26. Ember
TWENTY-SIX
EMBER
My apartment smelled stale. I stepped onto the floating laminate wood-look floors I’d had installed two years ago. They had been a safe, practical choice: hard wearing, easy to clean, and cost effective. But when I walked on them, they sounded hollow.
As hollow as I felt.
After wheeling my bag inside, I stood in the middle of the room and looked around.
The floors were a gray-toned fake wood. The walls were plain white.
My cabinets were white. The countertop was gray.
My couch was light gray. My rug was a swirly, abstract mix of cream and gray.
The artwork above the couch was a black-and-white skyline of Chicago.
I’d bought it because it was inoffensive.
My lamps were chrome. The coffee table was beige wood, and I never put anything on it.
My plants had died while I was gone, and they sat in brown, curled-up heaps in the corners of the room.
I lived in a sad, gray box. A mausoleum of safe choices. The culmination of everything I was and everything I would ever be. An exact replica of the person I was. Flat. Dimensionless. Boring.
I opened the fridge. A few condiments, but nothing more. I’d cleared it out, knowing I’d be gone for at least six weeks. The freezer held a few pre-prepped meals, labeled and dated. I took out a small container of chicken and rice. It would taste bland after I defrosted it in the microwave.
Bland like me.
It was no wonder Jack hadn’t actually wanted me. He’d fed me the same bullshit he shoveled at every other woman, making me feel special and beautiful and cherished. But the truth was right here in my home. There was nothing interesting or special about me.
I warmed up the chicken and rice and took a bite. It was indeed bland, but I still ate it. Then I unpacked my things, took a shower, and went to bed.
My life was remarkably unchanged. I slipped right back into my old routines without missing a step.
I shopped for groceries and did laundry.
I cleaned and cooked and worked. I listened to podcasts and read books.
I existed exactly as I had before, but I felt like I’d died and somehow gotten stuck as a ghost, doomed to repeat the patterns of my life for all of eternity.
Drifting through the world but never part of it.
I thought about the fact that if I died in my apartment, no one would find me until my corpse started stinking so badly the neighbors complained. And then my remains would get cleaned up, and I would be no more. I would leave no impact on the world. No one would miss me.
I’d spent a month feeling joy and love and compassion and frustration and understanding and pleasure. A month of light and laughter. Companionship. Love.
Now I made my little dinners and tucked myself into my little bed, and it all felt so fucking pointless.
I thought about my father’s money, and I told myself it would all be worth it once I got the payout. Then I could pay Jack his share and close the door in my mind that our contract had left cracked open. I could divorce him and be done with it.
When I got the money, I’d be able to fund my retirement accounts, build up my savings, and—
And—
And what?
Go on vacation? Where? Why? What was the point?
I could buy a new car, I supposed. Or maybe go to an art gallery and purchase a big, splashy canvas covered in color.
Something I never would’ve dared to bring home before.
Maybe I’d find an estate sale and look for the ugliest, creepiest piece of art I could find, and I’d buy that.
Something that would’ve made Darby laugh.
But then every time I looked at it, I’d be thinking of Darby.
And that would make me think of Jack, and the particular way his gaze would soften when he saw his daughter light up.
Then I wouldn’t be able to hang the creepy artwork, because it would be a reminder of everything that I wanted but would never have.
The two people who had very briefly felt like the only family I’d ever had.
I would buy a car, I decided. A Honda or a Toyota. Something reliable and mid-range.
The money was what kept me going. I worked long hours, kept myself busy, and told myself that financial stability was worth a little heartbreak. At least now I knew the truth about myself. I wouldn’t be fooled by a charming man again.
One Saturday night, the walls began closing in on me and I couldn’t stop wondering what Jack and Darby were doing.
(Was he seeing anyone new? Did he ever think about me?
Was Darby still playing piano? Would she go to Vikki’s birthday party next week?
What had they done with that Polaroid of the three of us at the estate sale?) Frustrated by my circling thoughts, I threw on my jacket, braved the cold, and went to the nearest bar.
It was a sports bar packed with people drinking beer while they watched the screens.
Football was on, but I didn’t recognize the teams. I slid onto a stool in the middle of the long bar, and one of the bartenders nodded at me to indicate they’d be with me soon.
I ordered a gin and tonic and watched the game.
It was college football. That explained why I didn’t recognize the teams. Lines of huge men crashed into each other while people cheered.
I sipped my gin and tonic, feeling nothing.
“Are you a big fan?” a man asked as he leaned on the bar next to me.
It took me a second to realize he was speaking to me. I blinked at him, surprised to learn that I actually existed. I wasn’t a ghost. I shook my head. “No. I don’t watch sports at all.”
He huffed. He had short, dark hair and a crooked smile. He looked like he worked out but also enjoyed pizza. Perfectly average, like me. “Funny choice of bar for someone who doesn’t watch sports.”
“I only wanted the ambiance,” I said, which wasn’t exactly true. I’d wanted the noise and the alcohol to drown out my own thoughts.
“The what?”
“Ambiance,” I said. At his flat look, I added, “The vibe.”
“Oh.” He smiled at me. He had a snaggletooth, and I wondered if I was a horrible person for noticing.
Was I only noticing because Jack had had perfect teeth?
Would I have cared a month ago, or would I have simply been flattered that a man was speaking to me at all?
He got his beer from the bartender, but he didn’t go back to his friends.
Instead, he turned fully toward me, and I got a waft of his breath.
It smelled like stale beer. I wanted him to leave.
“Do you come here often?” he asked, leaning too close. “You’re cute.”
I forced my lips to curl into a smile, but I really just wanted him to go away.
“Excuse me,” I said, leaving my drink on the bar as I made a motion toward the washroom.
He let me go, and I ducked down the hallway, counted to ten, then I peeked around the corner to make sure he had his back turned and made a beeline for the exit.
When I got back to my apartment, safely locked inside, I burst into tears.
Even if I got the money, my life would never change from what it was. All the contracts and the risk and the happiness and the heartbreak—they’d all been for nothing.
A bitter laugh fell out of me as the reality came crashing down on top of me. I’d ruined my life for no good reason. I’d tasted happiness, and now I knew just how miserable I really was.
My father had won, and maybe I was a ghost, with one foot on the other side, because I swore I could hear the echoes of his cruel laughter in my empty apartment.
JACK
It was Tuesday the 28th of October. The day, eleven years ago, when I’d taken Tanya off life support and watched her slip away.
Now Darby stood next to me at the cemetery, bundled in her winter jacket as we stood at her mother’s grave.
The wind was bitter cold, cutting through the layers I’d worn and freezing me to the bone.
Then again, I hadn’t felt warm for three weeks.
Not since Ember had left. She’d torn a hole in our lives and walked out, just like I knew she would.
Just like everyone did. And it was better now that she was gone, because Darby and I didn’t need anyone else.
We didn’t need complications. My focus had to be my daughter; anything else was a distraction.
And why was I thinking of Ember when I should’ve been remembering my late wife? Guilt slammed into me, burning the back of my throat. I tasted bile.
I cleared the blockage and said, “Anything you want to say, Darby?”
Her chin was tucked into the collar of her jacket. Between that and the woolly beanie she’d pulled low, I could only see a slice of red cheeks, her nose, and her narrowed eyes.
“No,” she replied.
I sighed and bit back a retort. This was how the past three weeks had been. The two of us circling, not quite falling back into our old, familiar patterns. There was coldness between us. Distance.
I was losing her too.
My stomach knotted, and I turned back to the headstone. We’d set some flowers down in front of it, and they shivered in the freezing wind. I wondered what Tanya would say if she could see us now. Wondered what she’d want me to do.
“All right,” I said. “You want to go out for hot chocolate?”
That was our tradition for this day. We spent the whole day together, whether it was a school day or not. We visited Tanya’s grave, paid our respects, then had hot chocolate and watched movies. We looked at baby pictures, and I told her stories of her mother.
But Darby shook her head. “I want to go to school. I have an algebra test this afternoon.”
I opened my mouth, but nothing came out. Darby turned her back on me and started walking back to the car.
Yes, I was losing her. She was mad at me about the piano and mad that I’d asked if she needed any feminine hygiene products (“Oh my god, don’t call them that, Dad!” “Well, what am I supposed to call them?” “Don’t call them anything!”), and she was mad that Ember had gone away.