Chapter 26
ABBY
“I only packed a small box of things, but she said I could have the whole month of July to come clear out my classroom,” I say to Hazel on my way home from the school.
It’s been two weeks since I came home from Cabo, and a week since I requested a meeting with my principal. She scheduled us for the last Friday in June, and I called Hazel right as I walked out of the meeting.
“And she was surprised, you said?”
“Very surprised. But she was happy for me and said if I ever wanted to get back into teaching that she would refer me, but she looked forward to seeing my art and told me I should start posting it on social media so everyone could keep up with me and see my stuff.”
“Oh my god, you should.”
“I’m just a beginner, though,” I say.
“Please. Beginner my ass. But if you’re that nervous about it, just make the profile private so only your people can see.”
“Do you think you and Winnie could come help me take stuff down in my classroom?”
“Of course. When she’s home from work, we can talk calendars.”
Hazel asks me to recount the meeting word for word, and I do, including my own commentary on how nervous I was. How I almost lost my breakfast, I was so scared, but once it was done, I felt just fine. And how I cried when I walked into my classroom knowing it would be one of the last times.
I had a spare box in the room and packed up some of my desk items, not ready to touch any of the art from my students. I know I’ll be keeping it, but taking it down felt too soon.
What I did today was hard.
But I’m so proud of myself.
As I pull into my driveway, I nearly slam on the brakes, my heart stuttering in my chest.
“Oh shit,” I say.
“What? What’s wrong?” Hazel asks.
“Todd is here.”
“What?! Why?”
“The box. I texted him and told him that I’m not mailing the box and he can come get it. He said he’d come today, but he’s like a half-hour early.”
“Ew, like he’s asserting his dominance or something. Trying to catch you off guard. I hate it. I hate him. I’m coming over to beat his face in.”
“Haze. He’s not worth the jail time.”
“Ugh, fine. But call me if you need me. I can be there in five.”
“You live fifteen minutes away.”
“I said what I said.”
Hazel hangs up, and I try to breathe through the rising nausea. A thousand moths take flight in my stomach. I’m afraid that, for the second time, I might lose the only meal I’ve had today.
Todd is sitting on my porch stoop, looking exactly the same as he did six months ago.
His dirty blond hair is combed to the side, perfectly styled without a hair out of place.
He’s wearing jeans and a baby blue button-down that brings out his blue eyes.
His lean frame looks leaner than I remember, especially compared to Miles.
“Hi,” I say as I climb out of my car. “You’re early.”
“Yeah, I have a lunch thing, so I needed to stop by a little earlier.”
“I told you I wasn’t going to be here,” I said.
“Where were you?” he demands.
I try to ignore him as I haul my box of things from the trunk of my car and carry the box to my door. It’s none of his business where I was, but old habits die hard.
“The school,” I say, proud of myself for keeping it vague, even if I couldn’t ignore him completely.
I knew this moment would be hard. In all of our four years together, my priority was staying small so Todd was comfortable.
I was practiced from a childhood of being as good as I could possibly be so I wouldn’t be more of a burden to my parents.
Unlearning all of these things will take time with my parents and my friends and eventually a new partner, but they’re especially hard with someone who has only ever known the smallest version of me.
Todd doesn’t offer to take the box from me, and I don’t ask him to. He just hovers as I unlock the door.
“If you just wait here, I’ll grab the box for you and you can—”
“I’ll come in. I have a few,” he says.
It’s tempting to concede, to shrink for him, but I don’t want him to come inside and what I want matters. I hold my ground.
“It’s probably just as easy if I—”
“Abby, I’d like to chat with you for a few minutes, if that’s okay.”
He hasn’t wanted to chat with me since he broke up with me six months ago, but now he wants a few words? Before I can protest again, he’s reaching around me and opening my front door, holding it so I can walk through.
I let out a frustrated sigh and walk into my home.
Fine. I’ll just kick him out quickly.
Todd follows, shutting the door behind me and climbing the stairs up to my apartment.
“Here is your box.” I gesture to the box of his things that I accidentally took when I moved out.
“Your space is really…interesting.” he says, taking it all in, ignoring his box completely.
I grind my teeth. Of course he would come in and put his judgmental eyes on my space. He’s looking at everything I have here and hating it.
Todd is a minimalist. He hates stuff and I have a lot of stuff.
Eclectic art pieces hang all over the walls, mostly things I found in thrift stores, and shelves are cluttered with art pieces my students gave to me and plants I’ve acquired.
The space is clean, but full. I’ve loved building this nest for myself filled with things that bring me joy.
It’s taken time, but I’m proud of my home.
I straighten. “Thank you. I quite like living on my own,” I say, but he doesn’t seem to catch the dig.
“Why do you have a box of things from your desk at school?” he asks, abruptly changing the subject again.
None of your business.
“I put in my notice today.”
“You’re leaving teaching?”
“I am.”
“To do what?” His shock is palpable.
“I’m going back to school to pursue graphic design,” I say.
“Why? I assume that means you’re losing your health insurance. And you’ll be out a steady paycheck for a few years probably.”
He says these things as if I haven’t thought of them. As if I’m a child who hasn’t belabored her own decisions. Did I really never notice the way he talks to me?
Thank god he left.
“Because I want to. I’m doing it because I want to. Do you want this box of things, Todd?”
Todd’s eyebrows shoot up to his hairline. It’s the strongest pushback I’ve ever given him, and I didn’t even use a harsh tone.
He scans me then, head to toe. It’s intrusive the way he’s looking at me, like he’s finally seeing me for the first time today, and maybe ever.
“You seem different,” he says, eyes narrowed.
“Oh, is it my tan?” I say, feigning ignorance. “I was just in Mexico.”
“Mexico? Who’d you go with?”
Maybe a few months ago I would have been hurt that he didn’t even remember that last week was when our honeymoon was planned.
It’s not like I thought he was pining over me after he dumped me, but it does sting a little that he seems to have forgotten things.
And then for him to ask who I went with…
I can see it in his eyes. He wants to know if I went with another man. Is he jealous or just incredibly nosy?
I did not go with another man, thank you very much. He just happened to be there already.
“No one, Todd. I went on what was supposed to be our honeymoon by myself,” I say, not softening the sharp edge to my voice. My shoulders are starting to feel stiff from all the tension in them.
“Wait, you traveled solo?”
Again, no acknowledgment of the honeymoon. Just a comment about how he can’t believe I did something by myself.
It makes sense, given who I was when I was with him.
I trailed Todd like I was his shadow, deferring to him, letting him make decisions because I pretended like I didn’t have preferences or needs.
Of course he doesn’t believe I could do something like that by myself or think that I would even enjoy it.
“Yes, I traveled solo.” I cross my arms in front of my chest.
“You were never the solo traveler type.”
“I guess I am now.” I smile brightly, refraining from rolling my eyes at him.
“Wow.” He’s looking at me again with bright eyes, a smile creeping over his face, like he’s liking what he sees.
I shift, uneasy under his gaze. “Anyway, thanks for coming to get the box.”
I pick the box up and thrust it onto him. He finally takes it from me, and I can see the light at the end of the tunnel for this conversation.
“No, yeah, I was out of town before and thought it would be easier for you to just go to the post office or whatever, but this worked out. It’s really, really nice to see you, Abby.”
I don’t echo the sentiment because it’s not that great to see him, although it has been really great to see myself around him. To see what I’m capable of. I thought with Todd I’d only ever be able to shrink, but I feel tall. I feel powerful in a way that I haven’t around him.
So maybe it was good to see him after all.
I won’t give him the satisfaction of that, though.
I start walking toward him so he has no choice but to make his way down the steps to the front door. He juggles the box in his arms to get the door open, and once he’s through, he turns back to me, shifting the box so it sits against his hip.
“Hey, maybe we could grab a drink sometime. It’d be really nice to catch up.”
I should just say no and shut the door. The best thing for me to do right now is to flat out refuse and let him lick his wounds in the car.
But my curiosity gets the better of me, and maybe the power I’m feeling has gone to my head a little too much.
“Can I ask why? Why you suddenly want to get a drink?”
He shifts, not used to this dynamic between us, where he has to answer to me.
“You just…you seem different. In a good way,” he rushes to assure me.
“You just seem really confident, and sure, the tan looks really good on you. But there’s something I can’t quite put my finger on?
And I’d like to. Over drinks, a coffee or something. ”
If I wasn’t certain I never wanted to speak to Todd again after this, his little speech seals the deal.
He’s interested in me now because I seem different.
Because I’m not the girl he dated for four years.
He’s seeing me right—I am a more confident version of myself.
I am now the version of me that he wanted me to be all along, but instead of loving me through that and walking with me as I became that version of myself, he kept me small until it didn’t work for him anymore and then he left.
Miles did more for building my confidence and empowering me in nine days than Todd did in four years. That’s the kind of partnership I want.
“Got it,” I say. “I think I’m good.”
The look on his face as I close the door on him is more satisfying than I expected it to be.
I lean against my front door, listening to the sound of his car start up and drive away, tension easing in my chest.
I need to call Hazel and tell her how it went. She’s going to eat it up.
But I need a minute to myself first, because my heart aches after that. Not because I saw Todd, and not because I’m sad about our relationship ending or how he behaved or treated me. It stung, but that isn’t what’s gnawing at me.
It’s the Miles-shaped hole in my chest. It’s having that entire interaction with Todd and missing Miles more than I have since I got back two weeks ago—and that is saying something because I have missed him a lot.
It’s wishing I could reach out to him and tell him what just happened and invite him over and have dinner with him and let him kiss away every memory of Todd my brain holds.
I haven’t heard from Miles in the two weeks that I’ve been back. Not a word. And while I’ve been tempted to reach out to him multiple times, I told him the ball was in his court.
But maybe it’s time to stop waiting for him. Two weeks is a long time to go without a word, and maybe he realized that we were better off without each other.
I told him at the resort that the door would be open to him, so do I tell him now that I’m closing it? Or do I just let sleeping dogs lie and move forward with my life?
I have so many things on the horizon: a new career, a furry friend to care for, confidence in myself.
I’m finally letting myself want things and speaking up about it.
But I think I’m starting to see that sometimes wanting isn’t enough.
Just because I want to try with Miles doesn’t mean I’m going to get it.
This is the kind of disappointment I’ve been trying to avoid.
This is why I stopped wanting things at all—because the pain of not getting it was harder to bear than not wanting at all.
I slide down to the floor, my back against the front door, hugging my knees to my chest. Captain meows at me from the top of the stairs.
It’s so tempting to just tell my heart to stop wanting Miles, to do what I’ve always done and shove it so far back to the depths of my heart that eventually it just becomes part of the furniture and doesn’t feel like anything.
Perhaps the reason my heart stopped asking for what it wanted all those years ago is that the pain of not getting it was harder to bear than not wanting at all.
But I’m not that girl anymore, and even if it kills me, I’m going to let myself want him, and some days, I may even let myself hope.