Page 114 of That Reunited Feeling

In the week since Hugo’s shockingly wise pep talk, I’ve done my best to adopt a fresh mental attitude. Opening my mind to new possibilities has lifted me out of my funk, energized me, and I’ve found myself waking up earlier and earlier. This morning I grabbed my laptop and brought it back to bed to take care of some business I should have dealt with long ago.

I read my draft email one more time…not that I care whether it has typos.

Dear Mr. Slate,

After giving your request, on behalf of Ms. Louisa Worthington, serious thought, I’ve decided I will not be handing over the marital home in the South of France.

Should Ms. Worthington still desire to own the property, she is most welcome to offer fair market value and I will consider it.

Many thanks.

Tom Dashwood

I hit Send.

The satisfaction and finality that comes with it is more fulfilling than expected.

That’s it. Louisa’s off my plate. Never again will I cave to whatever she wants for a quiet life—like I did for the last way-too-many years.

I feel cleansed, like that life is finally in the rearview mirror and I’m staring ahead at the clear bright road to the future.

And that future has to include Hannah. Ithasto.

In the month after she left, I did the best I could to put her behind me and move on.

I got some rest. Slept in. But had to get up as soon as I was awake or else I’d just watch a mental reel of her shocked, beautiful face that first morning on the landing, her failed attempt to stifle a laugh when I realized we were about to make chocolate dicks, her triumphant moment on stage in London, and how it felt to be inside her as she quaked with orgasm on my lap.

I went to New York a couple times to see the guys. It was rejuvenating to have time to reconnect with them in person and see how they’ve changed—all for the better—after settling down with their soulmates.

I traveled with Walker and Emily to their fantastic new brewery resort off Cape Cod—it will be spectacular when it’s finished. They’re holding their wedding there this summer, and I wished beyond the stars that Hannah would be there with me.

I distracted myself with work, including signing Jane Doe and the Stags. All the while hoping that when Hannah eventually gets to see them on TV or hear them on the radio, she’ll realize they wouldn’t be there if it weren’t for her. That she found them. That she changed their lives.

And I tried to practice guitar but couldn’t manage more than five minutes before seeing nothing but the joy on Dylan’s face when he strummed his first clean chord. My heart hurt so much at the thought I’ll never get to complete his lessons, that I had to stop playing.

But even after a month of all these trying-to-get-over-Hannah activities, I couldn’t.

Then, Hugo’s visit last week made me accept that the reason I couldn’t move on was because it’s impossible to move on from the person I know I’m supposed to be with.

He was a shot in the arm and stunningly, given the subject matter, correct. This might not be the timing I wanted, but it’s the timing I have. And I can’t walk away just because of timing.

Another uncharacteristically observant thing Hugo pointed out? He was spot on about how I got over the end of my marriage in a flash but couldn’t get over just a couple weeks with Hannah. And I’ve now taken the time to listen to everything that tells me how I feel about her.

Not that I didn’t already know. Of course I knew that in the brief time Hannah and I had, I’d experienced what it was like to feel whole for the first time. Ever since the evening she walked out of the snug and left me standing by the fire, a part of me has been missing. Not a trivial part, not a little toe or something you can survive without, but a vital internal organ necessary to stay alive.

And as well as the constant churning emptiness inside me, there’s also the sense that I will never be fully myself without her. The idea that I might live out my days without being by herside, watching her being the best mom Dylan could wish forandfulfilling all her own dreams, is too much to bear.

And I also need to learn from how happy all the brousins are. They all know where they belong. And that’s right with the women they love.

I mean, if Max can move to the rural outskirts of a small town in upstate New York and learn to feed goats, I should at least open my mind to Los Angeles, right? It’s not stopped Max being himself—he still spends a night or two a week at his Manhattan penthouse when he’s in the city for work. And, likewise, I would still have to go back to London regularly. But I am coming around to the idea that I don’t havetolivethere.

Perhaps it’s who you’re with that matters most, not where you are. Like Hugo said, that’s just fucking geography.

Whoever thought this man, who has shagged his way around most of the world and repeatedly shamed himself in the tabloids, would be the one to make me think so deeply about my own life?

He might be in a pit of despair about his own future, but his pain made me see that when life throws something at you, you shouldn’t walk away from it just because you can.

Hugo wasn’t planning on having a bum knee. But he’s stuck with it now. He can’t ignore it. He has to deal with it and figure out a new future.

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