My divorce was drama free.
"My" divorce.
It should have been "our" divorce, but by the end we were so independent of each other we couldn't even share the dissolution of our marriage.
No bad guys. Or maybe we were both bad guys. Neither of us made the necessary efforts to stay connected, or at least not at the same time. Marriage is really hard to get right, and in the end Beth and I just didn't have what it took, at least not with each other.
So we did what we couldn't -- or wouldn't -- do for the last few years of our 23-year union: we talked, we listened, and we decided to end our marriage with a modicum of respect and appreciation. Our daughters -- we'll always share Katie and Suzie -- felt a lot of sadness and anxiety at the big change to their lives, but they suffered no mortal emotional wounds, and the mediator got Beth and me through the financial settlement with no lasting bruises either.
And so with a few signatures and fewer tears my marriage ended.
Leaving me sitting in my condo on an early Saturday afternoon feeling oddly melancholy.
At least I'd showered and shaved today, which was a 50-50 proposition on the days I didn't go into work. And I'd made the bed and picked up a little, so the day was already modestly productive. I'd been to the gym yesterday, so I wasn't particularly interested in going again today. The wet roads from intermittent rain made a bike ride unappealing. I'm not a sports-bar kind of guy, and I don't really like to read for leisure. Mostly I felt flat, like I'd felt for the last three or four years, just without the structure of a marriage, the maintenance demands of a house, and the obligation to Beth and the girls to seem like I gave a damn.
I was also restless. I hadn't been laid in months, and flat, unfocused, and horny is no way to go through life, son.
Then the doorbell rang.
I was tempted to ignore it. Beth and the girls knew where I lived, and the girls had actually been around to visit. Katie always stayed with Beth when she came home from college. It made sense. The house was familiar, and her mom and sister lived there. But Katie should be a couple hundred miles away in her dorm, and Suzie had said she was going to be at her high school's volleyball game today, and Beth, well, for the last eighteen months of our marriage Beth barely acknowledged me when we lived together. So I had no idea who might be at the door.
But it would give me momentary diversion from my ennui, so I jumped to my feet and padded quickly over to the door.
"Hi, Mr D!"
You could have knocked me over with something even lighter than a feather. Standing -- or rather bouncing -- on my doorstep was Jacquelyn Salvio, Katie's best friend since fourth grade.
"Oh, Jackie. Uh, hi." If my expression didn't show my utter confusion, then my scintillating reply certainly did.
Jackie just giggled in that way she had. She'd always had the most enchanting giggle. When she was ten it was pure joy that bubbled up. When she was in middle school it added a coquettish timbre. When she was in high school her giggle added more layers, first the beginnings of adult knowledge, and later a depth formed by new and intimate experiences. And now her giggle was full and rich, befitting a woman just launched into adulthood with passion and promise and purpose. Or maybe that was all just the projections of the creepy dad of her best friend.
I always tried to be the cool dad, and I was pretty good at not seeing the kids as sexual beings, at least until they got to college. I had no illusions that Katie or any of her friends were celibate. Beth and I discussed how to talk to Katie about sex and relationships and birth control, and while I let Beth do the actual talking I stayed engaged behind the scenes. Beth shared the whole of their conversations with me. Katie and the girls she hung around with weren't virgins by the time they graduated high school, but none of them had more than three partners. Katie said only one for her, and we believed her. Beth and I made a good parenting team at least.
And now Jackie Salvio was standing on my doorstep. And she seemed even more excited than usual.
"Uh, Katie isn't here, Jackie. She's up at school."
"I know. I texted her to get your address."
"Oh. Um, okay. Then what, ah, what can I do for you, Jackie?"
"Can I come in?" She was smiling. She was always happy, upbeat, and she looked right now like she could burst at any moment.
"What? Oh! Yeah, of course. Come on in." I stepped aside so she could enter, and she whizzed right past me into my condo.
"Nice place, Mr D! Quite the bachelor pad."
I looked past the entryway to the great room. It looked pretty generic to me: fireplace with a big TV over the mantle, a small sectional, a recliner, a rectangular coffee table with a glass top. The kitchen was tucked off to the left behind an island with three stools. The hallway opposite the entry led to a bathroom, a guest bedroom I used as an office, and the master suite with its own bathroom, including a soaking tub I had yet to use. The walls were painted something like Oatmeal Hush and the carpeting was from the same palette. The walls were pretty bare, save for an old schoolhouse clock that came from my grandparents' house. At least I hadn't pinned up any posters.
I didn't notice until she dropped it onto the sectional, but Jackie had been carrying an oversized bag on her shoulder, and it looked fully stuffed. She turned and hopped up onto the back of the sectional, steadying her balance by putting her hands down and grabbing the edge.
"You can't go out like that, Mr D. Why don't you get changed, so you can feed me properly. After all, I'm going to need a lot of energy for the next week."
The next week? "Um, Jackie, what exactly is going on here? Shouldn't you be up at school with Katie?"
She smiled, a warm, genuine smile. Caring even. "This is a little more important."
"And what's 'this' then?"
"Operation Recover Mr D!" Jackie threw her arms up over her head, losing her balance and nearly toppling over the back of the sectional before grabbing hold to right herself.
I laughed in spite of myself. "Recover Mr D? And what exactly am I recovering from?"
Her smile this time was wistful. "A neglected soul."
Well that went right to my heart. My eyes flooded, and I had to blink rapidly and look away. I had no idea why those three specific words in that specific order affected me so much, but I struggled for emotional control.
"Oh, Mr D," Jackie said. She was on me in a flash, wrapping her arms around me and pressing herself against me. I couldn't remember the last time another person had held me like that for more than a second or two. And I began to leak tears. My body vibrated as I tried to suppress them.
"It's okay, Mr D. You're going to be just fine."
My crying jag passed quickly leaving only mortification. I tried to hold onto Jackie a little longer to delay the coming awkwardness, but when she pulled back the compassion in her eyes melted away my anxiety.
"I don't know where that came from," I said, wiping my eyes with the sleeve of my t-shirt.
"I do. I told you, Mr D -- we're going to help you. We know what you've been through the past few years. And we love you, and we want to help you."
'We?"
"You know -- Katie, Emmy, Tara, and me!"
"That's very sweet of you girls, but I'm pretty sure I can manage myself."
Jackie stepped back and put one hand on a kicked-out hip. She dropped her chin, arched her eyebrows, and looked up at me through her black bangs. Her deep brown eyes were lively, but their message was clear: I was full of shit.
"You're so sweet, Mr D, but we all know that's not true. Now get changed, and let's get something to eat. I'll fill you in over lunch."
I chuckled, and realized that I could eat.
I always enjoyed the company of Katie and her friends. They were interesting young women, each of them talented, but most importantly they all respected themselves and each other. None of them were perfect, but they accepted that they were worthy just as they were, and that comfort, that solidity of self made them unusual for their age. I always talked to them as equals, because while they lacked my life experiences, they seemed to know themselves so well. And apparently they knew me better than I knew myself.
* * * * *
I thought it wise to defer the selection of restaurant to Jackie, and she picked PF Chang's. So over lettuce wraps, ginger chicken, and honey shrimp, she told me about Operation Recover Mr D.
"You know Tara is studying psychology, right?" I did, so I nodded. "Well, when Katie told us that you and Mrs D were getting a divorce, Tara happened to be in a class about relationships. She said it was about how different types of people interact with each other, and how hard it is for certain people to create and sustain relationships because they're so different. Like that language of love thing. And Katie really wanted to understand why you and her mom were separating, especially since no one was cheating or fighting or drinking or anything like that. Katie was really upset."
"I didn't know that. Why didn't she say anything? Unless she talked with Beth...."
"No, she only talked with us. She thought you guys were maybe hiding something from her, because there didn't seem to be any reason for you guys to split up. She was really sad and angry and, well, just really upset. So she started reading more and more about relationships, and really pumping Tara for information, so Tara started talking with her professors and TAs trying to figure out what was going with you and Mrs D."
"Beth and I just grew apart. Somewhere we lost the spark, and then we just stopped doing things together, and then eventually there just wasn't much of anything left between us."
