Deep Surrendering: Episode Nine (6 page)

This isn’t working right now. I love you, but I can’t keep waiting for your calls, hoping that we’ll have the time to talk. Praying for a video chat. And that’s nothing compared to how much I miss seeing you and touching you. I’m not just talking about the sex, although I miss that. The closeness is what I miss. There are a lot of miles between us, but it feels like more. I think we’ve both been pulling away, knowing this was going to happen.

I don’t regret anything, Fin. I need you to know that. We were not a mistake, and I’ll always think of our time together as some of the best times of my life. I also know that I’ll love you forever. I know that I was made to love you, and that will never stop.

I’m always here for you if you want to talk. Write me, or not. I’ll be here.

I love you, now and always.

Sincerely,

Your Marisol

I reread my own letter several times before I folded it up and took it to the post office. I filled out the address I had for Fin and sealed the envelope before dropping it into the box for the international mail.

It was done.

I wasn’t sure how many days it would take for Fin to get the letter. Or if he would respond. I called Chloe right after I sent it and I could barely get my words out since I was sobbing so hard. But she got the gist and met me in front of her apartment. I needed to be somewhere else today.

“Oh, babe,” she said, holding her arms open. I fell into her hug, and she held me for a long time then walked me up the stairs to her place.

She sat me on the couch with a box of tissues and messed around in the kitchen. The sobbing gave way to a numb feeling, almost like being really drunk.

Chloe came back to the table with a tray loaded with wine, ice cream, cookies, chips, and coffee. “I wasn’t sure what you’d need, so I brought everything,” she said.

I reached for the wine and chips first. Chlo seemed satisfied that I was eating and drinking. Then she went and turned on the television, finding a channel that played Law & Order and not much else.

“The last thing we need is anything with romance in it,” she said in explanation as she sat down with me and poured her own glass of wine.

“Do you want to talk about it?” she asked.

I shook my head. Not right now, but maybe later. It was still too fresh and raw.

“Okay, no problem. Let me know if you do, or if you just want to stare at the television.”

“I think I’ll just stare. That’s about all I have the energy for right now.” The numb was giving way to tired. I just wanted to close my eyes and sleep for a year. I drained my first glass of wine and poured a second.

I wanted to get drunk. I wanted to forget. I wanted it to all go away.

I didn’t fall asleep. Chloe and I stayed up most of the night watching TV and eating enough food for six people. We also went through two bottles of wine, though I did most of the drinking. My hangover wasn’t terrible because of all the food I consumed. I’d have to remember that for next time.

Chloe was almost completely silent the whole time. She headed to bed but put a blanket over me. I slept for a few hours, but I kept waking up with this feeling like I was falling.

I didn’t get off the couch until noon, and it was only because I had to pee badly. Chloe was up and looking like she meant business.

“I’ve got some extra clothes for you. I want you to get in the shower and change your clothes. We’re going to the fucking aquarium.” I didn’t want to go to the fucking aquarium. It reminded me of Fin. But I saw the resolve on Chloe’s face and I didn’t have enough energy to protest.

So I got in the shower, changed my clothes, and blow-dried my hair. That was about all I could do. Everything took so much effort.

When I emerged from the bathroom, Chloe smiled at me and handed me a Pop Tart. I bit into it and remembered why I didn’t eat Pop Tarts anymore. Yuck. I ate it anyway.

Chloe pushed and prodded, and got me on the subway and to the aquarium.

“This sucks,” I said. Those were the first words I’d spoken since the night before.

“Yeah, breakups do. But we’re going to go stare at the jellyfish for a while.”

So we did. She sat me down on the bench we sat at the last time we’d come, and I stared at the jellyfish as families with kids streamed around us. A few kids got rambunctious and tried to smash their hands on the tank or climb all over everything. I just ignored them and watched the jellyfish.

They were so hypnotic when they swam.

“I feel like I’m high,” I said. Not that I’d really know what high felt like. I was just assuming.

“It kind of is, actually.” Chloe was a little more adventurous than I was when it came to experimenting.

“Do you want to talk about it?” she asked again.

“He wrote me a letter.” I hadn’t told her any details other than that it was over. “It was a really good letter. He said he wanted to end it, to set me free. It’s crazy because I was going to tell him the same thing, but I got his letter first. I mean, not the whole setting free part. I just . . . I couldn’t do it anymore. I couldn’t live in this constant state of limbo.” Chloe sat and listened. I jumped when a little boy started throwing a tantrum near me. His mother dragged him off, declaring it was well past his naptime.

“A letter. That’s much more romantic than a breakup text.” It was. The letter was terribly romantic.

“So I wrote him one back. I sent it today. I don’t know when he’s going to get it.” I leaned against her shoulder and she put her arm around me.

“What did you say?” she asked.

“I basically agreed with him. Told him I loved him. He said he loved me in his letter. That’s the first time he’s told me.” My heart had swelled, reading those words. And then everything burst.

“Wow. That’s a little messed up, telling you he loved you in a break-up letter.” I guess, looking at it from the outside, it was a little strange.

“I’m glad he did. I knew he loved me, but it was nice to see it. To know that his reasons for ending this weren’t because he didn’t want to be with me.”

Chloe sighed. “I’d think that would make it worse.”

I shook my head. “No, because I know that everything we shared was real. If he’d said he didn’t love me, I’d wonder if he ever loved me. If our whole relationship had been a lie.”

I couldn’t live with that. If I had nothing else from my relationship with Fin, I had the knowledge that he loved me.

“Yeah, I guess you’re right. So, what now?”

“I have no fucking idea.”

Chloe and I spent hours at the aquarium, just watching the fish. I’d moved past the numb stage and everything just made me want to cry.

“I think I’m doing those stages of grief,” I said as we sat down at the café for lunch. It was so loud with kids we could barely hear each other.

“Yeah? Which one are you on?”

“Sad. Really sad,” I said, and I had to take a deep breath. I knew my eyes were swollen and red. I hadn’t cared enough this morning to put cover up on them.

Chloe gave me a sympathetic face and started eating her hot dog. I looked down at my own food. I wasn’t hungry, but I thought I should eat so Chloe wouldn’t worry. I picked at my chicken Caesar salad and watched the mayhem around me.

“Do you think there’s any way you’ll get back together?” she asked.

“I don’t know. I mean, if he comes back and he’s here full time, maybe. But his dad is still going to be in the picture. And I don’t think his dad is just going to let him quit. Fin is his only son. He has to carry on the family name and all that crap.” A mother nearby gave me a nasty look for using the word “crap.” I wanted to roll my eyes at her, but resisted the urge.

“I used to think sometimes that Harmony and I would get back together. Everyone always tells you that if it’s meant to be, it will be and all that shit.” Chloe got another nasty look, but she didn’t notice. “And it felt like it was meant to be. When it was good, it was the best. But then it wasn’t good and I didn’t know how to get it back to that place. I knew we were ending before the whole cheating thing happened. I was so angry at her, but I was also angry that the thing I’d thought would work out, didn’t. My sure thing, not so sure.”

I’d never thought my relationship with Fin had been a sure thing. Not really. We’d always been on the edge of something. But I’d wanted it to be a sure thing. More than I could say.

“And then when it was over,” Chloe continued, “I didn’t know what to believe in anymore. If Harmony and I were wrong, and I’d thought we were so right, maybe everything I thought was wrong. Maybe I didn’t know a damn thing at all.”

I hoped I didn’t go through that. I didn’t want to question everything. The stages of grief were more than enough already.

“We’re quite a pair, aren’t we?” I said.

“Yeah. A pair of girls with broken hearts.”

Great. Now I realized I had a broken heart. That was that achy, hollow feeling in my chest. Sure, I’d had relationships and breakups before, but nothing like this. I’d never loved someone so completely before.

“This is going to be really awful, isn’t it?” I said, meeting Chloe’s eyes.

She nodded. “Yeah, it’s going to suck.”

Chloe and I spent the rest of the day together. We went shopping for some retail therapy that didn’t exactly help, but I ended up with a new pair of pants and a cute top, and then we drowned ourselves in mimosas and never-ending pasta for dinner.