Page 106 of How to Ruin Your Ex's Wedding
Then I go back to pacing a different walkway, waiting to dock again somewhere else.
Because sometimes life is just one big vicious circle while you try to get to your destination. Not that I have anywhere to be. I don’t even have plans for when I get home. I figure I’ll sit on my deck with a bottle of Macallan and my camera and see if I can’t make sense of things for a while. Or at least until the Macallan dulls life enough to force me to sleep.
It’s not like she said no.
This is what I tell myself so I don’t jump overboard into the icy waters of the North Pacific Ocean. She said she needed space.
So why am I so distraught over this? It wasn’t a no. It was anot right now. What kind of man am I that I can’t wait a couple of days to see what my woman wants?
She may not be your woman.
Of course she’s my woman.
Maybe she’s her own woman.
That’s bullshit. We belong together.
Doesn’t mean she’ll come back to you.
I tell myself to fuck off so I can stop the argument ping-ponging back and forth in my head. And spend the rest of the ferry ride reciting Seabirds stats to myself to stay occupied.
10-6-0, 2nd NFC division. Lost Wild Card to Dallas 22-24. 26.8 points. 353.3 yards. 193.3 pass yards. 160 rush yards.
This is bullshit. It doesn’t matter what I do to try and keep my brain occupied, underneath it all will still be Tabatha trying to break through to the forefront of my thoughts.
Stay positive.
I’ll give her a few days and maybe give her a call, see where she’s at with everything.
My phone buzzes with a text.
My heart leaps.
Please be Tabby. Please be Tabby.
It’s Gregor.
G-MAN: Hey, Maisey bailed on me to be with the girls. I was thinking I’d come over. Cool?
ME: Me casa es su casa, my friend.
G-MAN: See you soon.
I don’t know what I’m going to do when football season starts again. It happens to me every year. I get used to Gregor during the offseason. Then, come August, I lose him for another seven months or so. Now I know how military spouses feel when the other is deployed.
Because G is as close to a wife as you’ll ever have again.
Fuck off, self.
I board the ferry to take me to Port Orchard, where I can finally head home. My house isn’t far from the ferry terminal. Maybe a ten-minute drive at most. So, before I know it, I’ll be home and I can get rid of this monkey suit and indulge in some hardcore self-pity for the evening.
* * *
The west-facing side of my house is my favorite. Not only do I have multiple decks that overlook the sound, but on the main level, I have two sliding glass doors that are barely a foot apart and almost act as a disappearing glass wall. An abundance of trees on either side gives me all the privacy I could ever want.
It’s a big house, too big for one person, but I love it anyway. The main floor hosts the living, dining, and kitchen spaces on one end, with a big master suite on the other. One floor below are two guest rooms and an office, and just below that, my darkroom and studio. Technically it’s three stories, but it doesn’t always feel that way because I only bother myself with two floors—the top and the bottom. The whole building is set into a hill making the stories really more like gentle declines with steps. But every floor has a large deck with access to the big backyard below, and a phenomenal view of the sound.
I can usually count on the view to cheer me up when I’m feeling down. But today seems to be the exception, I’m realizing, as I sit on the upper deck, cigar in one hand, scotch in the other. I didn’t even change out of my suit, just plopped my ass down and started letting my thoughts wander to random places.
