Page 35 of I’m Not Yours

“I wanted to go to lunch with you, to talk and laugh, and I didn’t want to discuss the black, frothing muck in my life, this constant sadness, this fight, this disaster.

” For once I was not awash in lust while looking at him.

My sadness was squashing the lust. “I didn’t even know if we would see each other again, and I wanted to take a break out of my life and just be with you. ”

He thought for a while, watching the ocean. Maybe I should leave now?

“Within ten minutes of talking to you,” he said, “I knew we’d see each other again.”

“Because you knew we were living next door to each other?”

“No. Because I wanted to be with you again.”

I wanted to cry. I had so wanted to be with him, too.

“As far as your soon-to-be-ex-husband. Do you still love him? Do you hate him? Is the marriage over in your mind, or are there a whole bunch of things that are still upsetting you?”

“I have been through a mind-numbing range of emotions with this divorce, with the ending of my marriage, and I feel nothing for my ex-husband except this anger and frustration that he’s holding things up.

There are no other emotions left from the marriage itself.

I don’t love him, I don’t hate him, I don’t like him.

I want him out of my life. He’s controlling this situation, as he did our marriage, because he can.

I can’t stand that anyone is controlling me at all, especially him. ”

“He’s on a power trip, then.”

“Always has been. But am I over him? Yes. Long ago I was over him.”

“Why did the marriage break up?”

“Definitely at least half my fault. I never should have married him. I was acting as someone I wasn’t, reaching for things I didn’t value, and I worked incessantly to build my career.

I was part of an image that I thought, for years, I wanted.

Grayson fit into the image. He was the perfect fiancé, and the perfect husband for about three months.

We wanted the same things. We had the same interest in work. My mistake.”

“What did you used to do?”

“I was a lawyer in a law firm on a partnership track. He was a partner in another high-powered firm.”

“How’d that go?”

“I was unutterably miserable.”

“And your marriage was miserable.”

“Yes. I won’t get into the sordid details, but I will say that it was the criticism that killed it, an incessant onslaught of negative, until I shut down.

Down and out.” I studied the break of the waves, the way the blue-gray water shot out in both directions.

“That’s when you know you’re done with a marriage, I think, when there’s no fight in you anymore, no arguments.

You acquiesce, you give up, you dive into self-protection mode, arms over your head, knees to chest.

“He went on a business trip once, for four weeks, to New York. That was when I understood, finally, that I had a problem. Sometimes the problem has to leave before you realize you’re in an emotional war zone, fighting to keep yourself together and constantly battling emotional manipulations.

What is abnormal and not mentally healthy has become your normal, but you’re too mentally unhealthy to see it.

Your normal isn’t normal. It’s not a place where you can grow and live and create. It’s a bad, bad spot.

“When he was gone and I wasn’t constantly ducking for cover around him, and could breathe, and think, and finally be brutally honest with myself, I started to recognize how much my marriage had smothered me.”

“What was the final moment, when you knew you were done with the marriage? Was there a last straw?”

“There was. I told you I loved sewing as a kid with my family. Even my father could sew. During college and law school and my years of building a career, I stopped sewing, I didn’t have time.

In the midst of my misery, a year into my marriage, I started sewing again, at night, as soon as I could sneak away from Grayson.

It was my only respite, I lost myself in whatever I was making.

Soon my uptight lawyer suits had a rim of lace.

The skirts had ruffles. The sleeves were embroidered down the sides.

I made flowers out of dyed leather and attached them to the toes of my heels.

And I sewed dresses, long and flowing or short and snazzy, mostly out of lace, which I love, as I had done with my mom and my sisters.

“Through waves of pain and loneliness living in that barren marriage, in that barren job, I sewed and sewed. In every stitch, every scissor cut, every piece of thread that passed through my fingers, every touch of lace or satin or velvet or leather, I felt myself coming back to me. As if I’d lost her and she’d been packed into a sewing box in my head and the box had been nailed down and hidden.

“To court one day I wore a pink skirt with a ruffle and a bit of taffeta underneath it with a pink lace shirt I’d lined with satin trim, and I knew I was done. Even the judge noted, ‘Hmm . . . I think we’re feeling a bit pinkish today, Ms. MacKenzie.” I laughed out loud; so did Reece.

“I loved that judge. It was a woman and later she called me and asked where I’d bought my suit. That day I tore apart the lying witnesses, attacked the defense’s case with ferocity, nailed my opening and closing arguments, and won the case. It was a high-profile case.

“I headed back to my office and was stopped three times by women who wanted to know where I’d bought my clothes and the handbag I’d made out of leather and lace. I had an epiphany and I quit my job fifteen minutes later. I left with a check and decided that part of my life was over.”

“That was it?”

“That was it. It took a day in court with pink lace and satin trim.”

“That’s brave. I admire you. You were taking a new direction, didn’t know where it would lead, but it had to be better than what you were living with.”

“Exactly.” Man, he was so smart. “Sometimes ya gotta walk . . .”

“And the walk may have no clear path . . .”

“But you have to get on it anyhow.” We understood each other.

“Then what happened?”

Oh, those green eyes. I could feel the lust coming at me again, darn it.

I cleared my throat. “On my way out of the law firm, Grayson came tearing after me. He yelled, ‘What the hell did you do? What happened? Have you lost your friggin’ mind, June? Do you expect me to support you? Do you expect to sit around and eat chocolate all day while you sew your white-trash Halloween outfits? I’m not giving you a dime of my money, now get back in there and tell them you made a mistake, because you have, June, you have! ”

“No,’ I said to him. ‘I have not made a mistake.’

“You quit your job!’ He’s screaming at me now. ‘Why? What are you thinking? Are you thinking? And why are you dressed in pink ? You didn’t wear that to court, did you? You’re an attorney, not a pink cake!’

“And I said, ‘I’m quitting a lot of things. The job was first, you’re second, and now I’m quitting this city.’ And I did.”

Reece abruptly stood up, his face flushed, and started pacing the deck.

“What’s wrong?” I asked, alarmed.

He couldn’t even speak for a minute. “I believe,” he bit out, still stalking around, “that even though you don’t hate your soon-to-be-ex-husband, I do. I can’t believe he said that to you.”

I about cried right there, his anger was so touching. Reece ranted for a few minutes, protective, furious, and when he settled down, we talked for another forty-five minutes. I was as honest as I could be. I told him how afterward I went to visit my parents for a week.

“I walked through their fields and down to the river. I took off my shoes. I went barefoot. I rode their horses and petted their cats and dogs with strange names like Christmas Wreath and Mr. Scoot and Admiral Crow.

“I stared out their windows and watched sunrises and sunsets on their porch, something I hadn’t paid attention to in years.

I wouldn’t have even sworn that we still had sunrises and sunsets anymore.

I watched leaves flutter through the fields.

I watched flowers unfold. I studied a blue heron and blue jays.

I listened to the river bubble and sat in absolute silence.

At first the silence was so noisy I couldn’t concentrate, but then I breathed the silence in, so I could figure my way out of the disaster of my own making.

“My parents asked me to come and work for the family company, but I declined, with a hug, because I wanted to sew wedding dresses and build my own company. They understood, and we spent hours working together, planning my business, discussing designs, drawing, coloring, penciling . . . my hands shaking, shock slowly leaving my body to be replaced by this light of hope I hadn’t felt in years. ”

The kite flyers were out and I envied them their playtime.

“I came to the beach and rented my house because I am passionate about the Oregon coast. I can think here, be here. Most days I’ll put my rocking chair right next to my French doors, cover myself with my crazy quilt, and sew.

I’m as happy as I’ve ever been when I do that. ”

“What else makes you happy, June?”

“My family, as odd as we all are, as imperfect as we all are, they make me happy. What makes you happy, Reece?”

“Right now.”

“Yes, right now. Anything. What makes you happy?”

“I just told you. Right now I’m happy. I’m happy talking and watching the waves with you. Thanks for being honest, June.”

“You’re welcome. I probably should have told you the second I was dragging seaweed out of my mouth, so please forgive me.”

“Forgiven.”

So quick, without a second thought. The man did not want to play games.

“Thank you. So, Reece. If you want, we can be friends. Ah . . . good friends. I’m still technically married, so I don’t feel it’s right to date.

I don’t think I could handle being involved with anyone, it’s too stressful, I’m not a whole person yet, and I especially could not date you.

” I shifted in my seat. “Not that you would want to date me. I’m not trying to be presumptuous, I know you probably wouldn’t want to date me, but—”

“June, I want to date you. But why would you not want to date me if you were free?”

I bent my head, wrestling with my thoughts, then looked up again. “You’re sexy and too much of a man to get wrapped up with. I think I’d lose my head around you. There. I said it. More honesty for you.”

“I don’t want you to lose your head. You have a pretty head.”

His mouth tilted at the corners; nice lips. Such nice lips. I tried to put myself back together and not think about his lips. “I’m a fast-moving train wreck, but if you want to be friends with a wreck, sign me up.”

“I’ll sign you up. I’ve always wanted to be friends with a wreck.”

I smiled at him. He was such a cowboy/rancher sort of true man.

“I can do it,” he said, almost to himself.

“I can control myself. I can resist. I can stop myself from pulling you into my arms and kissing you on our midnight walks along the beach, counting stars together lying in the sand, hot tubbing . . . yep, I can control all those thoughts. But maybe, June, when this is all over, and you’re ready, you and I can start as an us. We can be an us. Going slowly .”

My stomach flipped and flopped in a happy, skippy way. “I think we might could do that. I haven’t scared you off?”

“No. Not at all. To the contrary.”

We sat in silence, my brown eyes on his green, neither looking away, both smiling like silly goons, my heart galloping about.

“It’s an incredible day, isn’t it?” he said, his voice carrying over the gentle ruffle of wind.

“Yeah, Reece, it is an incredible day.” And, June, you will not fall in love with him! You won’t! “Okay, I’ll try not to,” I said out loud.

“What?”

“Nothing. Oh, nothing.”

He reached for my hand, yes he did. His hand was strong and muscled.

Even though I believe in treats and chocolates, my body would seem small underneath the stroking of that hand.

At the thought of that strong hand slipping over my entire body, I felt myself heat up again, as if a match had been lit right under my feet and the rest of me was now engulfed in flames.

I placed my hand in his.

“Now I’m even happier, June.” He winked at me.

Oh, for heaven’s sakes.