Stronger (19 page)

"Take it, if you want.  I've got hundreds of them."

"Don't mind if I do," she inspects each of them on the tree carefully, before removing one from a branch. She finally holds up a yellow Christmas tree with pinched outer branches, a blue star, and green bulbs.  "I'll take this one.  It'll remind me of the day Lydia finally started living her life again."

Her words fill my eyes with tears.  At least they don't sting.

CHAPTER TWENTY

A MILLION REASONS

I sleep, curled up like an ear. 

When I open my door in the morning, I fully expect Aidan to fall into my apartment, but the hall is empty.  The urge to drink lingers, it nags me like a tiny headache, but it's not so hard for me to push off this morning.  All I really want right now is food--a bowl of Cheerios, to be exact.

Not that I mean to tiptoe past Aidan's door, but I do.  I ride the elevator to ground level and walk out into the wintery mess of the city, breathing deep.  Left is the way to the meetings, to the liquor store.  I turn right and head for the market. 

This morning I have on the hat I used to wear.  Stretched from holding my dreads, it used to look like a sagging beehive at the back of my head, but now it looks like a huge, empty sock.  My blond hair spills from the edges and over the shoulders of my coat.  I wonder if Aidan is watching my back as I walk down the sidewalk from his window.  I kind of wish he was trailing me, or even walking beside me, cracking his jokes or giving me his unsolicited insights into the world.

I'm in line with my cereal and milk and a bag full of other stuff I found, when my phone rings.  I freeze in place, listening again for the ringtone.  Des couldn't have gotten the papers already.  The clerk at the courthouse said Christmas might even delay them a little and with Claudia and Des away on their cruise, it can't be him--

The ringtone blasts a jersey accent,
Yo haaaairdressa is callin', pick it up!

I let out a relieved sigh as I pull out the phone, juggling my groceries to answer. 

"He's gone.  Rob's gone."  Jan bawls on the other end.

"It's going to be okay," I say.  "What happened?"

"The bastard cheated on me..."

"He always cheats.  He'll be back..."

"WITH A WOMAN!" Jan shouts in my ear.  "He's cheated on me
with a woman
!"

"Oh my God, are you kidding me?"

"Nooo!"  He breaks down crying again.

"Okay, listen, I'm coming.  Where are you?"

"At the salon, I've put up the
closed
sign and I'm sitting here getting drunk all by myself."

"Oh.  Okay," I say. 
Oh shit. 
He blows his nose and I can hear his heartbroken sobs.  But an open bottle...it might as well be a burning stick of dynamite waiting for me.

"Can you come, honey?  I could use a shoulder..."

Jan's been my shoulder through just about everything with Des.  I can't fail him now, but I don't know how I'm going to do this without failing myself.

"I'm coming," I say.  "Stay where you are, I'm on my way."

<<<<>>>>

"I need your help," I say into the phone.  My thumb paused over Edith's number, but it was Aidan's digits that I hit.

"What's going on?" he asks.  It sounds like he just woke up from a rough night and it probably was, if he sat outside my door most of the time.

"My friend Jan needs me, but he's getting drunk..."

"Then don't go."

"I have to.  He just broke up with his boyfriend and he's devastated..."

"What you're trying to do is more important than..."

"Just listen to me, Aidan.  I'm going to go see him.  I was just wondering if you'd come with me.  I won't drink if you're there."

"When are you going?"

"Now.  I'm almost to the lobby."

"Our lobby?  You went out?"

"Yeah, for breakfast.  You suck at guarding doors."

"I'll be right down," he says and hangs up. 

He's down in less than three minutes.  He takes my bag of groceries as we walk down to the bus stop.

"I'm sorry about yesterday," I begin.  "It hit me all at once."

"You did the right thing.  You called for help," he says, but there's an edge in his tone, as if he's beating himself up that it wasn't him that got the call.

"Next time, I'll just open my door." I say and his brow lifts.

"You could. So this friend of yours that we're going to see?  He's the hair guy?"

"His boyfriend, Robert, is an asshole.  He's been cheating on Jan forever, but this time, he did it with a chick."

"Ouch."

"Exactly."

"Does Jan know what you're doing...with the drinking?"

"Not yet."

"You should have a plan for how you're going to handle it before you get there," Aidan says as the bus pulls up.  We climb aboard and take a seat near the front.

"I guess I do," I say, rustling the bag in his arms.  "I'm planning on having breakfast."

He peeks into the bag.

"I thought maybe you
met
someone for breakfast."

"Nope, just the cashier down at the grocery store."

"Oh," he says and he grins at me. 

We get off the bus and make our way to Jan's salon.  I knock on the glass.  It takes a minute before Jan appears and opens the door.  His mascara has run down his face and he looks like hell.  The smell of the booze hits me straight in the face as I step inside, but I catch Jan in a huge hug anyway.

"I didn't think you'd bring anyone," he says in my ear.

"It's okay, Aidan's great."

"I can see
that
," Jan says with a sniffly laugh.  He wipes the mascara landslide from his cheeks.  "It's just not the way I was hoping to meet him.  But thank you for coming, honey.  Drink?"

"No, I haven't even had breakfast yet," I say. 

"That's never stopped you before," Jan giggles.  I laugh with him, but I move toward the back break room.

"You caught me at the grocery store when you called.  I brought cereal.  Do you have bowls around here?"

"Mugs," Jan says, raising his mug in the air.  Some of his drink sloshes over the lip.  "None for me though.  I have everything I need right here.  How about you, Aidan?  Would you like a drink?"

I watch Aidan swallow.  "No thanks," he says.

It hasn't occurred to me that being around the stuff would still affect Aidan.  He seems like such a rock, but as I watch his eyes swing to the Jan's bottle and linger a bit too long, I realize this is hard on him too.  I walk back to him, giving him an understanding smile as I hand him one of the mugs in Jan's stash.  I slide my hand up and down his bicep and he grins, as if I'm the one here to comfort him and help him out.  Maybe I am.

We sit in the stylist chairs, Aidan and I drinking out cereal from the mugs as Jan paces, ranting about Rob and the bitch he ran off with.  It takes Jan a solid hour before he begins to wind down.  By that time, Aidan and I have polished off the whole box of cereal and my stomach is painfully full.

"Thank you two for coming when I called," Jan says for the hundredth time.  The booze has got him monologue in circles.  "Thank you for listening to my mess.  Robert and I are so trapped in this cycle..."

"Not anymore," I say, but Jan sighs.  He collapses in a chair and it spins until he drags his foot along the floor to stop it.

"You know me, Lydia, probably better than anybody else does.  Even that fool man of mine.  You know how I am.  I'll be here for him.  I always am."

"Maybe you shouldn't," Aidan says and Jan gives him a sad little smile.

"It's a lovely thought, but Robert is me and I am Robert.  We've been together, doing this to each other for too long.  He knows I won't walk away over some little twat. 
Literally
."  Jan's laugh is as sad as his smile.

"You've done it for me how many times before," I say and Jan perks up.

"I wish I had your courage, Lydia.  What did Des say about the papers?"

"Even drunk, you've got the memory of a hairdresser," I say and Jan laughs.  "I don't think he's gotten them yet.  The court said they might be delayed because of Christmas."

"Well, it's about time.  It's about
damn
time you did it!  This calls for a drink!"  Jan roar, holding his bottle high in the air.

"And, I quit drinking," I say.

"Seriously?" Jan says.  He tries to focus on my face, scrutinizing.  It makes me uneasy.  I realize that this is what Jan and I are to each other, people who share a bottle over the constant mountain slides that we call our lives.  Our relationship might not work the same without the booze. 

But Jan takes my chin in his soft fingers and shakes it a little.  His eyes gloss over as he speaks. 

"I'm so proud of you, honey.  You keep going, Lydia, you
keep going
.  You're growing so far past Des, he'll never be able to catch you again.  And don't you let him, my girl, you hear me?"  His voice cracks. "Don't you dare let him."

<<<<>>>>

I draw an X over another day in my planner, close up the pleather binder and set it on my bedside table.  A heap of my displaced jewelry falls onto the floor.  Aidan reaches for me from beneath the sheets, his hand warm through the thin silk of my nightgown. 

"It's been two weeks," I say.  "Fourteen days."

"Are you feeling good?"

"I still want to drink, but I think it's getting a little better," I lay with my back against him, the heat of his body activating mine.  My hips press against his, release, and press again.  I've been walking so much--miles and miles a day, even in the sleet and freezing temperatures--that I think I've even gotten a little more buff.  One solid hip thrust and we could be making love.

"Still worried about when Des gets back?"

"Yes," I say, freezing my excitement.

"No point in worrying until you have to." Aidan pulls me close, kissing my neck.  "I think we should have a Christmas party."

"When?"

"On Christmas, duh."  He ruffles my hair.

"Who's going to come to that?  Everybody's got families to go to on Christmas."

"Do you?"

"No."

"Me either.  And most of the people we know don't.  Let's have a party."

I snort.  "That would suck.  Everybody sitting around the room, staring at each other."

"C'mon," his voice slithers, just like his finger, down my rib cage.  "I'll show you how to party without the substance crutches."

"I know how it goes.  I've been to one of your parties, remember?"

"You only walked in on one. 
Being
at one is a lot better."

"I don't want to talk about drinking and drugging the whole night..."

"Lydia, they're all normal people, with other things to talk about.  You'll see."

I make a sound that says he's wrong, but he just laughs, the sound as settling as muted wind chimes through my hair.

"Who do you want to invite?" he says.

"Nobody."

"Okay, sooo...Edith...and I was thinking Mrs. Lowt might want to come."

"I don't want Mrs. Lowt to know what's going on."

"You think she doesn't by now?  I think she'd be happy to hear it." He nestles his jaw against mine.  When he talks, his stubble brushes my skin and the hum of his voice transfers into my mouth as if it were his tongue.  The warmth of his body, the melodic tone of his words--it's got to be why I finally agree to having the party. 

To celebrate my flexibility, we have sex--with him on top, guiding his long, strong strokes against me like a classically-trained violinist.  He strokes my hair in a way that feels much more like making love than just having sex.  We've gone so far past three dates, it is impossible to convince myself that any of my old rules even apply anymore.

<<<<>>>>

It is Christmas Eve, and thinking of the party tomorrow, I am the exact opposite of excited.  My anxiety piles up like a brick wall.  It's not because I haven't thrown or attended a party, while being both straight and sober, since elementary school.  It's not that I'm nervous about the judgments Aidan's friends will probably bring about our relationship, wrapped up tight when they walk in the door, but slowly unfurling as they get comfortable over dinner.   It's none of that. 

What is getting me is that Des will be back soon.  He'll know about the divorce papers, if he doesn't already.  I can't even imagine what kind of fury that is going to bring to my front door.

I was so strong when I went to the courthouse to file, but as the time keeps passing, my resolve is fading.  The worry has set in.  I've got to make a life without Des.  I don't know how to do that.

I'm trying to make eggs when all my anxiety is put on hold by the ring of Aidan's phone.

He answers the call as he leans a shoulder on the fridge as I make eggs.  "Hey Shane, you're out of bed early..."

He pushes off the fridge suddenly, staring at the floor.  His back is so rigid and his stare so intense, I switch off the burner.