I missed her. It was an ache in my chest that never went away. After six months, I’d accepted that it never would.
The first few weeks after she left were the worst. I was depressed. There was no skirting around it, it was depression.
The kids kept getting sick from going back to school. It felt like I had someone home with a cold every day for two solid weeks. Then I got sick and had to take care of everyone else on top of it.
The house was always messy. Cleaning it was like shoveling in a snowstorm. Everyone needed me, all the time. Chelsea’s separation anxiety from Mom and Emma hit a crescendo and she hung off me like a monkey when she was home and cried every time I dropped her off at school. I was touched out and overwhelmed and missing Emma so badly it was hard to breathe.
I lived my days going through the motions like a zombie. My life felt like a series of mundane tasks I had to tick off until I die—meals, homework, laundry, doctor’s visits, grocery runs. Rinse and repeat.
I hated everything. I was moody and tired all the time. I tried to fake that I was okay during our visits with Mom, but she saw through me. She kept pressing me for what happened and I couldn’t talk about it and I’d leave feeling shitty because I could tell she was worried about me.
The guys tried their best to help. They tapped in. Took the kids to stuff. Sat with Alex at his games, Jane drove Sarah to dance for me a few times. They tried to get me out of the house, take me to lunch. But a light had gone out inside of me and nothing was going to turn that back on.
All of this was because of Emma. And I didn’t blame her for one ounce
of it.
If you can choose anger or empathy, always choose empathy. And I did.
A year ago I would have been mad at her for leaving. It was black and white back then. To me, love meant you stayed. But now I understood that love sometimes means you let someone go.
I appreciated the strength it required for her to come tell me she had to in person, even though it was hard.
I respected that she was self-aware enough to know what she was and wasn’t capable of.
I saw the sacrifice it took to decide she wasn’t going to repeat the same cycle with these kids that made her who she was.
And I didn’t want to repeat the cycle either. So I let her go too. And the worst thing about that was it meant I could never let her come back, because I couldn’t ever believe she’d stay.
I know she told me not to, but for a long time I was waiting for her. A very real part of me wanted to hope that she could change. Hold out for some miracle. But with distance I came to realize that wasn’t reality. That the same thing that took her from me would be the thing that would keep her away—or make her leave again if she ever came home. And I couldn’t put the kids through that. Not again.
I couldn’t imagine what Emma could ever say to me to make me feel safe in that relationship after this. And this was the hardest part of all to deal with. The finality of it.
It was really over.
I let myself wallow for a few hard, miserable weeks. And then I looked around at my life and I realized that I was a guardian now and that me unraveling was no better than when Mom did it. I had kids to raise, an example to set. I didn’t have the luxury of the meltdown I currently deserved. So I got my shit together. I did what I was good at. I pulled myself up by the bootstraps and I put systems in place.
I mapped out my day and took a good long look and I made changes.
I stopped making breakfast during the week. I liked doing it because Mom always did, but it was too much.
I took everyone to the store and let them pick out their favorite cereal and oatmeal. Alex’s new job in the morning was to pour Cheerios in a bowl for Chelsea, who was already up by the time he was, and turn on her movie
before he left for the bus. This took him two minutes and bought me another hour of sleep.
Once I started sleeping more, my energy and mood got better. I got a treadmill for under my desk so I could get my steps in while I worked. Got some weights and set up a little home gym to use after dropping Chelsea off at preschool.
Sarah liked to cook. I started asking her if she wanted to help me make dinners. She did. We bought that Sloan Monroe Crockpot cookbook and Sarah and I would meal prep and Alex cleaned up and suddenly dinner was fun again. A team-building activity I started to look forward to.
For Halloween Alex wanted to make the front lawn into a graveyard so we went to the Halloween store and bought a bunch of animatronic zombies. I spent way too much money, but it was the first project we all did together. We carved pumpkins and got Brad a dog costume. On Halloween night Sarah and I made a lasagna and hot chocolate and took Chelsea trick- or-treating. And I realized, when the kids were back at the house, sitting on the living room floor going through their candy, that I’d had a good day. It would have been better if she was here. But it was still good.
After that, the days kept getting better, a little at a time. Thanksgiving was hard without Mom, but we went to Leigh’s and came home with lots of leftovers. A few days later we went to cut down a Christmas tree. We took pictures and the smiles were real. We spent a Saturday baking Mom’s cookies and they came out perfect.
When the clock struck midnight on the TV on New Year’s Eve, I missed Emma so much I had to leave the room. But by then I’d accepted this pain as part of my everyday life, and while it never got easier that she wasn’t here, it did start to feel normal.
In January Alex turned sixteen and got his driver’s license. I gave him the van. Now I had another driver in the house, which helped.
Little by little, we were figuring it out.
And there wasn’t a day that went by that I didn’t feel her absence like a void in my soul. I missed her like I missed the sun in the winter.
I’d realized something after being with her. A valuable lesson that I think all the best and most enduring romances have figured out.
The love stories sold us the wrong thing.
The best kind of love doesn’t happen on moonlit walks and romantic
vacations. It happens in between the folds of everyday life. It’s not grand gestures that show how you feel, it’s all the little secret things you do to make her life better that you never tell her about. Taking the end piece of the bread at breakfast so she can have the last middle piece for her sandwich when you pack her lunch. Making sure her car always has gas so she never has to stop at the pump. Telling her you’re not cold and to take your jacket when you are in fact, very, very cold. It’s watching TV on a rainy Sunday while you’re doing laundry and turning her light off when she’s fallen asleep reading. Sharing pizza crusts and laughing about something the kids did and taking care of each other when you’re sick. It isn’t glamorous, it isn’t all butterflies and stars in your eyes. It’s real. This is the kind of love that forever is made of. Because if it’s this good when life is draining and mundane and hard, think of how wonderful it will be when the love songs are playing and the moon is out.
I was grateful that the life I’d been forced into taught me this lesson. I just wish I hadn’t learned it with Emma. Because nothing and nobody else would ever compare. With anyone else, it’s just folding socks on a sofa.
 |
Chelsea was home today, she had a fever this morning.
I was just finishing up my last project of the day when I heard someone on the stairs, but the steps were too heavy to be hers. I leaned back in my chair to look down the hallway. “Chels?”
Sarah popped her head in the door.
“Hey,” I said, blinking at her. “What are you doing home?” “I got my period. You need to come downstairs.”
“Who picked you up?”
She rolled her eyes. “Just come downstairs.” Then she left.
I let out an exasperated breath. Alex probably brought her and he probably dinged the van or something on the way here. Great.
I got up and took off my headset.
Why’d the school let them leave without calling me? I made a mental note to suss that out. I mean, I know they let high schoolers walk off campus without a parent standing there, but I should have gotten a call
about the missed classes at the very least.
I jogged down the steps. Sarah was standing in the mouth of the living room and I came up behind her. “Just please tell me Alex didn’t damage any
—” I froze.
Emma was on the sofa.
She had Chelsea cradled in her arms, bundled in her Frozen blanket, and she was talking softly to her. My dog had his head on her thigh, looking up at her.
It was like a still-life painting. Something a master had created out of the deepest recesses of my brain. I had to clutch a hand over my chest because it felt like it was going to split open.
Not a second had passed. It hadn’t been six months since I’d seen her, it was a heartbeat. A flicker.
This is the thing nobody tells you about The One. How they’re timeless. How the moment they pop up again you’re right back in it, right where you left off. I was darted through the heart, hit by the truck, my brain taking the screenshot.
Her hair was in a loose bun. She had on this light blue sweater and these little gold dangling dragonfly earrings. And I couldn’t even breathe looking at her.
She glanced up.
“She has a fever. Did you know?” she said. I just stared. Mute.
When I didn’t answer, she gazed back at my little sister and brushed the hair off her forehead. Chelsea was hugging her. She looked so content. Like a baby in the arms of someone she loves.
My mouth was dry. “I, uh. I gave her Tylenol two hours ago. She’s been kind of pulling on her ear,” I said.
Emma nodded. “I’ll look at her eardrums.”
The moment felt normal. Like she’d never left. Like I was just coming downstairs to get water in between meetings and she was home with me on her day off, helping with the kids.
I cleared my throat and turned to Sarah. “Can you—”
“Yup,” she said, cutting me off. She took Chelsea from Emma and carried her out of the room. The second Chelsea was gone, Brad took the spot on Emma’s lap. She put her hand on my dog’s head and peered at me
from the sofa. “Sarah called me to pick her up. She got her first period,” she said.
I felt my heart sink. So she hadn’t come to see me.
Not that I expected her to. She hadn’t called me in six months. Still, it hurt.
“Can we go in the kitchen?” I asked.
I didn’t know if I could have another depressing conversation on this sofa, I’d have to set it on fire.
We moved to the breakfast nook and I went straight to the fridge. Mostly to bury my face, to try and get my feelings together before I had to sit directly across from her. “Do you want something to drink?” I asked, talking to her but staring at a gallon of milk.
“No. Thank you.”
I gave myself another few seconds. Then I closed the fridge door, walked over, and took the seat in front of her.
Brad hopped into her lap and frowned at me across the table while she peered around the room.
“I like the chore chart,” she said. “Thanks.”
That’s all I could muster. The disappointment was too sobering. What do you say after six months of nothing?
Sarah still followed her on Snap. Emma was living in Wakan. As far as I knew this was the longest time she’d stayed put in the last decade.
But she couldn’t stay put for me.
For some reason, with her sitting in front of me, this felt like a slap.
They were her family. She was getting to know them, I wanted that for her. And I knew why she’d left, it had been a mutual decision. But she’d clearly put in some effort that she hadn’t been willing or able to put in here, and seeing her opened the old wound like it had never closed. Or maybe it was a new injury altogether. Evidence that she’d been capable of more than she’d claimed.
If Emma had six months of staying in her, why couldn’t she have given it to us?
Just two hours away.
She never visited, never called. And now she was only here because Sarah needed her.
I mean, I guess I should have been glad Emma at least cared enough to show up for that.
I sat back in my chair looking anywhere but at her.
All I wanted to do was look at her. Soak her up, store her away like I might never get another shot to do it. But I couldn’t do it without the lump in my throat threatening to make me cry.
I missed her so much I just wanted to get up and grab her and hold her and kiss her, but I got to sit here instead, knowing her being here was only because my sister texted her. This was just a social call. Popping in to say hi. At least that’s what it felt like. And did she drive two hours just to pick up Sarah? Because that didn’t feel likely. It felt more plausible that she was already in the area and why would she be in the area?
Was she seeing someone?
The idea burst into my brain like an intrusive thought on steroids.
I’d managed not to think about this for the last six months and now that she was here in front of me this question felt like a swarm of hornets buzzing in my rib cage. The idea made me want to claw my chest open. I was so jealous at the thought of it, it felt cruel that she came here to remind me this possibility existed. Because if she did date, that meant someone else got the Emma who stayed still when she wouldn’t stay still for me.
“How’s your mom?” she asked. I felt ill.
I gave her a one-shoulder shrug. “Fine. She’s adjusted now. Has a few friends. We go see her once a month.”
“I see you didn’t rename the dog,” she said. “Nope.”
Silence.
She cleared her throat. “So are you seeing anyone?” she asked out of nowhere. Her voice was a touch too high.
I glanced up at her to catch the tentative gaze she was giving me. My heart leapt at the question. Like maybe it was a sign she still cared.
I shook my head. “No. I haven’t dated at all.” Something flickered across her expression. “Are… are you?” I asked, terrified for the answer.
It was an excruciating moment before she replied. “No. I haven’t.”
There was a second of… something. But it didn’t last. The conversation
ended and we just sat there, quiet.
It was amazing how much this hurt.
It was like the universe wanted to let me know that no, I wasn’t over it, and no, I didn’t have it under control. No systems I could put in place could make this better. Nothing I did could change how absolutely shitty this felt.
“What are you thinking?” she asked.
I scoffed dryly. “Are you sure you want to know?” She swallowed. “Yes.”
I took in a deep breath. “I’m thinking that I’m happy to see you, but this just stirs up a lot for me.”
She nodded slowly. “And?”
“And I kind of wish you didn’t come.” I watched this hit her.
But I meant it. What was the point? I didn’t want to catch up. I wanted what I couldn’t have. What she wasn’t capable of giving me. I didn’t want her here on a technicality, I wanted everything.
She apologized. Then she got up to leave.
