Chapter Fifteen
“Evelyn! Oh my God!”
Evelyn heard David’s voice first. It came out strained, piercing the otherwise silent set. Blinking her eyes open, she tried to get a grip on what had happened.
She was lying on the floor. An overhead production light blared down on her before David appeared and blocked it out.
“Evelyn,” he said, voice pitched high, hands frantically fumbling over her body. “Don’t move.”
Evelyn attempted to sit up anyway. “I’m fine.”
David was beside himself. “You’re not fine.”
She pushed his hands away. “I’m fine!”
The words came out hot. She was annoyed that he could still drag those feelings of hurt out from her.
Or maybe it was simply that her head was throbbing, and she was having delusions of Hanukkah ghosts.
And worse yet—she glanced up at the puppet—it was almost nine o’clock at night, and the damn thing was still shiny.
Evelyn needed to get up, get back to work, but David was hovering over her like an ex-husband helicopter.
“Is it your head?” David asked.
“No,” she said, lying. “Obviously not.”
“Then why . . .” He sucked air through his nostrils, calming himself down. “Why were you lying on the floor?”
She needed to think quickly. “I was taking a nap.”
“Seriously?”
“I don’t understand why you care.”
David was in a tizzy. She knew because when David got panicked, his entire neck would straighten out like some sort of ostrich, and the vein on the left side of his throat would hyperextend and pulsate rapidly.
It was one of those things that you learn about a person, know about them, after spending a lifetime together.
“I care,” David said, finally, “because you had a major incident with the piano the other day, and while you keep telling me everything is fine, we’re now three for three on—”
She cut him off. “I always get headaches.”
“You don’t always pass out on the floor, though.”
The man had a point. But at the same time, there was no way in olam haba that she was going to admit she was having delusions, and that the delusions not only had names, but seemed hell-bent on making her relive every past memory with David.
No, she wouldn’t give him the pleasure of calling her off work, not when she was so close to achieving her dreams that could come from the success of her show.
“Look,” she said. “I was just . . . working on the puppet late. I had skipped dinner—” and lunch, and breakfast, though she left that part out “—and I guess . . . I just had a bit of a dizzy spell coming on and off the ladder. Probably because of the hunger and the fumes from the acetone. But I’m fine, David. Clearly I’m fine. Never been better!”
He huffed. She knew that huff. She hated that huff.
“What are you even doing here?” She grew annoyed.
He reached for a plastic bag that was now sitting on the floor. “I brought you dinner.”
“Oh.”
She was surprised by the gesture. Surprised he was standing there with a plastic bag that smelled . . . absolutely freaking delicious. Her stomach growled, and yet she hesitated on accepting his kindness. Admitting that she wanted anything from him felt like a weakness.
David began laying out items on a plastic catering table. Evelyn couldn’t help herself. Hunger got the better of her. She rose from her position on the floor to look over. David was just tearing open a pack of disposable utensils. Evelyn kept a safe distance.
“What is it?” she asked.
“Kasha varnishkes,” he said. “From The Pale.”
His words caught her off guard. “You remembered?”
“Of course, I remembered.”
Kasha varnishkes from The Pale had always been her favorite.
It bugged her to no end how sweet and considerate he could be, how charming and good looking.
How dare he be that good-looking while going out with another woman.
And then, he had the audacity to claim he was worried about her, that he cared whether her headaches were bad, or if she had eaten dinner.
That he cared at all was a joke of the highest magnitude .
. . when he was off in New York dating other people.
When he had left her in the middle of the night, breaking all their vows and promises by absconding from her life like a coward, only to serve her with divorce papers six months later.
God, she was angry. There was no way to come back from where they had been. No way to make what had happened between them better. All she wanted to do was take that container full of the best kasha varnishkes outside of her grandmother’s . . . and choke the man with it.
“Come on,” David said, waving his disposable utensils at her. “Please. I know you.”
He knew her.
How dare he? Her stomach betrayed her, growling aloud at the offer.
The threat of her migraine worsening, along with more hallucinations, forced her to get over herself.
Begrudgingly, she took the disposable utensils from his hand and filled up a plate.
The first bite was like finding a haven of comfort after a long trip away.
“Oh my Gawd,” she moaned.
“Good?” David asked.
“Perfection.”
He pulled out a chair for her. She took a seat and began scarfing fully.
David poured her a glass of water, laying it at her side.
The only time she came up for air in those next several minutes was to drink, or to squint through the pain that was currently radiating through the front of her forehead.
“Owwww,” she said, and used one hand to attempt to rub out the throbbing, pulsating pain.
“Here,” David said, coming closer. “Let me help.”
Before she could reject his advances, his hands were on her head. Gently, he ran his fingers in tiny circles around her eyebrows, the bridge of her nose, and her cheeks . . . before one hand found its way to her neck and he massaged her sinuses, upper back and forehead.
“Good?” David asked.
“So good,” she admitted.
“Well, I’m happy to do this all night.”
Of course he was.
He was always happy to go all night.
The thought caused her skin to prickle. Her nipples hardened.
Her mind wandered back to all those intimacies shared between them.
The way his body looked, naked, beneath her.
The feeling of him filling her up when they found each other in the rhythm.
Her breath hitched once in her throat as his hands made their way to her neck . . .
“That’s good,” she said, pulling away from him. She needed air. An escape. She needed David to stop touching her, especially.
“All better, then?” he asked, that cheeky boyish smile of his returning. It was amazing how he could be so oblivious.
She cleared her throat. “Much better. Thank you.”
“Anytime,” he said, and pulled out a chair, taking a seat beside her.
The room fell into silence once more. Their eyes caught on each other’s. Her stomach turned, with options, with choices. And then, her mind wandered back to that memory of Jackson Fields. The night she had lost her virginity. The night she had ditched David.
“Do you remember,” she said quietly, “back in high school . . .”
“High school?” he asked curiously.
“There was this party our senior year. I think after a play practice or something. We were hanging out. I was drinking. I had this huge crush on Jackson Fields, and then he came in with all his friends . . .”
“I remember.”
She wasn’t sure what she wanted to say about that.
She couldn’t exactly say, Well, it all worked out in the end.
Because it hadn’t. Divorce wasn’t exactly the happy ending to a love story that people wrote about in romance novels.
But still, the trip down memory lane—along with dinner and a scalp massage—was causing old feelings to awaken inside her.
“Do you ever wish things could be different?”
He swallowed. She watched his Adam’s apple roll from the top of his throat downward. “All the time,” he said quietly. “In truth—” his eyes flitted up to hers “—I’m a well of regret most days.”
“But that’s the funny thing about mistakes, right?
” she asked him directly. “Without them, we don’t grow.
So you have to grow through it. All the good.
All the bad. The blunder years. The heartbreaks.
Because otherwise, how do you learn, how do you change, how do you find the people and things worth your time . . . or not?”
He was quiet for a long time.
“You know,” he said finally. “It was the moment I realized I was in love with you.”
“What?” She laughed. “When I went off with Jackson Fields?”
He nodded, coming closer. “It broke my heart.”
“But you were playing wingman the whole time.”
“I know,” he said.
And her kasha varnishkes was getting cold.
“I appreciate you bringing this tonight,” she said finally.
“Of course.”
“You really didn’t need to go out of—”
He cut her off. “Look, I wanted to explain about the date.”
“You don’t have to explain,” she said, ready to be a grown-up about these things. “Really. It’s been two years, David. The ink on the paperwork of our divorce is long dry. You’re allowed to be . . . dating someone.”
“A date,” he corrected her.
“What?” The word came out high-pitched and squeaky.
“I went on a date with someone,” he clarified. “One date. I’m not actually dating anyone.” He shifted where he was standing. “I haven’t dated anyone since . . . our divorce, actually.”
“Oh.”
She was surprised to hear this. David was so handsome, so kind, so gentle.
Aside from absconding in the middle of the night without explanation, he had been a great husband.
And she, for all intents and purposes, had loved him.
God, she had loved him. Perhaps she had enough love left over in her heart to still want the best for him.
“Look,” she said finally. “If you want to date someone else, if you want to move on, whatever . . . I want that for you, too. Despite the way it ended between us, you deserve someone you can be happy with.”
His eyes dragged upward. “You deserve that, too.”
Her heart ached on his words, before she sucked back all the oxygen she could take. She jested, pointing her fork toward the sixteen-foot puppet watching their sad un-love story unfolding between them. “And what? Give up my late nights with the Ghost of Christmas Future over there?”
“I’d never dream of suggesting that.”
“Hey now . . . sixteen feet of tulle ain’t nothing to scoff at.”
David laughed, and she did, too. The room settled into another round of soft but prescient silence. She took a bite of her kasha varnishkes before David went to analyze the puppet.
“So, what were you doing here anyway?” he asked.
“He’s shiny,” she explained.
“I should have known by the acetone. You couldn’t get Demi to help out with this, or something?”
“I prefer to do it myself.”
He shook his head. “You really are the hardest working person I have ever met.”
“Well, that . . . and I have control issues.”
He squinted in her direction and then laughed.
She liked seeing him smile. She had forgotten how easy things could feel with David .
. . when she wasn’t completely hating his guts and wishing ruin and destruction on him.
“On that note,” she said, placing her kasha varnishkes to the side. “I should probably get back to work.”
“Tell you what,” he said, moving to stop her. “How about I make you a deal?”
“A deal?” she asked, incredulous.
“You eat. I’ll acetone.”
Her steadfast heart suddenly became pliable.
“Deal,” she said softly.
David began climbing up the ladder. Her eyes lingered over his form, the body she knew every intimate detail of, and for one split second, she forgot about the way he had hurt her.
She forgot that they were divorced, too.
Because it felt like old times. Like they were a team again, two people who had found each other, ready to take on the world together.