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Sam: Well???? How was the mafioso?
Sally: What she said. [fire emoji]
Susan: He was so intense and so hot I had trouble talking in complete sentences
Sadie: Wow!
Skye: So then surely with this one there will be a second date?
Susan: I don’t think so. He implied he doesn’t want to settle down. The man is forty-one!
Kat: So you could “not settle down” with him for a few nights
Kat: [Animated Gif: Dog wagging his eyebrows.]
Susan: Absolutely not
Sadie: Understood. What about the other one, the double date with Jenn’s new guy?
Skye: Take him out of the spreadsheet
Sally: What spreadsheet?
Skye: I’m just assuming Susan has a dating spreadsheet
Sam: LOLOLOL
Sam: I hope your dating calendar isn’t shared with the family!
Sam: Adam would get alerts to your possible trips to pound town!
Susan: No one is going to pound town!
Sadie: He doesn’t know that though ;) What about the other one, the double date with Jenn’s new guy?
Susan: Snoozefest
Skye: Still on for date number two with Pearce tonight though?
Sam: He is going to kiss you this time!!!
My stomach somersaults.
Skye: He absolutely is.
Sadie: Agreed!
Susan: You think?!
Sally: How do you feel about that?
Susan: I really don’t know!
Kat: You’ll know after the fact that’s for sure!
Sadie: Report back!
Skye: Whatever you decide, we’re with you! #TeamSusan
They all reply with the same hashtag and the nervousness subsides to make way for intense gratitude. I know I still drive them nuts and they’ll always tease me, as is our love language it seems, but I wish everyone in the world could have a gaggle of Cantons in their corner. Just the best.
I carry that happy energy with me through my Canton International meetings and as I update the Canton Family Master Calendar with Eli’s upcoming basketball schedule. I almost float through the day. There are no major fires at work and Pearce has texted me twice to let me know how excited he is.
Those are not the only messages I’ve gotten.
I resist the urge to pull out my phone as I exit the office.
Adam texts me everyday, just like when we were engaged. It’s been two weeks since he asked to take me out. I haven’t called him or seen him at the house, which has taken significant effort on my part. He sends funny songs, I miss you songs, even some angry songs. I never listen to them because I get the message just from the title.
He added photos last week.
Etchings. A crawdad, a lighthouse, all our recent roadside stops. His carved drawings when we were young were simple, almost modern impressions of the landmark. These…these are seriously little masterpieces.
“Have a good night, boss!” Addie says, smiling obnoxiously. She knows I have a date.
“Thanks,” I smirk back. As if he can sense my thoughts, Adam sends another image right as I’m imagining him carving in his studio, concentrating, wearing tattered jeans and dirty boots. Sweating. Ugh! Focus!
This is another one of his new pieces that I didn’t understand at first. This etched panel shows a giant peanut that is…smiling? I can tell it’s big because of the scale over the surrounding tiny parking lot and little parked cars. He holds the flat wood with the engraved drawing in his calloused hands and I have to force myself not to stare at them. I’ve always loved his big, rough fingers.
But we’ve never been to see this one. The first time he sent one of these new additions, he attached a song, Welcome to the Future by Brad Paisley. He is not a country music fan but the title made sense. Places he wants to take me to.
It’s sweet.
So romantic I haven’t even told my sisters.
And I can see it. Going to random little holes in the wall all across the US, taking selfies. And, without my permission, as soon as I remember our trip to Louisiana, my mind replays Adam’s words like some kind of greatest hits album.
I always wanted you.
I was out, Susan. Then I met you.
I have never, ever, not even once, regretted marrying you.
Because I love you.
I would’ve walked five hundred miles if you needed me to. I still would.
Susan, I would never say no to you. Think about it, when have I ever said no when you outright asked me for anything?
My eyes start to sting as I stare at the picture. Then my calendar alert snaps me right back to reality. Susan! You have a date with another man! Snap out of it!
I tuck my phone away, start my car, and head south to meet my date for dinner.
_____
“Hey, I had a really great time.” Pearce says nervously on the curb right by my car.
“I did too,” I say, meaning it.
He kept his word about only finding us food as delicious as his own creations. He made me laugh. He touched my hand, tucked a stray hair behind my ear. He asked all about my work and hopes and dreams and shared his with me as well. He has been an amazing date.
And now, I’m pretty sure, he’s going to kiss me.
Someone other than Adam is going to kiss me.
Pearce inches closer, tentatively. I smile, nervous, frozen.
He leans in and I smell his spicy cologne mixed with clean aftershave. I start to close my eyes. This is it. I feel the heat of his mouth.
I can’t.
I don’t want to.
I jerk my head back and blurt, “I’m sorry!”
He makes a choking sound. “Oh, no, I’m sorry. I thought…”
“No, you thought right. I just…I haven’t, um, done that yet since the, um, separation,”
“Ah. Right.” He steps back politely.
“Sorry,” I say again.
He studies me for a second. “Listen, we can take it slow, right?”
“I,” I exhale and admit the truth to myself. “I don’t think we can.”
“Oh.”
Disappointment washes over him and as bad as I feel, I know it’s the right thing to do. Pearce is handsome, sweet, funny, and feels exactly like a brother-in-law. There is just no chemistry. No swoon. I felt more looking at Adam’s fingers earlier than I have in all of my texts and calls and dinners with the sweet man in front of me.
“You’re still so wonderful, Pearce, really.”
“Oh wow, the it’s not me it’s you speech,” he jokes gracefully.
“Yes, but sincerely. I’m just not ready.”
He reaches a hand up toward my face but then drops it down. “If that changes you’ll let me know?”
“I will.”
I won’t.
But I try to assure him anyway. I pull him into a hug, get in my car, and drive home.
In bed, my mind spins. Is it just Pearce? And Reid and Elton and everyone? Or is it me?
Or really the big question is, is it Adam? Will it always ever only be Adam?
I’m so freaking over the spinning. My stomach, my feelings, my thoughts. I’m getting dizzy! My life makes me freaking dizzy. Ugh.
To push my psyche around in yet another circle, my phone lights up on the nightstand.
Adam: This is one of the Don Henley songs I showed you a million years ago, but when I searched for it, this girl popped up with her bright colors and so I had to listen to it. I cried like a baby.
Adam: [Link: Heart of the Matter by India.Arie]
I tap the link, because the title doesn’t tell me much. I also search my memories for who Don Henley is and what song this might be. As it starts to play, it seems more upbeat than I was expecting since he said he cried. India.Arie’s voice is soothing, soulful. But then the words…
Aaaaaand I’m sobbing.
The words basically say, well our whole life. As she sings about how she heard her lover found someone else I’m taken right back to that cafe, watching Adam laugh with someone. I remember him smiling and flirting and being fun again without me. It stings but I think through it, I feel it. Feel what it will be like if he really moves on someday.
Then the singer says she sat and thought about their relationship, all the bad things they suffered through, including some bad luck. She sings all about us, how we lost ourselves and each other, and I think about losing my Mom and losing his uncle and how we took on so much so young. Then she gets to the real kicker.
When it comes down to it, she sings, what matters is forgiveness, even if you don’t love me anymore.
Even if you don’t love me anymore.
But I do. I do still love him so damn much.
I hit play again, but I can’t even make it that far into the song until I’m up and out of bed.
Susan: Are you home?
Adam: No, but I am here at this rental house down the street.
That just makes me cry harder.
I fumble around my room in the dark trying to find my slippers and a robe. I go down the stairs and realize I left my phone on my nightstand. I go back and grab it, then rush down the stairs and out the door.
“Adam?” He’s on the steps, panting. “Did you run here?”
“Yes.” He bends over, hands on his knees and laughs at himself. “Matt’s right I gotta start doing more cardio.”
“What…what are you doing here?”
“Hoping you wanted to talk to me?” I nod and he gives me a small grin. “We can’t leave the boys in the house alone.”
My eyes bulge. “Oh my gosh, I forgot about our children.”
He chuckles softly, “That song’ll do that.”
“Yeah,” I squeak, starting to tear up all over again.
“Can I come in?” he asks tentatively.
I nod, swallow, and open the door. He follows me in.
Then he waits.
Oh, right. I wanted to talk to him.
“I…I don’t even know where to start.”
“Well, the song,” he thinks aloud, looking down. “Do…do you forgive me?”
“Yes,” I say softly.
Then he locks eyes with me and I can tell it pains him to ask, “Even if you don’t love me anymore?”