Chapter 2
2
Holly
December 17
New York City
Holly bolts upright. “Ahh! We overslept! It’s my wedding day.” Then her brain catches up and she realizes that, no , it’s not her wedding day. It was her wedding day. Now it’s…just a day.
She’s on Ivy’s couch—and Ivy has jumped up from the chair she fell asleep in, dazed and panicked at once. “Are you okay?! Are you hurt?!”
Holly squeezes her eyes shut and flops back down on the couch, which is extra wide and comfortable precisely because she stays over so often. She has the same super-comfy couch at her Upper East Side condo; she and Ivy got a discount when they bought two of the same at a furniture store that was going out of business.
“I’m so sorry,” Holly says. “I woke you. And there’s absolutely no reason for us to be up at…” She sits up again and rummages on the coffee table for her phone to check the time, but comes up empty.
“It’s in my room,” Ivy says. “I turned it off. Is that okay?”
Holly nods. “Well, whatever time it is, we don’t need to be up. Since there’s nowhere we need to be today.” The half-empty tequila bottle is still on the coffee table, but she feels perfectly hydrated and physically fine. Except for her chest. Something is wrong with it. She lifts her hand to her heart, holds it there for a moment.
“You look like you’re checking to see if your heart is still in there.”
“That’s exactly what I’m doing,” Holly says. “I can feel it beating, so objectively, I know it’s there. But it’s like…there’s a big empty space where my heart is supposed to be. Is that normal?”
“I’m so sorry. This is not fair. I hate that this is happening to you.”
“It did happen, right? I didn’t dream it?”
Ivy shakes her head sadly. “This is real. Do you want to try to go back to sleep, or do you want coffee?”
Holly sighs. “I want both. To be able to sleep if I need to, but also to have the warm comfort of a cup of your coffee with a splash of your dad’s maple syrup.”
Ivy stands. “I think we’ve finally found the only situation decaf coffee is good for, then.”
“A silver lining.” Holly manages a weak smile.
As Ivy leaves the room, Holly pulls the duvet around her shoulders and turns toward the large, east-facing windows that are her favorite feature of her best friend’s cozy, boho-chic Greenwich Village walk-up. The city is still dark, the dawn bejeweled with lights, but a glow is starting to shimmy over the skyline like a teenager sneaking back in the window after a night out. This day will officially begin soon—and it will not be the one Holly has been imagining for a decade. She touches her chest again, feels her still-beating but sensationless heart. Everyone talks about the pain of a broken heart, but no one has ever mentioned the yawning chasm. The nothingness of it all. Holly supposes that’s because it wouldn’t make for a very good love song: My heart is a terrifying pit of loneliness. Definitely wouldn’t make the top forty. She hugs her knees and keeps staring out the window. Shouldn’t she be angry? Is she doing this right? Why is she so numb?
Ivy is back, holding two steaming mugs. Holly accepts hers—she always uses the one that says “I hope your day is as nice as your butt,” a gift from one of Ivy’s old boyfriends; Ivy always uses the mug with Bigfoot on it that says “I believe,” which they bought on a California road trip—and inhales the fragrant steam. It smells like home, friendship, comfort. “You always make the best coffee,” she says.
“But you’re staring into the mug like you’re channeling Carly Simon.”
“Clouds in my coffee, yeah.” Holly peers deeper into the cup. “I wish there were some answers in here.”
“You know you don’t have to have all the answers right now, don’t you? It’s okay to just wallow.”
Holly looks up. “Matt said there was someone else.” She hates the way this becomes more real when she says it aloud. “I told you that last night, right? It’s a bit hazy.”
Ivy nods. “You did.”
She closes her eyes and presses her lips together. This is hard to say, but she knows she can admit it to Ivy. “I think I knew.” She puts her mug down beside the unused sheet masks from the night before. “As soon as he said it last night, that he was having an emotional affair, I knew who it was. We were at a work thing a few months ago, and there was a new lawyer on his team named Abby. There was a vibe between them. They finished each other’s sentences. They were both Blink-182 fans. Then, a few weeks ago, he texted me, ‘I can’t wait to see you tonight, Abby.’ A minute later, he wrote, ‘Oops, my phone autocorrected from “baby”! LOL.’ But he’s never called me ‘baby.’ Not once. It was right there in front of me.”
“Crushes happen, though. Even when people are in a committed relationship, they just do. It’s human nature. So the fact that you chose not to freak out and throw a jealous fit because he had chemistry with a coworker, and sent a text with a typo—that’s just a testament to what a levelheaded, reasonable, excellent partner you are. It was not your responsibility to stay on top of whether Matt was having an affair, emotional or not. But it was on Matt to sort this out and decide if it was something you needed to know, a long time before the eve of your wedding. This is not your fault. Don’t do this to yourself.”
“I know you’re right. It’s just…I have no idea how to do this!”
“Do what? Be sad? There’s no right way to deal with heartache, Hol. You just have to let it happen.”
“Can you come sit beside me?”
“Of course.” Ivy joins Holly on the couch, puts her arm around her friend. Holly feels grateful for the comforting proximity, but it doesn’t help. “You’re not alone, okay?” Ivy says.
“Remember that night in the summer when we went out with Oscar, after he got dumped by Kyle?” Oscar is one of Ivy’s friends from her college years, and now a good friend of Holly’s, too.
“I think so…”
“I remember you told him that everyone has their heart broken at least once, and that it builds character. You said all that stuff about being stronger in your broken places, and I’m pretty sure you also talked about kintsugi—”
“Oh, dear. I’m sorry,” Ivy says.
“No, no, you helped him. But the truth is it scared me a bit. It’s like I had a premonition that night. I’ve always played it safe. My high school boyfriend and I broke up mutually and respectfully—”
“Like you were a teenage Gywneth and Chris. I’ve always marveled at the yearly Christmas card he sends—”
“Yes, exactly. Of course I was nostalgic for a while, but I wouldn’t say I was heartbroken in the technical sense. Then there was that guy who slid the anonymous Christmas card in my locker—”
“Which you have kept for all these years, because you are adorable.”
“It was a really sweet card! The things he wrote, whoever he was, made me feel so seen .”
“Right. And you always regretted never finding out who he was.”
“Always. What if he, whoever he is, was the one? I mean, doesn’t that seem like a romance plot straight out of a movie? But then I went to college and met Matt. I thought I had it in the bag, my life completely in order. This wasn’t supposed to happen. It doesn’t feel like my life. There’s so much uncertainty. This wasn’t the plan.”
Ivy squeezes her close, and Holly puts her head on her friend’s shoulder. “I’m not going to lie and say this is going to be easy. But I will be with you. You won’t be alone.”
Holly falls asleep again. When she wakes up, Ivy is watching her with a concerned expression on her face. “Are you hungry yet?”
“Starving, actually.”
“Murray’s bagels with Nova cream cheese for breakfast, and egg-and-cheese rolls from the bodega, too?”
“And yogurt parfaits from Culture. I’m ready to try to eat my feelings.”
“John’s pies for lunch—Margherita and piccante. Zucchini sticks. Cokes. An entire cheesecake from Mah-Ze-Dahr for dinner.”
“But you have to pack for your trip, not deal with indigestion.”
“I told you, I’m staying right here. We can have a movie marathon every day. If you feel up to leaving the apartment, we can walk over to Greenwich Letterpress so you can get your 2025 day planner. We can—”
They’re interrupted by Ivy’s phone ringing, and Holly is grateful because she hates hearing Ivy talk about doing everything except the one thing she’s been looking forward to all year: her solo two-week art retreat.
“That better not be your mom,” Ivy says, retrieving her phone from the easy chair. “Nope, actually, it’s my mom. She’s leaving for Peru tonight and will be officially off the grid until January.”
Ivy answers and walks into the kitchen again with her empty coffee mug.
Left alone, Holly is suddenly gripped by the urge to check her own phone. There are probably things she needs to be doing to make sure her wedding is called off according to whatever protocols exist in situations like this.
In Ivy’s room, she retrieves her phone and turns it back on, and it immediately rings in her hand. Answering it without checking who it is is a reflex she immediately regrets.
“Holly, is that you? Have you gotten any of my messages? I can’t leave you any more, your mailbox is full.”
“Mom, I—”
“I’ve spoken to Matt’s parents. They’re on their way over here to the town house. Kitty feels sure she can get Matt to come with them. We can work this out together. We’ll have it sorted by the time the wedding is supposed to start. No one even has to know.”
“Mom, the wedding is off—”
“What exactly did he say to you last night, Holly? What if you’re overreacting? You can be a little sensitive sometimes.”
All at once, Holly can hear Matt’s voice, and every single word he said to her the night before—as if his words have been permanently burned into her brain.
“I’m so sorry,” he had said, his eyes full of torment. “I just can’t.”
“You…can’t?”
“ We can’t. We can’t get married, Holly. Admit it, we’ve both been on autopilot for years. The past few especially. We’ve been on this train, just going along the track, not even looking at the scenery, not even realizing…” He had trailed off, searching for the right words; Matt had never really been one for metaphors. “Without realizing that during the trip, we’ve changed. We’ve grown apart. We want different things. Maybe we want to get off at different stops now.”
“We…do?” Holly had felt like a person in a dream who wanted to move but was frozen in place.
“Okay, well, I want something else, then. And I want it for you, too.” At this point, he’d taken her in his arms and said, “I’m in love with someone else.”
Holly had pulled away from him and said, “Please don’t touch me when you say something like that to me.”
“We’re like roommates, and if this is what it feels like now, imagine how it’s going to feel in another ten years, twenty, for the rest of our lives.”
The thing was, Holly had imagined how it was going to feel. And she knew he wasn’t wrong—she just thought this was what marriage was. You found someone you either loved or liked enough to marry, someone who ticked all the boxes and made your family happy—which was important, wasn’t it, a route to less conflict, more harmony, an easier, happier life?—and you married that person. You braided your lives together. Maybe it wasn’t as dramatic as they made it look in the movies or as sexy and exciting as it was in romance novels, but that wasn’t real life. Desperately passionate, kissing in the rain, needing the person as much as you needed oxygen…that wasn’t real, and if it was, it wasn’t sustainable.
And no, Holly had never felt that way with anyone. Not even Matt. But standing in front of Matt the night before as he broke things off, while festive flakes of snow fell between them, all those thoughts had simply piled themselves up on top of one another in her head and she had been unable to articulate any of them.
“Do you really want to go your entire life never feeling passion? I don’t. We can’t do this, Holly. We have to call off the wedding.” He held out his empty hands, as if this proved something to her. “Can you say something? Please?”
“Okay,” she’d said, morphing into the emotionless automaton she was when she woke up this morning.
“Holly? Are you still there?”
“Mom, he said he doesn’t want to marry me. He said there’s someone else he’s in love with.”
“What?! His parents are going to be livid. They are not going to stand for this—”
“He’s not a toddler who’s been bad. We’re not kids. We’re adults.”
“You’re not acting like adults! You can’t just cancel a wedding on a whim, without even making an attempt at reconciliation!”
“Let me get this straight. You want me to attempt to reconcile with a person who said he’s having an emotional affair with someone he met at work, he thinks he loves her, and he doesn’t want to marry me.”
“Oh, please. Workplace romances are a fact of life. At least he’s being honest. And it’s not just the wedding, it’s the honeymoon! That beautiful trip to Kauai your dad and I bought you two as your wedding gift—I never imagined you’d be canceling, so I didn’t get insurance.” This was very typical Barbara, to spend tens of thousands of dollars on a trip but then balk at the cancellation insurance.
“I’m sorry that money got wasted. I’m sorry it’s all such a waste. Ivy is making calls, and she said you would, too. People need to be notified. That’s all we can do right now. I have to go.”
Despite her mother’s protests, Holly hangs up. She turns her phone off again and walks back into the living room. Ivy is standing by the window now, still talking to her own mom. She hasn’t heard Holly come in.
“She seems okay. But…she hasn’t cried yet. I’m worried. It’s like she can’t . Like it’s all bottled up inside. She’s flat out refusing to come with me to the Hudson Valley, but she doesn’t want me to stay here with her, either. No matter what she says, there’s no way I’m going anywhere. I’ll tell her. I know. You love her, too.”
Ivy is standing in front of one of Holly’s favorites of all the art pieces Ivy has made. She sketched it their senior year, during a spring break trip to Aruba. It’s of Eagle Beach and is the perfect depiction of the calm, clear water, in varying shades of turquoise and blue, and the shell-pale sand Holly remembers well. The beach is dotted with palapas and sunbathing tourists on towels; the water is studded with windsurfers, paddleboards, Jet Skis. It has the vibe of a Gray Malin photograph. Holly has one from the same trip, a gift from Ivy that hangs in pride of place over her couch. Guests always ask about the artist who created it, and Holly proudly tells them it’s her best friend, who is so talented she can blend her pastels into the exact color of the ocean. It’s her best work. Ocean- and beachscapes always have been.
“I can still get a refund, yes, tell Dad not to worry. Maybe I’ll rebook for later in the winter—honestly, it’s the least of my concerns, though. Yes, Hudson Valley. You’re right, spring could be better. More color in the water.”
Holly has an idea. As she continues to listen to her friend talk, it takes shape in her mind. A tiny town in the Hudson Valley, a remote cabin beside a frozen river…suddenly, Holly can think of nowhere that would better reflect her current mood. She’s grateful for everything Ivy wants to do for her, but right now, all she feels is numb. She needs to thaw, by herself. She needs to be alone. She can pack cozy clothes and extra blankets, books, fill her laptop with downloads of all the shows she’s missed out on binge-watching during this busy year of wedding planning. She can make a list of movies that are sure to make her bawl her eyes out, and she can do so in private. Perhaps it’s not healthy to want to nurse a broken heart in solitude, but it’s what she feels she needs—and she should follow her instincts, shouldn’t she? Ivy always tells her this. Holly will go to the eco-cabin in the Hudson Valley—and Ivy can go on her honeymoon and spend two weeks getting the color of the Hawaiian ocean just right.
Ivy ends her phone call and turns. “Hey! My mom says hi and sends the biggest hug.”
“Your mom gives the best hugs. Listen, I just had an idea.”
They face each other on the couch, and Holly does her very best to explain her logic about the trip swap, but Ivy is still resistant. “Having me enjoying what was supposed to be your honeymoon will just make everything worse, I know it.”
“I don’t agree. Knowing something good is coming out of this, that you’re there in Hawaii, making your beautiful oceanscapes—which you’re amazing at—would help me feel a little better, I think.”
“But I can’t leave you.”
“What if I want you to? What if I need you to? Getting away for two weeks to just hide and process and figure out what’s next, it’s what I feel I need. We’ve been best friends for years—and we always trust each other, right? So you need to trust me to know what I need.”
“Wow. Sometimes I forget what a great lawyer you are.”
Holly shrugs. “It’s easy to argue something you believe in.” She’s getting somewhere, she can tell. Ivy still looks hesitant, but her expression is softening.
“I just can’t help but think you need a friend with you right now.”
“You’re not going to disappear on me. If I need you, I’ll text, or I’ll call. I promise.”
“The trip isn’t transferable, though. How can I go in your place?”
Holly has thought of this, too. “We look so much alike. You can use my ID.”
“I’m pretty sure that’s a felony.”
“I’m a lawyer, and a good one, you just said so yourself. Plus, it’s not a felony, just a misdemeanor.”
“You’re a corporate contract lawyer, though…”
“We won’t get caught, okay? It’s a domestic flight. They’ll just glance at your ID and ticket, then off you go. I bet they barely look at your ID at the hotel, too.”
“They’ll want to know where your new husband is.”
“Tell them he died.”
“Holly!”
“Honestly, tell them anything. Tell them the wedding got called off and you want to be left alone. Tell them he has a fungus and can’t leave the room. Admit it will be the perfect trip for you—you’ll get to do nothing but stare at gorgeous scenery and make art for two whole weeks . Please, Ivy.” She grabs her friend’s hands. “Trade my Hawaii honeymoon for your Hudson Valley escape.”
“Well—”
“When have I ever asked you for anything, aside from being there for me for every errand and decision to do with a wedding that didn’t end up happening? Please. ”
“Okay, fine. If it makes you happy, I’ll do it. But the very second you need me, I’m getting on a plane and coming back. You have to promise you’ll send out an SOS if you need to. That has to be part of the deal here.”
“I promise. If I need you, I’ll tell you.”
“Immediately. Not the next day, not an hour later—in the moment.”
“Promise.”
“And we’ll be together on New Year’s Eve.”
“Yes. New Year’s Eve, we reunite and keep our dinner reservation at our favorite place, with all our friends.”
Holly gets ready to go to her apartment and pack for a wintry two weeks in the Hudson Valley. She’ll return to Ivy’s in a few hours and spend what was supposed to be her wedding night with her best friend, a movie marathon, and Gilmore Girls gluttony levels of takeout. Ivy is already planning the food and the viewing schedule as Holly pulls her parka over her pajamas.
“Maybe the funniest movies of all time, to make you laugh— A Fish Called Wanda and Grinch rolls from Kotobuki, Anchorman , There’s Something About Mary , and falafel from Mamoun’s. Or movies to make you believe in love again. Brokeback Mountain . The Umbrellas of Cherbourg . Magic Mike XXL . Every kind of ice cream you can think of.”
“ Magic Mike XXL ?” Holly can’t help but laugh, even in her emotionally deadened state.
“Just trust me. See you soon?”
“An hour, tops.”
Holly catches a glimpse of herself in the wavy elevator mirror and looks away. Her eyes have dark circles under them, and she’s the opposite of a glowing bride. Yet as this harsh reality sinks in, she still feels nothing but numb.
Outside, she raises her hand and hails a taxi. As the car glides across town toward her Upper East Side condo, where she will replace the bikinis and sandals in her suitcase with sweaters and thermal socks, she focuses on what’s ahead, not what’s behind her. The future stretches before her like an endless, frozen river—one she never believed she was going to have to skate alone. “Miss?”
The car has pulled up in front of her building. The entrance is decorated with swags of cedar garland, and a light snow has started to fall. She tries not to think about what a perfect day it would have been for a Christmas wedding, pays the taxi driver, gets out of the car, and puts one foot in front of the other—because she knows that’s all she can do until her heart unfreezes again.