Distraction,my therapist likes to say in a lecturing tone,isn’t the healthiest way to deal with your problems, Sophia.
Maybe not, but it sure is the most comfortable, not to mention profitable. My nonstop work hours began immediately after the divorce, when the Exciteur office became a homier place than the three-bedroom apartment I was emptying with Percy.
And they bore fruit. I’m now a senior project manager in the Strategy department, a step up from project assistant, and all it took was my personal life imploding.
The promotion came just in time for me to switch from avoiding the apartment I lived in with Percy, to avoiding the new apartment I’d found for myself. It’s a one bedroom in Midtown, modest by New York standards, and still expensive as hell for a single-payer household.
It’s also painfully empty.
The one begrudging silver lining is the kitten my sister had foisted on me. One of the cats that patrol her husband’s barns had a litter, and when I holed up in Marhill after I’d seen Percyin flagrante,the little ones had kept me company with energetic pounces and naps. Rose insisted I take one home.
So now I have a cat I never wanted, a too expensive apartment, and a job that requires an ungodly number of hours per week.
And that’s the third lesson I learned from my divorce. You don’t just lose your husband, or your marriage. You lose the entire life you’d built for yourself.
Sophia Browne no longer exists. And I’m not sure who Sophia Bishop is anymore.
She desperately wanted to become a New Yorker, that I know. I’d once had a poster of the skyline in my childhood bedroom and used to watchSex and the Citylike it was an instruction manual. Moving here had been a dream. Percy had helped me fit in, showed me the ropes… I’d married a New York man and into a New York family.This was my home.
But now I’m not sure who I am anymore.
The first task on my to-do-list is to work. I’ve always loved it. Percy often complained, in his characteristic voice that turned just a little petulant when he didn’t get his way, that I worked more than I should. That he’d offered to take care of me, time and time again, if I chose to stay at home.
I’d remind him that he’d always said he liked my ambition. He would then relent and nod and say that, of course, he did.
But I wonder how much of that had been true.
I take my usual walking route to work. Exciteur has its offices in a tall skyscraper a comfortable distance from my new apartment. I stop at my usual bench in the little greenery nearby, where most junior Exciteur employees eat their lunch during the warmer months, and switch from my ergonomic sneakers to a pair of low-heeled slingbacks. Then I undo the protective braid I keep my hair in during my walks. Nothing ruins blow-dried hair like the wind, and that’s a lesson I learned long before my divorce.
I’ve got my morning routine down to a science.
I grab a coffee from the cart outside of work and head up to my floor.
Exciteur is a huge consulting firm.
Actually,hugemight be too mild of a word. Colossal. Global. I have more coworkers across the globe than the small town I grew up in has inhabitants.
Let’s just say thereply allbutton in emails has been permanently disabled.
Jenna is already at her desk. Her sleek, black hair is pulled back in a severe ponytail. It’s her killer look, one she often wears to meetings with important clients.
“You made it in before me,” I say.
She shoots me a look over her shoulder, eyes sparkling. “There’s an almond croissant on your desk.”
“You didn’t.”
“I did,” she says.
“I’ll get in here before you next week. Do you want your muffin with blueberry or chocolate?”
“Sure you will,” she says. Jenna lives across the city but has, for some reason, decided to start biking to work. She arrives earlier than anyone so she can use the Exciteur gym showers. “But just in case you actually do… chocolate all the way.”
I head into my office to grab the croissant waiting for me. It’s a big day for my team. She knows it, ponytail and all, and so do I.
Then I head back out to her desk. “Are you going over our notes?”
“Sure am.” For all our teasing, Jenna has the sharpest mind. She’s my right hand and the third-in-command in my business development team at Exciteur Consulting.