“I need to know my choices.”
“Not how this works.”
She huffs a breath. “Fine. This one,” she says, poking my left hand.
“Mmm. That’s too bad.” I tsk. “You got your letter, but you would’velovedthe other one.”
She sits up and turns around, laughing and giving my chest a swat. “Stop. What was the other one?”
I kiss her outraged mouth. “It’s in the kitchen. Go take a look, and I’ll grab your letter.”
Her eyes go wide and bright at the prospect of a surprise, and then she’s out of the bed, walking out of my room with the same sway of her hips I’ve seen about a hundred times. Except this time she’s stark naked, and when I hear her gasp at the crate of avocados I sold a kidney for in Anchorage, all my life plans shrink down to keeping Margot naked for as long as possible.
I get up to grab her letter, and when we climb back into bed, she slots back against me like I’m her favorite easy chair. She tears the envelope open, occasionally forking another creamy green slice into her mouth with muffled pleasure, and I lean my head against the headboard to let her read in privacy, wondering if life has ever been this good.
I’m not sure how long it’s been since I drifted off, but when I wake, she’s no longer against me. I spot the letter first, abandoned next to me. There’s also a little enamel pin in the shape of an ax, but I don’t spare it more than a glance. Margot’s sitting on the edge of the bed, wearing a threadbare Stanford T-shirt that used to be mine but is now hers exclusively. Her usual upright posture is slouched, her shoulders caved forward. She’s looking at her feet, still as a stone.
“Margot,” I say, and she starts at my voice.
“Oh, hey,” she says with false brightness, her spine straightening. She’s still not looking at me. “You should go back to sleep. It’s so dark out.”
“It’s been dark since three p.m.”
She flaps a hand. “You know what I mean. It’s late.”
“Then you should come to bed too.”
“I’m busy,” she says, trying her best to conceal a wet-sounding sniffle.
“Busy crying?”
“Busy wishing you were still asleep,” she says without any real bite.
I move over to her, planting my feet on the rug beside her dangling ones. After a moment I say, “I’ll go start a fire, and then you can stop pretending you’re not dying to tell me all about it.”
She gives a watery laugh, and I kiss her damp cheekbone. I don’t know how much she’ll tell me, but I’ll take any piece of her heart that she’ll share.
In the end, with the fire crackling and snow silently building itself around us like a pillow fort outside, she lets me read the letter for myself.
Dear Margot,
Based on the brilliant chronological arc of my last letters, I’m sure you can probably guess what this one’sgoing to be about. Maybe you’ve even been dreading it a little? I know I have, but only because writing it involves mentioning He Whose Name Starts with A and Should End with Hole but Unfortunately Doesn’t.
First, though, I want to apologize. When we talked that night after the interview, pinning all of your new-to-me jadedness on Adam was a) giving himwaytoo much credit, and b) such an oversimplification of what has clearly been the result of not one asshole but a whole… pride of assholes? A murder of assholes? A bloat of assholes? Okay, sorry, that last one was gross, but so are they, and I curse them all with chronic hemorrhoids for eternity. Moving on.
Despite my finally understanding what led to your heartbreaking disbelief in all things romantic, I’m sure you get why my knee-jerk response was to blame Adam. Because while the other guys I’ve mentioned have done undeniably shitty things to you, breaking up with you one week before your wedding was next-level douchery. It was douchery to the power of douche squared. It’s math, and no, I will not be taking questions about my art school education at this time.
Anyway, the day you were supposed to get married and I took you to that ax-throwing biker bar instead, I saw a side of you that left me (and the rest of the patrons) in awe. Frightened awe, but awe just the same. Afterward, I thought:This is it. She’s never going to write another love story again. But to my utter astonishment, you walked back into your office the next day and sat down to finish writing Last Call—possibly the sweetest HEA you’ve ever written. You also exorcised all evidence of Adam from our house (including that incredible set of vintage Italian espresso cups hebought me—grr!), and suddenly, it was like your whole relationship had never happened. You didn’t speak about him, and I was too scared to bring him up (you arereallygood with an ax, btw).
I couldn’t understand it. Life went back to normal-sans-Adam so fast. The only real difference was that you had even more time for me. And if I’m honest, maybe that’s the real reason I didn’t question your supernatural powers of compartmentalization. Perfectly Fine and Holding It Together Margot was very, very convenient to have around. But now, looking back on all the ways you’ve shielded me from your pain, I can only imagine what it must have been like to go through that alone. Yes, I was living with you, but I wasn’t there for you, was I? As usual,youwere there forme. To this day, I don’t know why he broke things off, and if you never tell me, that’s okay too.
I suppose the main purpose of these letters is to let you know that I’m sorry it took me so long to see what was right in front of me. But I see you now, Margot. I see you, and I guess I’ve been wrong—itispossible to love you even more than I did before.
Stay safe, but not too safe,
Savannah
Carefully, I refold the letter. The original creases aren’t perfectly square to the edges of the paper, so I reopen it and correct the fold. Then I unfold it again, and my eyes lock onto the string of words that took me a solid two minutes to move past.One week before your wedding. And then the next set.The day you were supposed to get married. The revelation sears through me again. Margot was engaged. She’d been a singleweekaway from becoming another man’s wife.
