Page 63 of I'm Not Yours
Business failing because no one wants to get married anymore because they realize it is a silly thing to do, akin only to prison.
Not being able to resist the Greek god.
Never being able to divorce Grayson, the process dragging on and on until I give up because I am too broke and too much of an emotional wreck to deal with it anymore. Then Grayson gets what he wants, and I will be tied to him for life until I am an old and feeble woman collecting plastic bags and chatting with spiders.
The article. What if the reporter thought I had a sponge for a brain and said so?
Estelle. Is she lonely living alone? I think I’ll make her a lace shirt.
I played online Scrabble. I play online Scrabble with anonymous other people across the world. I did not win a single game that night, though I did spell these words: “nymph,” “lust,” and “green.” I could not get the gentle eyes of a man on a chariot out of my head to save my life.
I ate a Pop Tart and a teeny, tiny handful of buttered popcorn.
Okay, two Pop Tarts.
5
“This divorce could have been settled months and months ago,” I said, my anger simmering.
“But I don’t want a divorce,” Grayson, my soon-to-be-ex-husband replied, clipped and definitive. His hair was brushed back, nice and tight. Some women thought he was attractive, in a well-groomed, fashionable, rich attorney sort of way.
I did not.
I grunted with deep frustration and tapped the conference table in Cherie’s office. It was new. Another divorcing couple had had a fight on it over a lizard or something, and the table had split in two. “That’s out of your hands. We’re not living in the caveman era where a man can refuse to divorce his wife, then go out and slay a dinosaur for dinner with a spear.”
“I don’t think he’d be able to slay abigdinosaur,” Cherie said, beside me. She was wearing a tight, red dress with a plunging neckline and a silky, animal-print scarf. In the legal community, she is a legend. Cherie held up her fingers, one inch apart. “His spear isn’t big. He’d only be able to slay a dinosaur this big.”
I did not miss the hidden reference, and neither did Grayson, who protested by saying, “Hey! Keep it civilized.”
“A teeny, tiny dinosaur. A weak dinosaur. A floppy dinosaur. A dinosaur who has to fake how big he is, because he is so small . . .”
“We get it, Cherie,” Grayson’s attorney, Walid, said. Walid had the same slicked-back hair as Grayson. He is five foot, four inches tall. Cherie and I always wear our heels when we meet with him.
Walid and Grayson had been friends for years. I thought he was my friend, too. That was incorrect.
“Knock it off.” said Walid.
“I was explaining to your client, the teeny dinosaur, how things are.” Cherie leaned her elbows on the table. “Grayson, June wants out. She will never want back in. I have handled divorcing couples for many years and trust me when I tell you that she is not changing her mind. This is a fair deal we’ve offered. Sign it.”
“No,” Grayson bit out. “June, we can talk this out. I’m still waiting for you to sit down and listen to me. You refuse to do it. You’ve been rash and emotional. You took a vow, in sickness and in health, good times and bad, blah, blah. So, we had a few bad days, now you walk out? You were tired from work, overwhelmed, it was too much for you, and you take it out on us.”
