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“Yiayia,” I paused, and my voice dropped to a whisper. “Please, can we not talk about this?”
“Okay. Okay, moro mou. I will say only one thing more. I think you make mistake right now.”
I started to protest, but she cut me off.
“Oxi, no. No more talking, but you must think. I told you last time you make mistake and Yiayia was right. Think. Hard. That is all.” She paused. “What you want me to make you for dinner tonight? You want roast beef? With lemon potatoes?”
I laughed. Amber really screwed me over ten years ago. I’d had to choke down more roast beef over the past ten years than anyone should have to tolerate in an entire lifetime. Amber had moved out with her fiancé a few years back, but she’d benefited greatly from her little white lie.
“How about pastitsio, Yiayia?”
“Roast beef tonight, pastitsio for tomorrow when Amber comes for dinner.”
I smiled to myself. I’d take that deal. It would be worth it to watch Amber choke down the pastitsio after ten years of roast beef and roast beef leftovers for lunch for days.
All day long, Yiayia’s advice replayed in my head.
She was right.
I called my therapist to set up an appointment. It would be several weeks before I could get in to see her, but at least I set the ball rolling. If I could conquer air travel, we might have a chance. I almost texted him to tell him, but I didn’t want to create additional pressure for myself. If I told him, and I failed? I didn’t want to be a disappointment.
I’d tell him when it came up naturally in conversation.
He didn’t text that first night, and I wondered if he saw his son when he got home. Maybe he didn’t have time to contact me. I’d ask him how often he got to see Georgie when I talked to him. I smiled to myself. I’d tell him Yiayia still championed him. I’d tell him about the roast beef. He’d laugh. He knew the struggle of being force-fed by a Greek yiayia.
Thankfully, the following two weeks were jam-packed with final preparations for Amber’s wedding. It would give my brain something else to focus on. She planned a big, fat, Greek affair, and I looked forward to it. I loved Greek dancing, I loved the solemnity of the ceremony, the idea that God joined the couples and that what He joined could not be severed.
Realistically, I knew that made no difference to the divorce rate, but it warmed me in any case.
I checked my phone as soon as I woke up the next morning, but there was still no message from Vander. A small, hard knot of trepidation formed in my stomach. The thought that he might not contact me started to take hold, but I pushed it away as an impossibility. There was no way. He wouldn’t let what we had slip away twice.
Would he?
During the day, I distracted myself with work and family and pushed thoughts of Vander deep down where they burned into the lining of my stomach. I popped antacids like breath mints and struggled to eat anything, even when Yiayia pinned her eagle eyes to my dinner plate.
Food prep at work became hazardous to my health. Sharp knives and tear-blurred vision did not mix well. I cut myself twice, and the second time I required stitches. I needed extra help that week from Yiayia for food prep for the first time in a long time, and her steady presence helped me to keep it together.
My pamphlets for franchising sat untouched in a corner of my small office, having lost their lustre.
I pretended excitement over the wedding preparations for Amber’s sake. Only a fraction of it was real.
Every night, the blank screen on my cell, where his texts should have been, mocked me. I replayed our weekend over and over, wondering if I’d made it out to be more than it was.
Several times I started to type out a message only to put my phone back down.
He had to want us. I told him I loved him, told him there’d never been anyone else. I wasn’t going to beg him to want me, but my pride did not warm the sheets. My pride did not ease the loneliness. My pride did nothing to stop the bleed beneath my breast.
From the outside, I gave every indication that I was fine. Yiayia didn’t buy it, but I got past Amber, who, being wrapped up in the final push for her big day, was not as observant as usual.
Inside, I was utterly broken.
In the morning, I dragged myself out of bed, unrested no matter how many hours I slept. Sharp shards of rejection pierced my lungs, and the band of grief around my chest tightened by infinitesimal degrees with every passing hour. The sensation of being cornered never left me, whether I considered flying to him, or decided to stay, I felt like a trapped animal.
Thoughts of him stung my eyes and drew down the corners of my mouth. The remembrance of his unyielding mouth softening into a smile just for me, his tears when he made love to me, his shoulders shadowing me, his arm hooked under my knee, his hand keeping mine warm as we explored the downtown, the sob that escaped his throat in the moment before he walked away.
Without looking back.
By the eve of Amber’s wedding, I’d heard nothing from Vander.
