Chapter Eighteen
On Friday morning, we received another set of emails from Andie, so I posted up in the back seat of the giant black Suburban Connor had rented from the Hertz on Forty-Eighth Street and powered up my hotspot so I could review them on the drive upstate.
We’d barely hit the George Washington Bridge when I got to an email that I realized was directly supportive of one of our thinner defense arguments.
“Holy shit,” I muttered, immediately forwarding it to Eddie with a declarative “We need to talk to this Emerson person. He’s in LA.”
Eddie responded two minutes later that he was still in Los Angeles and I should plan to fly out Monday.
“Fuck,” I groaned loudly.
Connor was driving as if we weren’t in the middle of Friday rush hour in New York City.
Gillian turned around. “If you want to sit up front, I’ll switch with you,” she offered sweetly.
I winced. “No. I need to fly back to LA on Monday. But there’s no way I’ll be able to get home in time to pack and make the flight. Which means Monday is going to be the longest day ever.”
“Sorry, Sam, but all I’m hearing is that you have to go back to being a lawyer on Monday, just in LA, instead of New York. Why is this a Friday afternoon problem?” Connor asked as he swerved, cutting off at least the fourth car since we’d left.
“The point is I need to prep before Monday, and I have to go into the office to do it. Sometimes your insensitivity to the demands of my job is really fucking annoying,” I whined. I emailed Patricia to please book a late flight on Monday. I’d leave from the office.
Three hours later, we pulled up to a rustic, two-story wood cabin Connor landed in a last-minute Airbnb deal.
I silently wished I was there for the cozy fireplace and view of the snowy Catskills.
Instead, I dropped my bag next to the stairs and settled into the oversized couch to work on another interview outline.
I didn’t move until Emilie came over a few hours later with a glass of red wine.
“Dinner’s ready, no thanks to you,” she said.
“Shit, I’m sorry. I’ll make breakfast tomorrow,” I promised as I closed my laptop and took a long sip.
I stopped in the half bath off the living room to freshen up before heading to the dining room. The table was set with champagne flutes, wine glasses, and a massive pine-cone centerpiece.
“Wow. Nice table, guys, but are we inviting the neighbors?” I asked, counting six place settings.
I heard a loud pop and turned to see Connor holding a magnum of Moet just as everyone shouted “Surprise!”
My brain couldn’t catch up. I looked around and saw Caroline standing next to Emilie, and I saw a third person behind a giant balloon that said “Thirty?!!”
“Happy thirtieth, Sam. You don’t look a day over twenty-one.” Charlie handed me the balloon as Emilie put a champagne glass in my other hand.
“Wait, what? Is this actually happening?”
No one had ever thrown me a surprise party, let alone a surprise weekend. I couldn’t stop laughing as Connor raised his glass.
“We knew you’d never agree to a birthday weekend, so we found the only people you’d actually want to celebrate with. So I guess in the end, this is more of a toast to everyone who made the cut. To us, guys.”
I went around the room clinking glasses.
“You’re all excellent liars,” I said.
I couldn’t believe Charlie was there. “Weren’t you still in Texas yesterday?”
Charlie raised his glass. “When there’s a will, there’s a way. Emilie emailed me a few weeks ago, and I knew I couldn’t miss it. You keep me sane and caffeinated, and there’s no one else I’d want to celebrate surrounded by strangers and snowdrifts.”
I was so happy to see him. In a short amount of time, he had become a dependable part of day-to-day life. He knew that I kept face wipes in my drawer, and I knew he stashed nicotine mints in his. We were eyewitnesses to the insanity of life as a first-year associate.
After rib eyes and mashed potatoes, we each carried a bottle of wine to the living room to play Cards Against Humanity.
I’d never seen Emilie laugh so hard. Even though Caroline and Charlie were new to the group, it felt like we’d all been friends for decades.
I felt happy, almost blissful. I’d never celebrated a birthday surrounded by a group of my closest friends.
By midnight, everyone had either lost or decided to call it except me and Charlie. Caroline, the most responsible of the crew, was the first to head to bed. Emilie followed suit, and soon no one could ignore Gillian’s exaggerated yawns, especially Connor.
“Finish it out?” Charlie asked as he refilled his wine glass.
“The game or the bottle?” I asked.
“There has to be a winner,” Charlie said competitively. “Officemate playoffs.”
“Okay, fine. If you think I’m heading into this decade a loser, you don’t really know me.”
I watched as Charlie shuffled the cards. He looked like he hadn’t shaved in a week, and I realized he probably hadn’t been back to his apartment in that long.
“Thanks for being here,” I said sincerely.
He kept shuffling. “Of course. It’s been weird living our separate lives recently. I have no idea what you’ve been up to. Good thing we have the whole weekend to catch up.”
I nodded and took another sip of wine, thinking about how I’d drunkenly ended up in bed with my ex-husband. A wave of embarrassment flushed through me. I was there with every one of my closest friends, but I hadn’t told any of them.
“Yeah . . . it’s been weird. I actually saw Ben a few weeks ago.”
He looked at me sideways. “Ben, Ben? I thought he still lived in DC?”
“He was in the city.”
“Wow. How was it?”
I took a deep breath. Maybe telling someone would defuse the emotional bomb that kept going off in my head.
“It could have been fine, but I fucked it up. We went to dinner and got super drunk.” I tried reading his reaction, but his face was entirely neutral, as if I was telling him about a memo I’d written. “And we slept together.”
He went from poker face to startled and I immediately wished I could backtrack.
“Believe me, I regret everything about it. It wasn’t the right move at all. I know that.”
Something about Charlie’s face told me he wasn’t going to try to make me feel better about it.
I took another sip to stall. “Sorry, let’s change the subject . . . I feel like a schmuck for having done it, and I don’t need anyone else to tell me that.”
Charlie stared at the cards. “Your move, counselor.”
I refilled my wine glass and checked if he needed a top off.
“Do you still have feelings for him?” he asked.
“Despite the very bad choice I made to sleep with him, no.”
“Have you dated anyone since you guys got divorced?”
“Not seriously.”
“Casually?”
I smiled ruefully. “I have no clue what I’d do on an actual date. I was either dating Ben or married to him for most of my twenties. When we got divorced, the only way I could bring myself to interact with men nonplatonically was by drinking. A lot.”
I hoped Charlie could read between the lines that it had just felt too strange, or too vulnerable, to be intimate with someone after I had been someone’s wife.
“So what you’re saying is, you’ve only gone on drunk dates?”
I felt my face flush. “I wouldn’t even call most of them dates. Just hooking up with guys I kind of knew from school and felt comfortable with.”
I paused. “I actually haven’t had sober sex since I was married to Ben.”
Charlie looked stunned again, then quickly recovered. “Well DeFiore, I’d offer to help you out with that tonight, but . . .” He nodded toward the collection of empty wine bottles on the table.
“That’s generous,” I said lightly, feeling my face get warm.
“Your move again.” Charlie rubbed his jaw. “I’m sure he still thinks about you in that way. Ben, I mean. You’re the one that got away. Not a lot of beautiful and funny girls out there, in my experience.”
I blushed again and mumbled, “Oh.”
He looked embarrassed. “Should we call it? I’m feeling a rough morning if we keep this up. Gotta be ready for ice-skating tomorrow,” he said.
I groaned. “Ice-skating hungover isn’t how I want to spend my surprise thirtieth birthday, so I accept your resignation. Besides, I could fall asleep sitting up right now. I hope they figured out the heat upstairs, because it’s freezing down here.”
I went to stand up and gravity pulled me back down.
“We should let this last log burn out before we call it a night. Safety first.” He sat back against the couch.
I wasn’t ready to try standing up again, so I nodded and wrapped my arms around myself.
“I might just fall asleep right here.” I yawned and rested my head on the back of the couch. He passed me a blanket.
“Happy birthday, Sam.”
I woke up on the couch, tucked in a warm blanket with a pillow under my head.
There was a glass of water and two Advils on the coffee table.
I smelled coffee and bacon coming from the kitchen and tried to put my finger on what I was feeling.
I remembered telling Charlie about Ben. The memory of his reaction was fuzzy, but I felt a warm, unjudged feeling.
There was something else I couldn’t put my finger on.
Something I’d felt right before Charlie went to bed.
“Rise and shine, birthday girl.”
Emilie appeared from the kitchen with a mug in one hand and the paper in the other. “Brought you the morning paper. That’s what people do in the Catskills,” she said proudly.
I squeezed one eye shut. “That doesn’t make any sense to me, but I drank my weight in red wine last night, so . . .” I said, grabbing the coffee.
Emilie plopped down next to me. “Yeah—the housemates are on the verge of rioting because we gave you the master bedroom, and you slept on the couch.”
“Believe me, that wasn’t my plan. Charlie and I stayed up way too late trying to finish the game, and I don’t even remember falling asleep.”
“Was it fun?” she asked.
I nodded. “I need this coffee, though.” I sighed loudly. “Are we really going ice-skating? Is that like reading the paper here?”
“Connor isn’t letting anyone go back to the city without trying it.”
I finished the coffee, then sprinted upstairs to shower before breakfast. I wondered if Charlie felt uncomfortable about how much I’d shared.
The end of the night was spotty. I remembered it feeling cathartic the night I first told him about Ben, after the gala, when he asked me pointedly about having been married.
But sharing that I’d recently slept with my ex-husband—who I had no plans to reconcile with—felt like TMI.
I was about to turn on the hairdryer when I heard a light knock on the door. Charlie was there bright-eyed and showered, holding out the folded blanket and pillow.
“Figured I’d return this before the natives notice you didn’t sleep in the only room with a king-size bed,” he said.
I felt my face turn shades of crimson at the memory of Charlie tucking me in. “Emilie already found me. But thanks. Think I’ll lay low on the wine tonight.”
Charlie grinned. “See ya downstairs.”
After breakfast we bundled up and piled into the Suburban.
I hadn’t ice-skated since I was a kid. Every time I fell, I laughed so hard I could barely get up.
Either Caroline (who grew up ice-skating) or Charlie (who grew up playing ice hockey) pulled me up before gracefully gliding past me.
After thirty minutes, I decided to let them have the ice and went to join Emilie and Connor in the café.
“Caroline and Charlie would dominate Olympic couples skating, huh?” Connor announced as I sat down with a hot chocolate.
Emilie grabbed a sip of my hot chocolate. “Oh, that’s good. We really curated an idyllic winter weekend up here.”
“I curated,” Connor said indignantly.
I nodded. “Yes, great surprise, both of you. Crazy you kept it under wraps so well. I always thought I’d be impossible to surprise.”
“You’re full of surprises. I’m just glad we were able to fool the master,” Connor said as he scrolled distractedly through Reddit.
“How am I full of surprises?” I asked.
“Well for one, you’re a divorcée.”
“That’s not a surprise anymore. And can I please start my thirties with a clean slate?”
“Maybe you should start with a romp to clean the palate? ‘What happens in upstate New York . . .’” he said, nodding in Charlie’s direction.
I looked at Emilie, who quickly came to my defense.
“She’s got a bit much on her plate, mate. I don’t think she needs to jump into another relationship.”
I wrinkled my nose. “And not everything revolves around finding a partner.”
“Well, looks to me like Charlie’s lookin’ for love,” Connor sang. “Caroline’s been laughing her arse off out there all morning.”
I shrugged. “Why are you so obsessed with everyone else’s love life anyway? Focus on your own.”
“I just think everyone could benefit from my expertise. But I actually don’t think Charlie and Caroline need any help at all.”
I felt a twinge thinking how easy it would be for Charlie and Caroline to have a tidy weekend hookup.
The idea of something so casual as a “romp” was anathema to the path I was on.
Every day I wondered if I’d ever feel like a normal thirtysomething and not someone who already had a failed marriage.
I didn’t know if I’d ever learn to trust myself again.