Thirty-Eight—Ivy
I
didn’t always feel this bad. There was a time, a long time, when my chin was pretty darn level with the rest of humanity, when eye contact came natural and I used to laugh. There was a time when I slept easy, and my soul didn’t ache and I felt like a relatively normal girl. How I let this…this implosion happen in me…to me, is one of the biggest shame storms of my life. I almost can’t remember who I used to be.
It takes an extraordinary person to ruin someone’s life. Mia had said that the day I moved in here.
Tim was not extraordinary. He was barely even special. I think I’d always known that. I wanted him to be. I built him up to be something fine and wonderful in my mind. But he was just Tim.
When he left me standing stupidly alone in the gazebo, just before the enormity of what was happening had sunk in, what he did was just one more time when he’d left me for Angela—a girl he didn’t love but couldn’t stay away from. And in that same microsecond, I figured he’d come back—because he always had before. That wasn’t me in denial. That was me knowing another person inside out. I was Tim’s safe place. That was my job. Angela was his live-for-the-moment place. His exciting place. But she was like fireworks, a short burst of exhilaration that quickly fizzled itself out and always left the smell of scorched air behind. That’s when he came back to me. Sorry and clear-eyed and desperate. And I let him. I always let him. I’d been doing it for so long, I didn’t know how not to .
People back home, Mama, Gran, my friends, they all thought the reason I would never come back to Savannah was because the humiliation of my botched wedding was too great. I was fine perpetuating that line of thinking because I knew the truth was even more disgraceful: I was afraid I still loved Tim. And that was a whole new level of pitiful that I would prefer to deal with from three thousand miles away.
When Bo asked me, actually said the words and made me answer him: Would I take Tim back if he asked me? I said no even though I wasn’t sure. But then saying it out loud felt true—it was even a profound relief. But Bo didn’t ask me the bigger question—did I still love Tim? I didn’t know that answer. I didn’t even know if my weird little heart would ever know, because all it did was ache.
I groaned and pulled the covers over my head. I was exhausted, but I couldn’t sleep. Again. It was a quarter to four in the morning.
After walking through Lullaby Sutton’s world, reading her funeral letter and then hearing Mia tell me she could have written it for me, I broke down a little. I didn’t mean to, it just all started to leak out of me. Mia had simply held my hand and said, “Cry if you need to. Cry all night if you want. But then be done. You’ve given Tim Marsh more than enough of you. Maybe it’s time to be finished.”
I told her she sounded like Mama but nicer. At any rate, I knew she was right.
She also informed me that after our laps tomorrow morning, she was taking me shoe shopping. I like shoes. But that was tomorrow—well just a few hours—which didn’t leave me much time to work on being done. I wasn’t making much progress.
I picked up my phone. It was a quarter to seven in Georgia, and I knew my grandmother was up. She’d left me a message late last night. No greeting, no: “Hello my darling,” just: “ I did not know about Tim. You call me so we can talk. ” I dialed and she answered already speaking. “Oh, my sweet girl! I am so sorry.”
“Is the Universe trying to tell me something?” I whimpered.
“Always, my love. Why? ”
“Nothing. I just…I’m having a very bad life right now.”
There was a long silence, and I didn’t expound. Finally, my grandmother said, “I’m sorry your mama told you about Tim in a note.”
“I think I hate her a little, Gran.”
“No, you do not, Ivy Lee. She’s your mother. She was wrong in her approach, and I’m very disappointed in her, but she is your mama, and she loves you. You should call her.”
“No. I don’t have anything to say to her. It doesn’t matter that she was mad at me at the time; this was always bigger than her little fit. She wanted to hurt me, Gran. She wanted to get back at me because she was wrong, and I called her on it. Did you know she was meeting up with my dad in Carmel two or three times a year? Did you know that, Gran? She never brought me. Not once. We couldn’t have that, right? Who brings a kid on a tryst? What kinda mama lets her kid tag along on a booty call?”
“Don’t be like that, Ivy.”
“Why did she get to decide that I didn’t need a dad—a decent dad? A real dad?” I was almost howling now. “I can’t believe how mad I am at her. And I can’t understand why it’s taken me so long to get this mad at her. Oh, wait, yes I can, I’m finally far enough away to see her. Now that I can, I hate what I see.”
“Hush now!” Geneva said. “I mean it. There is not one ounce of hate in you, Ivy, and you know it. I wouldn’t have chosen your dad to be the love of her life, but it wasn’t my call. It wasn’t yours either, so just stop all the snippiness. It’s fruitless and unbecoming.”
“I know that, Gran,” I sighed, coming down from my high horse. “I’m just spewing.”
“I know, darling.”
“I should go.”
After a long moment of neither of us hanging up, Geneva said, “To answer your question, sug, yes, absolutely, the Universe is indeed trying to tell you something. But you’ll have to figure out what it is on your own. ”
I blew out a big and dramatic breath. “Of course,” I said, my voice dripping with sarcasm. Then I hung up because the tears were back.
After a few minutes, my phone buzzed. I thought she was calling back to lecture me with more nonsense, but it was a text from Bo.
Are u awake?
Yes. Sleep hates me.
Lol. Sorry. Left u some organic nectarines.
Why? When?
Thought you’d like them—they’re good for you. Just now. Sleep hates me, too.
I do like them. Thanks. I feel your pain.
LOL. Well…enjoy…
I peeked outside to be sure he wasn’t lurking in the shadows, then I opened the door and found a small bag of nectarines and some pita chips—homemade, I’m sure—sitting there.
That Bo Sutton…sweeter than sugar on honey.