28th May 2018 - Memorial Day

Car keys safely hung by the door, suddenly I was overcome by a sense of loneliness. A wave of self-pity and tired lethargy sweeping over me. Alone by myself on the Memorial Day holiday. Husband about to fly to the other side of the country. Kids busy with their own things, building their own lives. Ex-lover and boyfriend in a self-imposed exile several thousand miles away in California. I caught myself in the mirror, wondering how come I was so alone on this day when everyone else would be together with loved ones.

I just stared at myself in the mirror, in one of those rare moments of self-reflection where you look at your own face as others see it. Seeing beyond the mask you’re overly familiar with.

I’m not quite sure how long I stared and Jill stared back, but it seemed quite some time before my maudlin thoughts were disturbed by the ringtone that meant my daughter Abigail was calling.

Like most mums the world over, I loved my three all equally but wasn’t blind to their differences. Abigail had always been the most sensitive of the three, from her early years onwards, always more alive to my moods and feelings than the others. And my mood instantly brightened at the thought of Abigail’s love and the prospect of a chat with her.

“Hi mum, just thought I’d give you a call to see how you’re doing. I know Dad’s away so just wanted to check-in and see how you are?”

Always direct and to the point, the previous weekend when the family had gathered to celebrate John and Becky’s good news, Abigail and I had ended up having a late-night heart-to-heart talk about Chris and the whole situation over the last few months. She’d been remarkably sympathetic and unjudgmental. Treating me more like a good friend who needed support, rather than an errant and weak parent who’d put at risk the family she loved and relied on.

The others had gone to bed, Abigail and I had ended up opening another bottle of wine, retiring to the decking and talking into the early hours. I started off just sharing the more mechanical and factual side of what had happened with Chris, picking up from where things had ended with Daryl as Abigail was already aware of this. The only bit I was too embarrassed to share being my debauched night with Chris and Rocco. Even my ever-loving and broad-minded daughter didn’t need to know that part of the past.

And although I’d started off mainly describing events and the headlines, sitting out on the decking it hadn’t taken my loving daughter long to get beneath this. To the heart of the matter – how I was feeling, how her Dad was feeling and how things were between us. And you might say that a mother shouldn’t share such things with a daughter, breaking the parental bond to protect their kids, but I’d ended up spilling my feelings pretty much without exception. Glad to have someone who loved me so much and who’s expression and words told me she wasn’t criticizing or judging. Just trying to help me and let me know she was there for me.

In the two weeks that had passed since I’d returned home from my last date with Chris, I’d been pretty open with Dave. But sometimes I needed to hold back a little, to protect his feelings and not expose him to the full glare of some of my confusion, mixed feelings and guilt.

The things I shared with Abigail, I’d already shared with Dave. But maybe in a more monochrome, two-dimensional way. With Abigail, I was able to give full expression to the depth of my feelings.

I’d told Abigail about each and every part of how I was feeling. My relief and contentment that her father and I seemed to be putting things back together. Reassembling and gluing the slightly chipped vase we’d made of our marriage. How we were dealing with things step-by-step, generally heading in the right direction, happy with this but sometimes still slightly disbelieving that we were on the road to recovery.

But I’d also told her of my slightly darker and more confused moments. The quiet moments at the office when I’d look into the empty chair in Chris’s office and find myself almost physically pining for his presence. Wishing as if some genie from a kids' movie would appear and magic him back into my life. Back into my life, back into my heart and back into my bed. Momentarily angry that life wouldn’t allow me to have the two men I so wanted, daydreaming about parallel universes where I could have my cake and eat it. Wondering what life would have been like in my magical parallel universe, if I had gone to California with Chris.

I’d shared with my wonderful daughter about the guilt and confusion I felt at this pining for love lost. Confusion at how much I still yearned for Chris and our love, while at the same time so happy that Dave and I were still together and stepping forward better each day. Guilty at having these feelings for another man, another man who’d almost cost me my marriage.

All through this Abigail listened, held my hand and acted much more like a loving best friend than a disappointed child. As we’d shared these intense moments, I was so glad and grateful for her love and understanding. We even laughed a bit when I tried to make light of the schoolgirl flutter I felt in my heart on the few occasions when work had forced Chris and me to talk on the phone. And how afterward I’d fight the urge to find a made-up pretext to call him back. Abigail teasing me and christening me ‘the teenage stalker mum.’

All of these memories from a week ago had come flooding back as I heard the ring tone I’d set up for Abigail, and now hearing her soft voice asking me how I was, instantly swept away the lonely feelings I’d been experiencing.

“Mum, are you there? I asked you how you were doing?”

I’d been so lost in my thoughts I’d forgotten to answer her question.

“Sorry, honey. I was a million miles away. Thinking back to last weekend and the chat we had when everyone had gone to bed.”

Silence on the other end, Abigail was trying to figure out what to say, momentarily lost for words for once. “Well, yes. That was quite some conversation, wasn’t it? Not the kind of thing a daughter forgets in a hurry. But I was just glad if it helped you a little, mum. Anyway, how are you, mum?”

“Fine, I guess. Just missing your Dad, I guess. Wondering if I’m the only one in the sub-division all by myself tonight?”

“I know you’re an English major, mum, but don’t be such a drama queen,” she gently admonished me, her tone teasing as well as delivering a soft rebuke. “Dad will be home soon enough, and surely there are loads of friends you could go and spend the evening with?”

She had a point. Or two points, to be precise. There were plenty of friends I could call on to provide a bit of company and warmth.

“What about Charlotte and Callan?” she unwittingly asked. “They’re always glad to see you.”

It was my turn to be lost for words, trying to work out how to tell my daughter about the latest sad news about the state of Charlotte and Callan’s marriage. When they’d coached their soccer teams, all three of our kids had become close to them and in turn, they loved spending time with and spoiling our kids. Like John and Sarah, Abigail had been so happy when they reconciled, and now I needed to find the right words to tell her that a couple she almost considered as surrogate parents were calling time on their marriage.

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It was forty or fifty minutes later that I finally finished talking to Abigail about what was happening with Callan and Charlotte. She was sad and upset, but she was mature enough to know these things happen. Heaven knows she’d seen enough of her own friends’ parents involved in similar splits.

As we discussed it, she became more accepting of it, but I have to admit it did sting when she made a couple of comments about how her father and I hadn’t been quite so far away from being in the same boat as Callan and Charlotte. I didn’t like to hear her say this, but I could hardly argue the point.

The only upside of this difficult conversation was it took my mind off how lonely and down I was feeling. Cheering up and consoling my daughter taking first place over and above any remaining self-pity I felt.

I’d just put down the phone and poured myself a well-earned glass of wine when the doorbell rang. Whereas an hour ago I’d have been glad to hear the bell, now I felt slightly frustrated. After the long, difficult conversation with Abigail, I’d been looking forward to some peace and quiet before maybe popping over to a friend’s house. But my car was parked outside declaring to all the world that I was ‘in residence’ so with a slightly resigned feeling I trudged to the front door.

Opening the door I saw the slightly guilty look of my ex-boyfriend smiling back at me in a slightly lop-sided and bashful way. His crooked grin offering an unspoken apology for arriving unannounced and disturbing my holiday.

“Sorry, hun,” he declared, using the pet name he’d often used for me. However I was feeling, I could never stay angry at him for long.

“To what do I owe the pleasure?” my simple question, mirroring his smile and signaling I was okay at his sudden appearance on my doorstep.

Never short of confidence, even when life had thrown him several curveballs, his smile upped a few amps and he turned up the knob on his charm meter. “Knowing Dave was away, I thought I’d pop over and cheer up my favorite girl,” he announced, pulling a bottle of white wine from behind his back.

“You’ll never change will you,” I parried back. “My once and former crush, a man who could sell sand to the Arabs. Snow to the Eskimos. Or lies to a Politician.”

He knew he was in, pushing the bottle into my hands. “Come on, hun. It’s not like you to be slow when there’s a bottle of Chardonnay to be enjoyed. Where’s the girl I knew all those years ago?”

The way he said ‘knew’ carried more than a hint of the type of meaning not appropriate in a conversation between two exes when a lady’s husband is absent. But I let it pass, gave him a welcome hug and let him follow me into the kitchen. Fully aware his gaze was almost certainly on my ass and legs, two parts of my charms he’d always loved, even all those years ago when we’d dated.

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As we opened the bottle and settled down it felt good to have Callan there. Even before he really opened his mouth in any meaningful way, I knew he’d come here to unburden himself some more about him and Charlotte, now that they’d decided to finally call it quits on their marriage.

I’d long since gotten over the pain and hurt from all those years ago when he’d dumped me to take up with Charlotte. I was happy that I’d found a wonderful friend and lover in Dave and that we’d built a great life together. So I was fine to sit there and just be the friend that Callan needed right then and there.

As I sat there listening to him and his various long monologues about him and Charlotte, just occasionally interrupting with a question or a comment, I couldn’t help but think how handsome he looked. The first time he’d looked at me back in college, I’d thought him the most handsome boy I’d ever met and I’d been overjoyed when he’d picked me over other girls I thought far prettier than me.

It was something I’d not thought about in many years, but as I only half-listened to him going on and on about him and Charlotte, I smiled to myself reflecting that the way Dave and I had changed things these last months meant I was looking at Callan in a way I’d not looked at him since I was a shy and innocent eighteen-year-old. I tried to stop myself smiling at the silliness of all this in case Callan asked me why I was smiling, just about pulling it off.

I guess the other reason, aside from the changes in our marriage, for the different way I was looking at him, was the way I was still missing Chris. Most of the time I was more than happy with how things had turned out and that I’d one-hundred-percent made the right decision, but there was still more than a little of the ‘Chris poison’ in my blood, even if it was gradually getting better and better each day.

I’d often thought that there were many similarities between Chris and Callan, both of them overly confident ex-jocks who’d spent a lifetime knowing most women were happy to be charmed and flattered by their advances. And with Chris on the other side of the country, having my handsome ex sat there with me drinking white wine wasn’t a bad placebo to get me through the evening.

After a while, I wasn’t the only one who seemed to have got the poison out of their system. Callan seemed to have vented whatever he needed to say about Charlotte and his mood lightened as he slowly became nostalgic and almost wistful as he started talking about the two years we’d dated before Charlotte had come along.

Aside from his looks, athletic build, and charm, Callan had always been an entertaining and gifted story-teller and raconteur. And he soon had me laughing as we shared all kinds of memories of our two years together at college. Memories of crazy parties, romantic walks, and dinners. Memories of tender moments shared and nights of passion as we discovered and explored each other’s bodies, two young adults still in our teens but excited by the life ahead of us. A life we thought we’d share together until events proved otherwise.

We were happy to meander down memory lane, each prompting the other to remember things either forgotten or just on the edge of memory. A lovely and cathartic way to spend the evening for both of us, each with our different needs.

Once or twice I thought I caught a look in Callan’s eye that I’d not seen since before that horrible, painful night when he’d dumped me for Charlotte, shattering my heart into a thousand and one-pieces, causing a pain that took so long to recover from. Maybe I was imagining it. Either way, he said nothing about it and we were happy to just relive old memories. Remembering past events, friends, and feelings.

I honestly don’t know how long these self-indulgent pleasures would have lasted if the phone hadn’t rung again. This time it was the landline, and I wondered who it might be as Dave, the kids and most of my friends defaulted to calling me on my cell phone. Not many people rang the landline, and as it was now past six it seemed unlikely to be some nuisance commercial call.

“Hello,” I answered noncommittally, still wondering who it was on the other end.

“Hi, girlfriend,” came back Riley’s chirpy tone. “Your loving husband told Byron that you were all on your lonesome tonight and all but insisted that we invite you over for some food and a few drinks. Now I happen to think you’re the kind of old school girl who promised to ‘love, honor and obey’, so why don’t you throw something on and get yourself over here before Byron eats all the food, in line with your Lord and Master’s wishes and commands.”

Hell, this girl could talk for the USA. Byron’s ears must have been glad of the rest now that they were just ‘good friends’ or ‘friends with benefits’ or whatever phrase people use. The first time I’d met her, I’d thought she was a quiet sort, but this was a view I was rapidly re-evaluating.

For a few moments I tried to put up a fight and say I’d prefer to stay home, but Riley was proving to be as stubborn as she was talkative, and in the end, I gave in and headed next door. I asked Callan if he wanted to come as he seemed at a bit of loose end, but he made his excuses and said he’d head home. Evidently he didn’t want to share me with his buddy Byron and Riley.

As I watched Callan’s headlights disappear around the corner, I walked to the end of the drive and then headed up our neighbor’s drive, thinking how my quiet evening was turning into an unexpectedly busy time. Courtesy of Callan and Riley.

Riley’s hug and overly effusive welcome suggested she’d spent much of the holiday drinking. A fact which with a giggle and a hiccup she confirmed, adding that she and Byron had also ‘rekindled old memories’ two or three times as well. She was quite brazen and shameless about this, which shocked me for a moment before I thought about some of the things I’d done these last few months. I was hardly the one to feign shocked innocence.

Byron seemed to be in charge of the cooking as Riley poured me a large glass of wine, glad to see that she was drinking white so I’d not be mixing my drinks. I’d already had the best part of a bottle as Callan and I had wiled away the evening reminiscing.

As Riley filled my glass and Byron stood quietly with his back to us cooking, I innocently asked Riley if Byron’s two house-mates Freddy and Josh were in. This just brought a fit of giggles from the giddy and semi-drunk Riley. “Why you asking, girl? While the cat’s away, the mice will play? Is that it? Does the naughty little white wife want a portion of black sausage? Want to try what Aunty Riley’s been savoring all day?”

I couldn’t be angry. She was grinning like a naughty schoolgirl and her words didn’t offend me, more they reminded me of some of the conversations I’d had back in High School with my girlfriends. As we day-dreamed and joked about the various boys we liked.

I just gave her my best motherly look. “Riley, you’re incorrigible. Just how much have you had to drink?”

“Not enough. Not enough, sister,” came the all too predictable reply.

The alcohol obviously had the effect of making Riley frisky, because having embarrassed me she then moved on to Byron, rubbing herself up against him provocatively as he tried to concentrate on the cooking. For whatever reason, Riley was getting little return from her efforts, and she made the face of a sulky child as she gave up on her femme-fatale act with Byron and returned her attention to me. Sitting back down opposite me at the kitchen table and then refilling my glass even though it barely needed topping up.

There was a mischievous glint in her eye as she looked into her glass, playing with the stem and swirling the yellow liquid. Slowly looking up and looking me directly in the eye with a playful curl of the lip, I had a nervous feeling about where she was about to take this conversation.

“You know, Jill, I think the reason that big slab of beef over there isn’t interested in little old me is that he’s secretly carrying a torch for someone else. Someone older. Someone who lives a little closer to him than I can manage. Someone who’s suddenly back on the market.”

She left her words just hanging there between us, enjoying their effect on me and keeping me hypnotized with a stare that would have done the python in the Jungle Book proud.

She just carried on looking at me, no word said. Until she was ready to tighten the hawser just a little more. “What do you say, girlfriend? Do you think there’s any hope for the big lump? Or do you think he’s carrying a torch that’s never going to get lit? A flame that’s never going to enjoy the pleasure of lighting your wick?”

Again that look. That challenge. Enjoying the game, knowing I was nervous at what she’d say next and enjoying every second of my nervousness.

And then, just when I thought I’d explode with the tension of it all, she burst out laughing with a huge guffaw and leaned over the table, giving me a huge hug.

“You’re priceless, Jill. You’re such fun to wind up. I’m just kidding with you, hun. I know that you and Dave are on a break, trying to get some sanity back into your lives over the last few months.”

And just like that, I felt just like a balloon. One minute ready to burst, the next minute with the air rushing out of me and causing a huge deflated and hollow feeling. But a feeling I was happy to embrace, better than the tension of the game Riley had been playing with me. The mouse dangled by the sharp-clawed cat, relieved beyond measure as the cat gently lays me down and tells me ‘only kidding.’

I laughed and Riley and I laughed together, before she snuck over to my side of the table, pressing her petite body tight next to mine as she whispered in my ear as we both looked at Byron’s back as he finished off our dinner.

“But, you know, Jill. As and when you and Dave are ready to get back in the pool, you could do a lot worse than old lover boy over there,” her whisper was low enough that I suspected Byron couldn’t hear us.

“I guarantee you’d have no complaints. My old squeeze would have you shouting from the rooftops, hanging from the chandeliers and enjoying your first real taste of black meat. And I suspect your loving husband would be just as happy as you would be. Byron puts on quite a show you know.”

As her words trailed off, I found myself turning towards her and looking her in the eye. Suddenly there was a different look in her face. Before she’d been teasing and winding me up. Now there was a seriousness, one friend talking to another, almost trying to do two good friends a favor. “Just think about it, when you and Dave are ready. Byron’s a great guy and I’d love to see the two of you get it together. He’s not like that Chris guy, remember he walked away from that couple in LA rather than be the cause of problems between them. That’s the kind of guy he is.”

She squeezed my hand, sensing that she shouldn’t say any more. That she’d said her piece and planted a seed that might or might not grow.

Sober Riley was a very tactile person, but semi-drunk she was something else. Her piece said, she suddenly put her arms around my waist and scrunched her face next to mine, making a really exaggerated sniffing the air gesture. “Come on lover boy, your two best girls are dying of hunger over here. When’s the food going to be ready?”

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We were soon eating a wonderful meal. Byron was some chef and I made a mental note to invite myself over more often to sample his cooking. He’d obviously heard the first part of Riley’s teasing comments about me and him, but he made no sign that any of her words had gone in, taking the conversation back to much more normal topics such as school, family and work.

But this normalcy lasted only until about ten minutes after we’d finished eating and were ensconced in the lounge enjoying fresh coffee and talking about John and Becky’s upcoming wedding and baby. Our quiet tranquility was suddenly burst as the front door opened and Byron’s two housemates came crashing into the lounge. Obviously in a similar state and mood to the one Riley had been in before the meal.

Both of them had big cheesy grins on their faces the moment they spotted me sitting in the lounge on the larger of the two sofas. Riley and Byron were sat snuggled up on the two-seater and I was alone in the middle of the four-seater.

“Jill,” the dread-locked Freddy declared with a surprised squeal that would have done a horny teenage boy proud. “Fancy seeing you here? If Josh and me had known, we’d have come home hours ago.”

With that, he plonked himself down next to me, with his buddy Josh wasting no time before he took the spare space on the other side of me.

They were obviously half-cut but their mood seemed harmless enough, so I relaxed and played along. “Well, you two seemed to have had a nice evening. Where have you been?”

“We’ve been dancing,” a very smiley Josh declared, his bald black head showing a shiny sweatiness that supported his claim. And before I’d had a chance to react or speak he’d got up and given an exaggerated pirouette of a twirl that would have put a ballerina to shame. Or at least it might have done if he wasn’t so drunk that he nearly knocked all the coffee cups flying.

Undeterred and grinning like a fool, he headed to the corner and turned the music system on, before carefully retracing his footsteps until he was standing in front of me.

“Madam, would you do me the honor,” he declared in a voice that wouldn’t have been out of place in Gone with the Wind. His hand remained outstretched in front of me, and when I didn’t respond he bent down and gently lifted my hand so that the rest of my body needed to follow.

Josh’s face was still a picture of old-world seriousness, but the other three were laughing and hooting and I gave in to the mood and burst into a smile as I put my arms around Josh’s shoulders and let my drunk admirer lead me in a slow waltz as best he could. Considering his blood alcohol level, he didn’t do too bad a job, at least until the song ended and his partner in crime executed a gentleman’s excuse me.

After all of Riley’s earlier flirty talking, I’d been a bit fearful that things might get out of hand. But for the next hour or so I enjoyed a perfectly lovely time as these two harmless and handsome young black teachers led me around the small dance floor that was their lounge. Slowly the coffee and the conversation seemed to help them sober up as they took it in turns to dance with me. And it was nothing too extreme, but although I tried to pretend it wasn’t happening I was getting that familiar tingling between my legs as I danced and danced with these two very passable young men. They’d certainly been drinking, and by now I must have been nearing two bottles of wine myself over the last several hours.

Luckily they were okay with slow dances, irrespective of the music, which was just as well as neither of them seemed keen on letting me take a breather, as they passed me between them at the end of each song.

In the end, it was the buzzing of my phone which came to my rescue, signaling an incoming message from Dave. Looking at my phone, I suddenly realized how late it was. I’d had such a nice day first with Callan and then with my other friends that I had no idea it was already eleven p.m., the time that Dave had told me he’d most likely call.

“Facetime?” was his one-word message, and I suddenly found myself feeling guilty even though I’d done nothing to feel guilty about. Looking and feeling flustered and flushed, I rapidly made my apologies, picked up and put on my shoes and headed next door. Feeling rather like Cinderella escaping the ball to be at home in time to avoid trouble.

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“Hi, honey,” I smiled at my distant husband. Hoping I didn’t look too guilty and flustered. Aware that I still felt a little out of breath from the dancing and my hurried exit back home.

“Hi, darling,” came Dave’s reply. Something in his face telling me he was feeling maybe even more guilty than I was.

Before I could think about this, my wine-infused brain had sensory overload. I saw two shadows through the semi-opaque glass of our front door just as I tried to concentrate on what Dave was telling me. “You’ll never guess who I saw in the hotel tonight?” my husband’s strained voice told me, just as I heard the doorbell going for the second time that night.