Beautiful

by Christina Lauren

  “Come in,” I said, and took a step back, giving her plenty of space as she walked past me.

  She stopped inside, taking a few seconds to look around. Some of the furniture she probably recognized. The end table. The lamp on the entryway table. She had taken nothing with her when she left except for a few suitcases full of clothes and a couple of paintings her grandmother had given us.

  I still ate off our wedding dishes, for fuck’s sake. A gift from my brother Niels; my family hadn’t let me return them. Maybe that was something I should change.

  “You guys took off before the tour ended,” she said, turning to face me.

  I nodded, sliding my hands into the pockets of my track pants. “Yeah, we left sort of on impulse.”

  “Was it because Cam and I were there?”

  Shrugging, I said, “That was part of it. Really, though, the tour wasn’t our thing, in the end.”

  Silence ticked between us, and her eyes scanned the walls and the living room just beyond, the kitchen, and it was then that I realized my mistake.

  “Where’s Pippa?” she asked.

  I coughed out a quiet laugh. I was too fucking tired for this.

  “Pippa is . . .” I started, and then realized I didn’t have to explain a thing. “She doesn’t live here.”

  Becky blinked, confused.

  “We aren’t married,” I said simply.

  “What?” she asked, eyes wide.

  “We were just—it was just us having fun.” I ran one hand through my hair and watched as she scanned the room again.

  “Why would you make that up?” she asked, looking back to me. “You looked like a couple, acted like . . .”

  “We were together,” I said with a tiny twinge of discomfort.

  “But you’re not actually married?”

  “I just . . .” I trailed off, deciding it wasn’t worth getting into. “Becky—sorry—but is there a reason you’re here?”

  She opened her mouth to say something and then closed it again, shaking her head with a small laugh. “I wanted to say goodbye,” she finally said.

  “You came over here because you didn’t get a proper goodbye?”

  Becky grimaced, clearly catching the irony there. “Well, and . . . we didn’t really get any time to talk. Just the two of us. Cam is really encouraging me to try to communicate better. Do you have maybe twenty minutes? I just . . .” She turned and walked farther into the room, pushing her hands into her hair before facing me again. “There are so many things I want to say.”

  I’m sure the loaded silence that followed wasn’t what she’d expected. I almost wanted to laugh. If someone would have asked me five years ago—maybe even only two—whether I had anything to say to my ex-wife, I could have written a dissertation.

  And, in truth, I’d certainly had a lot to say that night at the vineyard with Pippa, shouting up to the sky while the sprinklers soaked us from every direction. But now I felt strangely empty. Not angry, not even sad. I’d left those parts of me at the winery, and only Pippa knew about them anymore.

  “If you want to talk . . .” I trailed off and then amended for clarity, “I mean, if it will make you feel better to talk . . .”

  She took a step closer. “Yeah, I think I can explain now.”

  I couldn’t stop the short laugh that burst from me. “Becks, I don’t need you to explain anything to me now.”

  Shock moved across her face and she shook her head as if she’d misunderstood. “I don’t feel like we ever really discussed it,” she explained. “I’ve never acknowledged how shitty it was to leave you the way I did.”

  I pulled back a little, realizing even now how self-absorbed she was. “And you think six years after we split up is a good time to hash it out?”

  She stuttered out a few sounds of protest.

  I lifted my shoulders in a helpless gesture. “I mean . . . if you want to get it off your chest, I’ll listen.” I smiled at her, not unkindly. “I’m not saying this because I’m bitter or because I want to hurt you, but because it’s the truth. There isn’t anything you need to explain to me, Becks. This isn’t something I live with every day anymore.”

  She moved to the couch, tucking her feet up under her and staring at her hands. It was odd to gaze at a profile that had once been so precious to me and now just looked . . . familiar.

  “This isn’t really going like I expected,” she admitted.

  I came around the couch, sitting beside her. “I’m not sure what you want me to say,” I admitted quietly. “How did you expect this to go?”

  She turned her face up to me. “I guess I felt like I owed you something, and that it would be a relief to you to hear me say it. I’m glad you don’t need it,” she said quickly, “but I didn’t really realize I needed it until I saw you at the tour.”

  Nodding, I said, “Well, what is it you needed to say?”

  “I wanted to say I’m sorry,” she said, holding my eyes for a few seconds before blinking back down at her hands. “The way I left was terrible. And I wanted you to know it wasn’t really about you.”

  I laughed a little, dryly. “I think that was partly the problem.”

  “No,” she said, looking back up, “I mean that you hadn’t done anything wrong. I didn’t stop loving you. I just felt like we were too young.”

  “We were twenty-eight, Becks.”

  “I mean, I hadn’t lived yet.”

  I watched her, feeling the truth of it. Feeling a tightening of my breath as I remembered Pippa saying much the same thing just last week, but saying it so much more readily, with confidence, with wisdom.

  Becky had gone from living at home, to living in a dorm, to living with me. With the tendency to be a bit of a wallflower, she had never sought adventure, per se. I just never thought she craved it.

  “I understand all of this in hindsight, of course,” she said quietly. “But I saw this life stretching out ahead of me, and it was content and easy, but not very interesting.” She pulled at a loose thread on her sleeve, and it unraveled a bit more than she expected, I guess, because she lifted it to her mouth, biting it off. “Then I thought of you, and this person I was married to who was ready to take the world by storm, and I knew that—at some point—one of us would absolutely lose it.”

  This made me laugh, and she looked back up at me, a little relieved.

  “I don’t mean actual insanity,” she added, “but I mean cheating, or midlife crisis, or something.”

  “I wouldn’t have cheated on you,” I said immediately.

  Her eyes softened a little. “How can you know? How long did it take you to fall out of love with me?”

  I didn’t want to answer this, and my silence gave her what she needed. “Can you really tell me you’re not better off?”

  “You’re not asking me to thank you?” I said, incredulous.

  She quickly shook her head. “No, I just mean that I saw my own loose foundation. I saw myself breaking at some point in the future. Or maybe that was my break. But for whatever reason, I knew we weren’t forever. I knew we loved each other enough to get through the obvious, temporary stresses like career changes and having young children. But we didn’t love each other enough to get through boredom, and I worried you would be absolutely bored with me.”

  I wondered if that explained Cam, whether she found him to be a simpler man than she found me. I also wondered how I should feel about that: flattered that she regarded me so highly, or troubled that she valued herself so little.

  “Are you happy with him?” I asked.

  “Yeah.” Her smile, when she aimed it at me, was genuine. “We’re talking about having kids. We’ve traveled a lot since we met: England, Iceland, even Brazil.” With a little shake of her head, she added, “He has a good job. He doesn’t need me to work. He just wants me to be happy.”

  Becky had never liked a lot of pressure.

  And this made me wonder whether I gave the appearance of a man who needed a wife who was willing to compete w
ith my career, making Becky feel like she could never win.

  The truth was, maybe I did need that. And maybe she couldn’t have won. But how could I know?

  And did it matter anymore? I was older now. I wanted someone whose presence demanded more space in my thoughts and my heart. When I thought back to how I had described Becky to Pippa, I registered how generic it all sounded.

  She was nice.

  We had fun.

  I wasn’t whitewashing it. I just didn’t really remember much beyond it being pleasant. Because Becky was right; she hadn’t lived yet. Neither of us had.

  “Do you feel better?” I asked.

  “I guess so,” she said, taking a deep breath and then letting it out through puffed cheeks. “Though I still can’t understand why you pretended to be married to Pippa.”

  “It isn’t that complicated.” I reached up, scratching my eyebrow. “When I saw you, I panicked.” Shrugging, I added, “It just came out. And almost immediately after, I realized I was fine, and that it wasn’t all that hard to be around you. But at that point, the lie felt easier. I didn’t want to embarrass you. Or me, either, really.”

  She nodded, and kept nodding for a few seconds as if settling on a realization herself. “I should go.”

  I stood after her and followed her to the door.

  This entire conversation was both strange and totally banal.

  When I opened the door for her, I realized Cam had been parked at the curb all this time. “You could have invited him in,” I said, incredulity threading through my words. “It’s been forty-five minutes he’s been sitting there.”

  “He’s fine.” She stretched, pecking my cheek. “Take care, Jens.”

  I collapsed on the couch, feeling a little like I’d just run a marathon.

  It was early, way too early for bed, but I shut off the TV anyway and switched off the lights, and finally pulled my phone from my bag. I would set my alarm but not check emails, I told myself. I would read my book and I would go to sleep.

  I wouldn’t think about Becky, or Pippa, or any of it.

  A text flashed on the screen. It was from Pippa.

  Gramps is an adorable loon and he wants me to take him to dinner tomorrow at 3. THREE, Jensen. By half seven I’ll be starving. Please have dinner with me at a normal, adult hour?

  I stared down at the screen.

  The idea of dinner with Pippa sounded good. She would make me laugh, maybe we’d even come back here, to my place. But after Becky and knowing the nightmare that waited for me tomorrow at work, I wasn’t sure I’d be good company.

  To put it simply, I was tired. I just couldn’t deal—with anything right now.

  I felt terrible before I even replied.

  This week is really nuts. Maybe next week? I typed.

  I tossed my phone to the side, feeling faintly nauseated.

  A half hour later, climbing into bed, I checked my phone for a response. There was none.

  Fourteen

  Pippa

  Grandpa handed me a bowl of steel-cut oats, and it took several seconds for my stunned brain to register that the ceramic in my hand was hot.

  Yelping, I quickly set it down on the counter beside my hip, thanking him absently.

  “All you Millennials staring at your phones,” he grumbled.

  Blinking up, I watched as he ambled over to the kitchen table, sitting down to tuck into his own bowl.

  “Sorry,” I said, turning the screen off. “I must be gaping at this like a snake that’s unhinged its entire jaw to eat a small creature.” I put the phone down, joining him at the table. Staring at my mobile in bewilderment wouldn’t change the message there from last night:

  This week is really nuts. Maybe next week?

  Yes, you wanker, but next week I won’t be here.

  “Am I a Millennial?” I asked, grinning at him to push aside my irritation and confusion. “I felt I was an in-betweener. Not an X, not a Y, not a Millennial.”

  He looked up at me and grinned. “Twelve hours you’ve been back and already it’s going to feel quiet when you leave.”

  It already feels quiet, I thought. One week of a house with six people and it became the norm.

  “How about this,” I said, swallowing a bite of oatmeal. “I’ll leave my mobile here and we’ll catch a film?”

  Grandpa nodded into his mug of coffee. “You’ve got yourself a plan, kiddo.”

  The road passed under us in a steady hum that filled the car.

  I had a pretty nasty hangnail on my left middle finger.

  My skirt needed to be laundered.

  My shoes were falling apart.

  I suppose I should have clued in with his It was really nice to meet you when he dropped me off, but I’d been hoping it was just nerves or the awkwardness of Hanna watching us so intently. It wasn’t. That hadn’t really been a see-you-later kiss, it was a goodbye.

  Jensen was an asshole.

  I’d forgotten how horrible it felt to be dumped.

  “I realize I don’t know you as well as I used to,” Grandpa said carefully, “but you’ve seemed pretty quiet all day.”

  Looking over, I gave him a halfhearted smile. I couldn’t deny it, and even going out to see a beautifully shot and wonderfully distracting documentary on the migration patterns of African birds hadn’t snapped my mood away from Jensen’s brush-off last night.

  It wasn’t that I’d expected more, it was that it had genuinely turned into more. I knew I wasn’t imagining it. I trusted my view on things too much to believe that.

  “I’m sorry,” I said.

  “That’s the tenth time you’ve apologized today,” he said, frowning. “And if there’s one thing I know about you, it’s that you’re not a compulsive apologizer.”

  “Sorr—” I stopped myself, giving in to a real smile this time. “Oops.”

  He stared stoically at the road ahead of us. “I’ve been told I’m a terrible listener,” he joked, “but you’ve got me trapped in the car.” Softening, he added, “I’m all ears, honey.”

  “No, it’s nothing,” I began, turning slightly in my seat to face him. “But those mobile phones you hate? I hate them, too, now.”

  Glancing at me quickly, Grandpa asked, “What happened?”

  “I believe I was dumped via one.”

  Grandpa opened his mouth to speak, but I continued on, clarifying. “Not that Jensen and I were together. Though, in a sense, we were?” I winced.

  “Jensen?”

  “The guy I talked to on the plane. Apparently he’s Hanna’s brother.”

  Grandpa laughed. “And Hanna is . . . ?”

  “Sorry,” I said, laughing now, too. “Hanna is the wife of Ruby’s brother-in-law’s business partner.”

  He gave me a blank look before turning back to the road.

  I waved my hand, letting him know it wasn’t mission critical that he understood the spiderweb of relationships. “It’s this giant group of friends, and I went on the trip with some of them: Ruby and Niall, Will and Hanna. Jensen is Hanna’s oldest brother, and he came along.”

  “So it was two married couples and you, and Hanna’s brother?” Grandpa asked, frowning. “I think I’m getting a picture of what’s going on.”

  “I honestly don’t want to overshare here,” I said, “and since that’s my given superpower, I may need to physically cover my own mouth to keep from doing so, but I will say that I liked him. I think I rather liked him a lot. And on this holiday, for two weeks, it felt like . . . he might like me, as well? But now that I’ve reached out, wanting to see him one more time before I leave, he’s . . .” Frowning, I murmured, “Well, he’s got work.”

  “Work,” Grandpa repeated.

  “Every waking hour, apparently. He has too much work to do to see me even for a late dinner.” My heart seemed to dissolve, painfully, inside my chest.

  “So,” he said, making sure he understood, “he was pursuing you on this two-week trip, but back to the real world and he doesn’t hav
e time.”

  Ugh. Enough. “It’s some version of that. We were both on the same page, but then suddenly . . . we weren’t.”

  Grandpa turned down the tree-lined street of Coco’s childhood home. “Well, then I guess it’s time for some whiskey.”

  By seven, I’d had just enough whiskey with Grandpa on the porch that, when my phone lit with Hanna’s number, I wasn’t entirely sure it would be a good idea to answer.

  But then my gut grew a little tight with guilt, because I didn’t want to ignore her call, either. She was doing what I’d wanted us to do, after all: call each other, stay connected.

  “Hanna!” I said, answering as I stood, walking to the other end of the porch.

  “Gah,” she started, without greeting. “It’s so good to hear your voice. I feel like we’re all going through withdrawal today!”

  I laughed, and then felt my humor cool. Maybe not all of us.

  “Absolutely,” I said, as evenly as possible.

  “What are you doing Wednesday night? Do you want to come over for dinner?” Without waiting for an answer, she added, “You’re in town until next Monday, right?”

  “I leave on Sunday.” I glanced at Grandpa, who sat sipping his whiskey and staring serenely out at the brilliant green lawn. He loved his granddaughter, but even more, he loved his quiet. “Uh . . . let me check my calendar for Wednesday.”

  I pretended to open the calendar app on my phone, knowing of course that I had literally nothing scheduled the entire week other than sitting around Grandpa’s enormous house and wandering Boston alone. The idea of going to Hanna’s for dinner sounded perfect.

  But the possibility that Jensen might show up, after telling me he was busy all week? A little nauseating.

  Unfortunately, I couldn’t head this potential awkwardness off at the pass and ask whether Jensen would be there, because the last thing I wanted to do was open up the conversation with Hanna about her brother having sex with me in nearly every position possible for two weeks and then blowing me off via text message. No doubt Jensen wouldn’t discuss me with Hanna unless she pried, and she would assume all was well. I was also sure that while he was still a jerk for the text brush-off—and it didn’t excuse his behavior—he probably was busy. After being away for two weeks, the odds of him taking time to go to his sister’s were probably not good. It would be fine.