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Natalie Natalie
CHICAGO
PRESENT—APRIL 14
My home looked as if a bomb had gone off, obliterating my life.
I shook my head. That was too negative. My life wasn’t obliterated. Sure, I was leaving my dream home, where I’d painted every room, chosen each stick of furniture, and hand tiled the bathroom, but it was still just a move. People do it every day. There are entire companies dedicated to helping others haul their things from one place to another. So not obliterated, just... off track. I put down the cheese grater and took a deep breath.
After almost a year of therapy, I could hear my therapist’s voice in my head all the time instead of just one hour a week in her office. “How could you reframe this in a more positive way?” she’d ask.
So My life was ruined when the man I loved most in the world, for whom I would have crawled through broken glass, walked away from our twenty-plus-year marriage became Will isn’t the man I thought he was, but his choices don’t define me. My life isn’t ruined; it’s temporarily derailed.
I’m fifty and no one will ever love me again and I will die alone, eaten by the pet cats that will be my sole companions became I don’t know what the future holds, but I’m a vibrant, smart woman who deserves happiness. And a cat if I feel like it.
My husband’s mistress, Gwen, is a lying, cheating, husband-stealing whore, who clearly doesn’t understand the basic concept of women supporting one another and greatly deserves to have all her hair fall out became... Well, my counselor let me have that one. I suspect she figured anger was progress over despair. On the grief scale it was practically kissing cousins to acceptance.
I meandered through the house, searching for the tape gun to seal more boxes. I wanted to be someone who handled divorce with a sassy attitude, took up a new hobby like pottery, and discovered that I could give myself a far better orgasm than Will ever had, but the truth was, I felt abandoned. Not fully part of a new life, but unable to return to the one I’d had before.
My best friend, Molly, took me to a sex shop after Will moved out. I thought it might be good for my “healing journey,” a way to get over the fact that nearly my entire sexual experience had been with Will, unless you counted my prom date, which I definitely did not.
At the shop, an older woman wearing an airbrushed sweatshirt bedazzled with “Number One Grandma” over two kittens sold me a vibrating silicone friend. So, on the upside, I had checked “better orgasms” off the postdivorce list. Now all I needed was a pottery wheel.
My new bracelet sat on the edge of the coffee table. I slipped it on before it disappeared into a box, never to be seen again. That had been another of Molly’s help-Natalie-post-split projects. Worried that I wasn’t bouncing back, she’d invited me to weirder and weirder activities, culminating in a Wiccan weekend retreat for women to find their “soul power.”
The retreat had involved a lot of vegan food and chanting, and I’d ended up buying an overpriced crystal bracelet that was supposed to have magical powers. I couldn’t remember all the details: rose quartz for self-compassion, moonstone for guidance, the rest I’d forgotten. I’d come back from the weekend filled with energy and hope that I was finally fully emotionally above water, but only a few days later I was back to waking up in the middle of the night and pacing in circles trying to figure out the exact moment everything had gone wrong. But maybe the rocks had a bit of magic. I’d been able to at least act like I was holding it together. Until now. Something about having to decide who would get our dented cheese grater had tossed me back into the deep end.
There was a knock on the door, but it opened just as I reached it.
“I brought champagne,” Molly trilled, dangling a bottle aloft and swaying it back and forth as she barreled past me.
I stared out at the SOLD sign in the yard for a moment before shutting the door and trailing after her to the kitchen, my slippers shuffling along.
“I don’t know where the champagne glasses are.” I surveyed the wreck of my home. There were boxes everywhere, along with tumbleweeds of crumpled brown packing paper littering the floor.
“No problem. There’ll be something we can use. Necessity the mother of invention and all that.” Molly worked her way through the kitchen, opening and shutting the mostly empty cupboards. “Ah, here we go!” She pulled out two mason jars and spun the metal tops off with a flick of her finger, sending them skittering across the kitchen island.
“It’s not really a champagne occasion,” I mumbled.
“Every day is a champagne occasion if you want it to be. I splurged for the good stuff, Veuve Clicquot.” Molly picked at the foil covering the neck of the bottle.
In a second the cork would smack into her face. It’s all fun and celebration until someone loses an eye.
“Give me that.” I grabbed a towel and twisted the cork, freeing it with a loud pop.
Molly clapped, took the bottle back, and poured a fizzy mason jar full for each of us. “To new horizons,” she said.
“To new horizons.” I clanked my jar against hers and took a sip.
Molly surveyed the space. “How’s it coming?”
I shrugged. “It’s coming.” Moving was a Sisyphean task. For every box I packed, the remaining items in the cupboard multiplied overnight. Tupperware breeding with baking dishes giving birth to random kitchen gadgets. Everything had to be divided into his, mine, and things to be donated.
“You’ll be ready for the movers?”
“I think so.” I picked up a large serving platter and wrapped it in paper before tucking it into a box already partially filled with Bubble Wrap. I didn’t know why I was keeping it. My new condo didn’t even have a dining room—fancy dinner parties weren’t in my future.
“What else can I do?”
“I don’t think there’s anything. It’s all stuff I need to finish.” Molly had earned her best-friend status over and over in the past few months. Most of our couple friends had drifted away as if divorce might be contagious. But not Molly. She’d helped with everything from picking up boxes to hauling loads to the Salvation Army.
“I took some time off to wrap up things here and get settled in the new place,” I said.
“Good! You must have weeks of unused vacation.” Molly wagged her finger in my face. “You need more balance.”
I took a sip of champagne to avoid saying anything sharp. Molly had been harping on the topic for months. She didn’t seem to understand I liked going to work. Insurance risk evaluation might not be the most exciting field, but there was a certainty to it that satisfied me. A sense of putting things in order, warding off disaster when possible, and returning things to normal when it wasn’t. At my office, everything was still together. Each file in my cabinet had tidy, typed labels. Papers were stacked on the desk in priority order. Crisp check marks down the side of my daily to-do list made me feel capable and in control. I might not be able to control the mess of my own life, but I could take care of others’ mayhem. I’d come in early, shutting out the noise of my personal life as soon as I swept in the door. I’d drop off the venti latte (extra foam) that I had picked up for our receptionist on my way and knit myself together by the time I sat at my desk.
Most people at work didn’t even know I was getting divorced. At first, I didn’t say anything because I was afraid that I would start crying, and then it seemed like a strange thing to bring up over the photocopier or while grabbing lunch in the break room. In the office I was the same Natalie Taylor I’d always been. Eventually, I had to tell HR because I’d needed to change my emergency contact and the beneficiary of my life insurance policy, but it had felt like a dirty secret. Disclosing something unpalatable that was best kept quiet like an intestinal illness.
I threw myself into work, taking on more and more files and volunteering for everything from heading the birthday celebration committee to updating our company policy-and-procedure manual. When my boss heard I was moving, he all but insisted I take time off after the extra work I’d done in the past year. He thought he was being thoughtful, and I didn’t know how to tell him that routine was what held me together.
“It’s going to be fine. It really is. I know you didn’t want to sell, but it’s going to be good. A fresh start.”
If I had a dollar for every time someone used the term “fresh start,” I would have been able to afford to stay in my house in our expensive Naperville neighborhood outside of Chicago. “I’ll be okay,” I said.
Molly lightly kicked my foot. “You’re going to be more than okay.”
I sighed. Okay still felt like a vast reach. Some days were fine, but others felt like I was moving through a thick fog as I took apart the only life I’d known as an adult.
Molly put down her glass with a thunk. She had that come-to-Jesus look in her eyes of a woman who had been binging the Brené Brown podcast for too long. “Look, it’s time to pull yourself together. It’s a divorce. Not death. You saw that article I sent you, right? The one on silver splitting?”
Even divorce had been rebranded. At least for people fifty and up. Apparently, we were all living our best lives as newly minted single people. The women they interviewed in the article were all starting businesses, learning Mandarin, taking up Pilates, and having sex with people young enough to have gone to school with their kids.
“Did I tell you Will brought Gwen to the meeting to sign the house papers?” I asked. “You should have seen Justine’s face,” I added with a smile. My lawyer reminded me of one of those sleek whippet dogs, thin and angular. Her clothing all looked vaguely European. Justine disliked Will more than I did, a professional courtesy that came with her high hourly rate. I hadn’t needed my therapist to tell me I’d hired Justine to voice the things I couldn’t say aloud. I might have complicated emotions where Will was concerned, but I had at least managed to employ someone who didn’t.
“Hey,” Molly said, breaking my train of thought. “Stop talking about Will and Gwen. Focus on the upsides of your new life.” She must have seen the doubt in my eyes, so she pressed on.
“You won’t have to compromise all the time. You can do anything. Move to Paris and take cooking classes. You love entertaining. Paint your new place any color you want. Decide to have popcorn for dinner.” Her hands waved in the air, champagne sloshing in her glass. “Anything you want is possible!”
I stood in my nearly empty kitchen and tried to not cry. Why was it so hard to think about what I wanted? Was I that out of practice?
There was a knock at the door, and I flinched. “That’s going to be Will,” I said, warning her.
Molly’s nose wrinkled up like she’d smelled something foul. “Why is he here?”
I took a fortifying gulp of champagne from my jar. “He came to get some things he’d left in the basement.”
I stepped toward the hall, but Will was already opening the front door. “Hey, it’s me,” he called out uselessly. He stopped short when he saw Molly step out. “Oh, hi. Nice to see you.”
“Wish I could say the same,” Molly said.
I shot her a look.
“I’ll go finish packing.” She ducked back into the kitchen after giving him one more withering glance.
“She hates me,” Will said when she was gone.
“No, she doesn’t,” I replied automatically. We both stood there awkwardly, knowing that was a lie. Molly and I became friends in college, but we’d quickly expanded to include our spouses. The four of us had gone on vacations together. We were godparents for their child. We held regular summer barbecues with Will and John manning the grill. They’d drink entirely too much craft beer and discuss sports with the intensity of doctors reviewing a terminal cancer diagnosis.
This was an occasion where previous ownership made a difference. I would get Molly and John in the split, just as Will had claim to the barrister bookcase in the living room that I had always loved but had originally belonged to his grandfather.
“Guess I’ll get this out of your way.” Will hefted his golf bag over his shoulder, clubs clinking together, and picked up a box of books that I’d dragged to the foyer. I watched him walk them out to his BMW and tuck them gently into the trunk like they were the child we never had.
Will looked around when he returned. “Is there anything else you need me to do?”
I shrugged. Be the person I thought you were didn’t seem to be a reasonable thing to ask at this point.
“It looks weird so empty.”
I stared into the shell of our dining room. I swallowed over and over.
Will’s forehead furrowed. “You okay?”
I shrugged, trying for casual but knowing I wasn’t pulling it off. I refused to cry. “Sorry, it’s just so...” My brain searched for the right word to encompass the feeling.
“You know, this is hard on me too.”
His words clanged in my brain, discordant.
“I’m also losing my home and previous life.” His voice sounded shaky.
Something inside me tipped over. It might have been the sight of the empty room, or the last of my fucks picking up their bags and heading for the door. No amount of crystals, chanting, or reframing would make that comment okay.
A wave of pure rage boiled up from my stomach in a rush. “You’re not losing anything,” I said. “You’re throwing it away.”
He stared at me with sad eyes. “I can’t be the husband you want.” His voice was soft and low, but for some reason, that made me angrier.
“What, faithful?” I put my hands on his chest and shoved. He acted as if I’d wanted the impossible from him. That I’d expected too much, when the truth was, I hadn’t asked nearly enough. How dare he want me to feel sorry for him? And what made it worse was that I did feel bad. I knew he was hurting, and the fact that I cared sat dark and seething in my chest.
“Maybe it would be best if I left.” He held out his worn leather key ring. “You can give these to the Realtor.”
I reached for it, then pulled back. “No. You take care of it.”
“Look, I know you’re upset—”
“I’m not upset!” I yelled, clearly lying. “Take care of your own damn keys. And you’ll need to meet the cleaners, too, to let them in, make sure they get everything done before the closing. And there’s still the ladder and mower in the garage. Those need to either be sold, or donated, or whatever. The new owners want a walk-through, and the yard service is coming one last time to trim the bushes out front.” The list of to-dos spewed out of me. I was done. I wouldn’t spend one more minute, not one second, on tasks to make this divorce easier.
Will sighed. “You told me you had time off to deal with all of this.”
“Too bad. I changed my mind.”
“Nat,” he said, his voice full of strained patience.
“What? You changed your mind. You decided that you didn’t want to be married anymore. Changed your view on the whole till-death-do-us-part thing, so yeah, I changed my mind about taking my vacation time to do this.”
“You’re upset, but you have the time off already. I’m in the middle of a project at work.”
As if his time was more important than mine. But I’d taught him that, because I always treated it that way. We booked our vacations around his work schedule. We’d moved here for his job. When I was sick, I moved to the guest room so my cough wouldn’t wake him. Even the meetings with our attorneys were at his lawyer’s because it was close to his office. I’d put this man first my entire adult life and never noticed that it wasn’t mutual.
“You have to do it. I won’t even be here,” I said, my voice flat.
Will’s eyebrow shot to his hairline, a farther journey than it had been when we’d started dating. “Where are you going to be?”
“Paris,” I said, surprising myself as much as him.
