25
Moving On
Charlotte
Over the weekend, I do my damnedest to pretend that things are normal. I go through my usual weekend life; cleaning, doing my bills, and reading. But Oliver’s absence hangs heavy in the air. He’s not watching football or cooking a delicious dinner. He’s not rolling over in the middle of the night and wrapping an arm around me.
Emotions swamp me in these moments, filling me with such sorrow and at the same time such anger. But I have no choice but to press on. I got over Stephen. Somehow, someway, I will get over Oliver too.
On Sunday night, I’m wrapped in a blanket in my window seat as snow lightly falls outside, and drinking a glass of wine and reading a book, when there’s a knock at my door. Immediately my heart lurches in a desperate hope that it’s Oliver. But I squash that down, and if it is Oliver, I won’t open the door. Or maybe I will open the door so that I can give him a piece of my mind, although if I look at him, all tall, broad, and sexy, I might get taken in by him and allow him inside. I can’t have that. If I let Oliver in, that might lead to forgiveness, and I can't risk that. I’ve been twice bitten and so in this case I’m thrice-time shy.
I look through the peephole, and don’t see Oliver. Instead, I see Theo and Madeline. I’m not sure I want to talk to them, especially if they’re here to talk about Oliver. At the same time, my problem isn’t with them. They were friendly neighbors to me long before Oliver showed up, so it wouldn’t be right to send them away now.
I open the door enough for me to look out, but not necessarily enough to let them in. “Theo, Madeline, what’s up?" I say, trying to be perky and friendly.
Madeline pulls a little Christmas tin out from around her back and holds them out to me. “I made cookies.”
I look from her to Theo wondering what this is all about.
“For Christmas. I can’t bake worth beans, but it turns out I’m pretty good at cookies.”
Her comment fills me with both sadness and anger yet again because I remember Oliver explaining how he’d encouraged Madeline to give up cooking and instead bake.
“She’s decided to make cookies for all her closest friends in the building, which really only amounts to you, Paige and her sister Nadine.”
“And Gavin,” she chimes in.
Theo nods and smiles. “And Gavin.” He pulls a bottle of wine out from behind him. “Me, I’m bringing wine. And I’m told that this wine pairs very well with those cookies.”
I reach out to take the tin and wine, and for a moment we all just stand there, and I realize that if I don’t invite them in, I’m being beyond rude.
“Why don’t you come in and we’ll have some.” I open the door and let them pass through. They go to my living area sitting on the couch while I bring the cookies and the wine to the kitchen to get items to serve them. I find a tray, and I put wine glasses and the wine bottle with the corkscrew on it, and then I put some cookies on a plate, and bring it all to them.
“Maybe you would want to do the honors with the wine?” I say to Theo, nodding to the corkscrew and the wine.
He takes the hint and opens the wine, pouring us each a glass.
We hold up our glasses and Madeline makes a toast to Christmas and we drink. Then there’s a long, awkward silence.
Finally, Madeline speaks up. “I haven’t decorated for Christmas either.”
I look around my apartment and note that she’s right. I haven’t decorated for the holidays. I don’t have a lot of Christmas decorations anyway, but even if I did, I’m not in a festive mood these days. My goal is to skip through Christmas, hardly noticing it until we get to the new year. Hopefully, the new year will bring me better luck than this year.
Theo clears his throat. “Do you have plans for Christmas?”
I study him, feeling suspicious. “Did Oliver send you?” I ask.
Theo stares at me intently. “Would it matter if he did?”
I look down into my wine glass because I don’t want them to know how badly I’m hurting. Or how deep down that I wish Oliver had sent them. Hell, I wish that Oliver would show up at my door again.
When I don’t answer, Madeline says, “We’re going to my grandparents’ for Christmas. It will be me and Theo and Nadine and her boyfriend. We’d like to invite you too”.
Inside I feel humiliated and pathetic because they’re feeling sorry for me.
“We invited Gavin too, but he said he can’t come,” Madeline says quickly, like maybe she realizes that her invitation feels like charity to me.
I give them the same excuse I gave for Thanksgiving. “I like to stick around the city, in case any of my clients need me. Holidays tend to be the hardest times for them.”