which shouldn’t have surprised her. Declan had always been a friendly sort, and she imagined he was popular at the Salty Dog with both men and women.
“By the way, I told David he can quit soccer and we’re going to try the rec baseball league. I really appreciate your offer to get him there, but for now maybe you could just give him a few pointers.”
He stopped at the bottom of the steps to the porch, as if waiting for an invitation. “I’ll teach him everything I know.”
She’d make room for him on the swing but sitting close to Declan didn’t suit her guarded heart. Declan was a tough man to ignore. She might be able to overlook the way he’d bruised her heart for the sake of her son, but that didn’t mean her heart was open for business. Besides, Declan was taken.
“That’s all I can ask of you.”
“Well, you could ask for more but I know you won’t.”
