8. Marco
CHAPTER 8
Marco
A fter dance class, I asked Leah out for a drink and we went to The Lawrence. I had been there with work colleagues but never Camille, so it felt like a safe choice.
We sat at the bar, which she wanted. “I eat alone a lot, and sitting at the bar makes it more interesting.”
I ordered an Old Fashioned made with rum while Leah went for a Lagavulin neat.
She sat a little to the side on her barstool, like I did, so that we could look at each other. She was still radiant from the class, her cheeks slightly flushed, and her hair loose around her shoulders.
She sipped her Scotch and took a deep breath. “There’s nothing like a nice peaty whiskey.”
I grinned. “I’m a cliché! I like my alcohol in the form of rum.”
We talked about the kind of whiskey she liked and how it compared to rum. “One day, I want to go to Scotland and taste the whiskey there. Have you traveled much outside the US?”
“Some,” I conceded. “We tried to go away on summer vacation and explore. Went to Paris, London, the usual places. You?”
“Same.” She seemed pensive after that and then shrugged. “Kevin wanted to be able to talk about where we went with his friends and colleagues.”
“Why did you stop working after you got married?”
“Kevin wanted a stay-at-home wife, and I wanted to make him happy.” She looked at me with sad eyes. “His validation was important to me.”
“Is it still?”
“No. But I miss my children,” she admitted. “I can’t help but feel that if Kevin could just get over the fact that I asked for the divorce—if he could let go of his bruised ego—maybe he’d stop poisoning my relationship with them. Maybe I could have Davis and Presley back in my life.”
She looked so forlorn that I leaned forward and stroked her silky cheek. “I can’t even imagine how much it must hurt to have your children turn against you.”
“Tell me about Camille?”
And just like that, she threw her sadness away and led with curiosity. I withdrew my hand and picked up my drink.
“She was an engineer like me. She was the Vice President of R&D for an IT company.”
“Wow!”
“Yeah.” I sipped my cocktail. “She was impressive in and out of work.”
“You miss her?”
“Every fucking day.”
She put her hand on mine and squeezed. “I’m so sorry for your loss, Marco.”
“Thank you.” I turned my hand so our fingers intertwined. “I’ve been at a crossroads. I loved…love Camille so much. Losing her...broke me. I feel that to have you , because of how I feel, I have to let Camille go. And that terrifies me.”
Her expression softened. “Marco, you don’t have to let Camille go. Love doesn’t work that way. You can love her and still move forward. You don’t have to choose one or the other.”
“How do you do that?”
“Do what?”
“See the world with so much compassion,” I marveled. “Your heart—it’s bigger than I ever thought possible.”
She smiled, her eyes shimmering with a mix of vulnerability and strength. “I learned some hard lessons after I left Kevin. The first was realizing that I had an identity outside of him. And yes, I missed our marriage and even him sometimes—but that didn’t mean I wanted to go back to him or that life. The second was understanding how much I’d been made to feel like I wasn’t enough during all those years with Kevin. If only I were thinner. If only I threw a better party. If only...
“I’m still working on that,” she admitted, her voice steady. “Working on being okay without his validation. Because now I know I’ll never get it, and, more importantly, I’ve realized I don’t want it anymore.”
“Your ex sounds like a right-on douchebag.”
She laughed then as she did with her whole body. Then, she became somber. “Marco, you’re allowed to feel whatever you want to feel. It doesn’t make you weak or wrong. It makes you human.”
At her words, I felt a swell of emotion rise in my chest. I was grateful for her big heart and empathy, admired her indomitable spirit, and respected the work she’d done to heal after what sounded like an emotionally abusive marriage.
I squeezed her fingers with mine. “Thank you.”
“For what?”
“For being you. For being exactly what I didn’t know I needed.”
She chuckled, picked up her drink with her free hand, and took a long sip. “Never expected you to get so sappy, Marco Cabrera.”
“I’m Latin.”
She did this all the time. Changed the tone of the atmosphere so we could move forward, get past hurt or pain or irritation, and just be together. This woman was a treasure, and I was certain her ex-husband was a stupid man to have let her go.
Just then, Gloria Gaynor’s “I Will Survive” streamed through the speakers. We both grinned at the appropriateness of the song.
She lifted her glass in a small toast. “To growing strong and getting along as Gloria says.”
“ Salud .” I clinked her glass with mine.
I held her hand all the way to her car.
I kissed her gently, softly. It was our first kiss. The first time my lips met hers.
It was a benediction—it was me telling her and myself that I was ready for her.