Weather Girl(26)

“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” he says. “This wasn’t me trying to get back together with you. This was just—it was just physical.”

I scoff at that, because I’d love for it to be just physical. I’d love nothing more than to text him every Friday night to come over and go down on me for a solid fifteen minutes, zero emotional attachment. But if I have any hope of moving on, I can’t do that.

“It doesn’t matter. Even ‘just physical’ is going to be a mistake. Is that real enough for you?”

I grab my box of things, leaving him on the couch with mussed hair and a raging hard-on.

“Happy New Year,” I say from the hallway before I shut the door.

When I get back to my car, there’s a parking ticket wedged between the windshield wipers.



* * *



? ? ?

    I TURN THE remaining days of the year into an exorcism. I try on my entire closet and donate anything that reminds me of him, a dress he loved or an accessory he bought me. The only exception is a pair of jeans he said made my ass look incredible because, well, they do.

I’m leaving him in December because I can’t leave him back at Halloween, and I can’t carry him with me into January.

This year, I’m going to be good to myself. I’m going to do things differently. I’ll go on a date and Get back out there, queen! the way every millennial lifestyle website is telling me to. Maybe I’ll learn how to do this casually and I’ll be okay with Friday nights alone, the way my mother so rarely was.

If I’m casually dating, I don’t have to tell anyone about my family or my prescription or my dark days. Because even if Garrison threw all of that into question, I still have no idea how to talk about it with someone. On the third date? The seventh? Right before you sleep with someone? It’s never felt right, never felt natural, and that makes me think it’s never going to.

So I reinstall the app Garrison and I matched on, the one I deleted a few weeks into our relationship. And when Alex texts me asking if I’m free to see our mother after the KSEA retreat next week, it must be the newer version of myself who responds, Okay.

I decline a New Year’s Eve invitation from him in favor of self-care. I’ve never eaten in a restaurant by myself that wasn’t fast-casual, but I make a reservation at my favorite Italian place and simply shake my head when the server asks, “Are we waiting for one more?”

“No,” I say. “Just me.”

I force myself to leave my phone in my bag to savor the atmosphere and the independence. And . . . it’s kind of great, no pressure to talk as I listen to a string quartet play Sinatra.

Only once, in between courses, do I pull out my phone and find a Happy New Year text from Russell. I parrot it back and add a few emojis, but I hesitate before I hit send.

The revelation about his daughter threw me. I’m ashamed to admit I scoured social media afterward, but I couldn’t find any of his profiles. Smart of him, frustrating for me. Still, he’s not married, I’m pretty certain of that. No ring, no mention of a spouse. Then again, this was the first I’d heard of his daughter.

I push him out of my mind. This could be the year of casual dating, learning how to be single, having dinner by myself.

So I order a double chocolate torte for dessert, and I scrape the plate clean.



* * *



? ? ?

THE FIRST DAY of the new year, I sign up for a Costco membership and buy a sixty-four-pack of triple-A batteries.





9




FORECAST:

Freezing temperatures and warm gooey feelings

WE START SMALL.

At our GM’s seventy-fifth birthday, the one he declined to attend, I learned that Torrance and Seth happen to be the only people at the station with a deep and abiding love for carrot cake. I even wondered if Torrance, who planned the party, ordered it just because she knew no one else would eat it.

Our first day back in the office, Russell orders one from a downtown bakery, propping it up in the kitchen with a note that reads HAPPY NEWS YEAR! beneath a doodle of a TV wearing a party hat.

“There’s carrot cake in the kitchen,” I tell Torrance with a knock on her half-open door, while Russell does the same thing with Seth down the hall. Bonding over their favorite food—it’s got to put them in a good mood.

Later that week, I spend an afternoon at a greenhouse picking out the most attractive and least fussy succulent I can find. The woman loves plants, but the less she has to water them, the better. It’s not cheap, but it’ll be worth it. I schedule a delivery and don’t include a card.

“That’s a nice succulent,” Seth says the next day when it shows up, leaning against the wall outside Torrance’s office. It’s exactly what someone who anonymously sent a plant to her would do, and I send him a thousand mental thank-yous.

“It is.” Torrance rearranges some of her pots to find a place for it on her desk. I can tell it’s taking every ounce of restraint not to ask him whether he sent it.

The problem, though, is that we’re not close enough to either of them to know how they’re really reacting. Whether any of this is making an impact.

At the end of the week, after a near-constant exchange of ideas over text and email, we get lucky.

I loop a scarf tighter around my neck, shivering inside my puffy coat as I scan the rows of seats in the arena. Russell waves me over, and I mutter, “Sorry, sorry,” as I climb over legs and bags and foamy cups of beer to get to him.