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Chapter Seventeen

Over the following months, Ayden and I grew closer. We did everything together. It was me who did the school runs with him, me that went to his parents’ evenings. I helped him with his homework, I volunteered to go on school trips. I wanted to fill the void Ayden must have where his dad should have been. He’d been gone for months, and we had seen and heard nothing from him. To say I was angry was an understatement. Drake had made a commitment to me nearly eight years ago and he’d taken Ayden on as his own, even going so far as to adopt him to make him legally his. So why had we heard nothing?

Lynne and Meghan had visited, taken Ayden out at the weekends sometimes. They didn’t know where Drake had disappeared to or why, and they hadn’t heard from him either. It was like he had just vanished. It was coming up to Christmas and I wasn’t looking forward to it at all. Our first Christmas without Drake was bound to be hard, but Ayden was going to suffer the most. He knew it wasn’t his fault that his dad had left, I’d made sure to make him realise that. But he still cried himself to sleep at night. And now we were going to go through the motions of celebrating, but with no presents from Drake, Ayden was back to thinking it could be his fault. Meghan brought him presents over and so did Jack and Leanne. Lynne invited us for dinner with them, as she had given up trying to find out where Drake was and she didn’t want us to be alone. Nobody had heard a single word from him, and when Meghan had seen a friend and work colleague of his in town, she found out he wasn’t at work either. He was supposedly off on leave under ‘special circumstances.’ God alone knew what that one meant, but I didn’t go to the trouble of trying to find out. If he wasn’t working, that was up to him. I was the one paying all the bills for the marital home now—everything had been transferred over to me, so there was no need to worry that he was going to leave us in the lurch by not working and not paying the bills.

That night, I sat and wrote an email. I was advised by a friend that when I needed to say something to Drake but couldn’t because he was uncontactable, to write it down. She said that it would help get all my feelings out and then I could delete it.

It’s nearly Christmas and I sit here wondering where you are, what you’re doing, who you’re with. Do you ever think of me? I know that you’ll never read this—because I’ll never send it—but writing is cathartic, or so I’m told. I’ve written to you a couple of times, but those emails stay in my draft folder, without an email address to send them to. I tried emailing you once, only to get it returned because the email address is said not to exist. It’s silly really, I get these overwhelming urges to contact you, so I do this instead. I talk to no one except the screen, the feelings I have remain locked away from other people because they want me to say I’m moving on. Everyone wants me to be okay. I need to be okay. Not just for me, but for Ayden too. He needs his mom to be strong. Mostly, I am strong—at least on the outside. But sometimes, I want to curl up in a ball and cry myself into oblivion. If I didn’t have my son keeping me grounded in the real world, I’d retreat from everyone and everything.

Sometimes I kid myself that I’m over you, but I’m just lying to myself. I’m lying to everyone I know and love, telling them what they want to hear; I’m okay, I’m over you, I’m happy. These are all things I say each and every day, like a mantra, but no matter how many times I say them, I can’t actually believe them. I know you’re long gone and your life with me is a thing of the past, but each day that I wake, I look across to your pillow and in my half-sleep state, for a moment, everything is okay. But then when I’m fully awake, it’s like a knife to my heart as it sinks in that you’ll never be here again. You left and I have to learn to cope with that somehow.

I go about my daily life and struggle to keep up the façade. My beautiful son misses you, but tries not to mention you in case he upsets me. I don’t mention you in case I hurt him, so I guess we’re both walking on eggshells. It’s probably not the healthiest way of dealing with things, but it’s the only way we know how.

I still don’t know why you left. You never offered me any explanation—in fact you seem to have cut all ties. I don’t know what has become of you. I have your number but it just goes to answerphone. I want to talk to you, to find out how you are, but even if you did answer your phone, I know you’d reject me again. So I guard my heart instead. I’ve been doing it for months now and it comes a little more naturally with each passing day. The pretence of being okay is like a cloak I pull around me. I don’t know if I’ll ever truly be okay again, but I’ve gotten good at pretending. I want to accept that you’re gone and that nothing I say will ever bring you back, but I can’t do that either. It isn’t false hope, I’m not foolish enough to believe that anything could make you come back to me. I bear you no ill will, hold no grudges, and wish you well. But I can’t be happy for you. You destroyed everything I believed in. You destroyed us. And all for what?

I’m not going to lie to you. As Christmas draws near, my heart breaks a little more. I want to remain strong, but I crumble a little more with each passing day. Christmas used to be such a happy occasion. The three of us would wake together, open our presents, and then we’d head to your parents’ house where we’d eat until we were fit to burst, laugh until our faces hurt, and be as happy as any family could be. Now it’s just me and my beautiful little boy. A boy you helped raise as though he was your own. A boy you also left as easily as a snap of the fingers. That was something that really broke my heart. You left and he questioned if it was his fault. Did he do something wrong? I had to comfort him, hold him as he cried, stroke his hair and tell him the awful truth; that you didn’t love me anymore. It wasn’t in any way his fault—it was mine, and I drove you away.

I sit here writing this and wonder exactly what I did to drive you away. What did I say? What did I do? What was so wrong with our relationship that you could just up and leave without giving me a reason? It must have been something glaringly obvious, because you saw it, yet I remained oblivious. I was so in love with you that I didn’t comprehend you not feeling the same way. When did you stop loving me? Why? Was it really something we couldn’t have worked out? I know we had our ups and downs, every couple does. But looking back over our time together, I can’t see anything that stands out as the thing that broke us up.

What truly matters to me now is finding a way to move on. I never got any closure from you. You owed me that, at least, but I never got it. I’ve been trying to find my own closure, but it’s seemingly elusive. I guess that’s why I’m writing this email, to see if my mind can come to terms with things and allow me to move on.

I’m sat here wrapping presents for Ayden and what breaks my heart is that your name doesn’t appear on any of the tags. It breaks me a little more inside. How can I repair the breakages? It’s not like there’s hole-filler for the heart. Emotional scars aren’t visible, but they run the deepest. I think of all the things I never said to you and I think of your last words to me, words that left an indelible mark on my soul; it’s not your fault. Every woman knows that those words are code for the exact opposite. You said “we need to talk” again, that was code for “I’m leaving you.” I’ll never forget how my heart lodged in my throat upon hearing these words. I couldn’t swallow. I couldn’t breathe. Time stopped having any meaning the moment you walked out the door and I still feel as lost now as I did then.

You haven’t asked for a divorce and I can’t bring myself to initiate it. I’m not lying to myself that there’s a chance you’ll come back. I know you’ve gone for good. But I can’t file for divorce because it would make it all too real. But then, is that exactly what I should do? Would it be the closure I need? I can’t even bring myself to contemplate it right now. Maybe once Christmas is over, I should revisit that question. For now, I’m just going to concentrate on giving my son as happy a Christmas as possible. It’s the least he deserves. I hope wherever you are, whatever you are doing, that you’re okay. I meant it when I said I don’t hold a grudge. I want you to be happy. I just don’t want to have to hear about it. That’s why I’ve distanced myself from any mutual friends. I don’t ask, they don’t tell. Be happy. Be loved. Just don’t rub it in my face. Please.

***

It was two days before Christmas when Meghan came round to see the two of us. We had a tree in the dining room and Ayden was itching to decorate it. Auntie Meghan had told him she had something special for him to add to the tree, so he waited impatiently at the window in the lounge to see her car arrive.

The red Mazda pulled up on our drive and Ayden squealed, running to open the front door. I was glad that even though Drake hadn’t contacted us, his family had remained in contact. Ayden didn’t deserve to lose his whole family.

“Hey there, little man!” Meghan said as she got to the front door, arms laden with a huge box that had
‘Disney Store’
printed on the side. She moved the cumbersome box to her hip so she could ruffle Ayden’s hair and pull him in for a one-armed hug.

“Hey,” she said as she saw me.

“Coffee?” I asked as I helped her with the box.

“Oh yes please,” she replied, smiling at me as Ayden rambled on at her about Christmas.

I turned towards the kitchen and went to put the coffee machine back on. I made the drinks and followed the noise into the dining room. Ayden was chattering away about what he wanted Santa to bring him.

“Now Mommy’s here, you can go ahead and open the box,” Meghan said to Ayden as I passed her the steaming mug of coffee.

Without further ado, Ayden dived into the box and found so many pretty things. There were hanging ornaments for the tree, crackers, and a stunning snow globe. Everyone knew that Ayden still loved Mickey Mouse, so many of the things in the box were Mickey related in one way or another. The snow globe was Sorcerer Mickey from
Fantasia
and it had his hat on top of the globe. It was perfect and Ayden’s face lit up as he shook it and watched the snow and glitter fall. He loved snow globes and had a little collection of them in his bedroom.

As Ayden hung the ornaments on the tree and made space for the crackers, Meghan moved closer to me and whispered quietly.

“These are from Drake. He came by my place the morning after the last time he saw you both. He asked me to bring them to you. They came from your visit to Disneyland.”

I didn’t know how to feel about that. He obviously wanted to surprise us with them, so had bought them without our knowledge while we were away. But to not give them to us himself, to go to his sister and get her to do his dirty work, that didn’t sit well at all. I knew I needed to put a happy face on for Ayden, but I didn’t know if I should tell him that they came from Daddy.

“Should I tell him?”

“I don’t really know, that’s why I haven’t said anything. It’s your decision if you tell him or not,” Meghan whispered as she took another sip of her latte.

I looked at my son and saw the happiness on his face as the box seemed endlessly full of goodies. I didn’t know whether telling him would burst his bubble or make him happy to know his dad had been thinking of him. I decided not to tell him just yet. I shook my head infinitesimally at Meghan and she nodded in acquiescence. She wouldn’t say a word.

We finished decorating the tree with a Santa Jack Skellington tree topper. My favourite film of all time is
The Nightmare Before Christmas
and I had gone gaga over the topper when I saw it in France. Drake had bought it for me and now it took pride of place on top of our tree. It was just a shame Drake wasn’t going to see how great it looked. The whole house looked like Christmas had thrown up on it. We had lights, streamers, popcorn garlands, tinsel, and a gingerbread house that Ayden and I had baked and decorated. There was a blow up Santa on the front lawn, a reindeer on the roof, and icicle lights all around the front of the house. I never really cared much to decorate for Christmas until Ayden came along. But after he was born, we made an effort to decorate and go trick or treating on Halloween and to decorate for Christmas. It was tradition to have a cup of cocoa before bed on Christmas Eve and to leave a plate of goodies out for Santa and his reindeer. We had some magic snow and snowflake stickers in the windows, as well as a big sign on the lawn saying
‘Santa Stop Here,’
so it was safe to say that this house was done out enough for Santa to notice. The whole street tended to go all out for Christmas too, so at least we didn’t look out of place.

The following day was Christmas Eve and traditionally we would go to Lynne’s for roast chicken, stuffing, and gravy sandwiches. So that afternoon, we got a taxi over to her house. I was saving up to buy myself a car—we hadn’t needed one when it was the three of us because Drake took us wherever we needed to go, but somehow I had to afford a car in order to stop having to get taxis everywhere.

Lynne had gone all out with the decorations as usual. Benji the dog even had an elf hat on. We ate and drank until we were full to bursting and we watched Christmas films, including Lynne’s favourite,
The Snowman
. Ayden’s laughter filled the house, but it wasn’t enough to fill the void that was left by Dennis’ death and Drake’s absence.