Page 10 of The Holiday Honeymoon Switch
“Which you have kept for all these years, because you are adorable.”
“It was a really sweet card! The things he wrote, whoever he was, made me feel soseen.”
“Right. And you always regretted never finding out who he was.”
“Always. What if he, whoever he is, was the one? I mean, doesn’t that seem like a romance plot straight out of a movie? But then I went to college and met Matt. I thought I had it in the bag, my life completely in order. This wasn’t supposed to happen. It doesn’t feel like my life. There’s so much uncertainty. This wasn’t the plan.”
Ivy squeezes her close, and Holly puts her head on her friend’s shoulder. “I’m not going to lie and say this is going to be easy. But I will be with you. You won’t be alone.”
Holly falls asleep again. When she wakes up, Ivy is watching her with a concerned expression on her face. “Are you hungry yet?”
“Starving, actually.”
“Murray’s bagels with Nova cream cheese for breakfast,andegg-and-cheese rolls from the bodega, too?”
“And yogurt parfaits from Culture. I’m ready to try to eat my feelings.”
“John’s pies for lunch—Margheritaandpiccante. Zucchini sticks. Cokes. An entire cheesecake from Mah-Ze-Dahr for dinner.”
“But you have to pack for your trip, not deal with indigestion.”
“I told you, I’m staying right here. We can have a movie marathon every day. If you feel up to leaving the apartment, we can walk over to Greenwich Letterpress so you can get your 2025 day planner. We can—”
They’re interrupted by Ivy’s phone ringing, and Holly is grateful because she hates hearing Ivy talk about doing everything except the one thing she’s been looking forward to all year: her solo two-week art retreat.
“That better not be your mom,” Ivy says, retrieving her phone from the easy chair. “Nope, actually, it’smymom. She’s leaving for Peru tonight and will be officially off the grid until January.”
Ivy answers and walks into the kitchen again with her empty coffee mug.
Left alone, Holly is suddenly gripped by the urge to check her own phone. There are probably things she needs to bedoing to make sure her wedding is called off according to whatever protocols exist in situations like this.
In Ivy’s room, she retrieves her phone and turns it back on, and it immediately rings in her hand. Answering it without checking who it is is a reflex she immediately regrets.
“Holly, is that you? Have you gotten any of my messages? I can’t leave you any more, your mailbox is full.”
“Mom, I—”
“I’ve spoken to Matt’s parents. They’re on their way over here to the town house. Kitty feels sure she can get Matt to come with them. We can work this out together. We’ll have it sorted by the time the wedding is supposed to start. No one even has to know.”
“Mom, the wedding is off—”
“What exactly did he say to you last night, Holly? What if you’re overreacting? You can be a little sensitive sometimes.”
All at once, Holly can hear Matt’s voice, and every single word he said to her the night before—as if his words have been permanently burned into her brain.
“I’m so sorry,” he had said, his eyes full of torment. “I just can’t.”
“You…can’t?”
“Wecan’t. We can’t get married, Holly. Admit it, we’ve both been on autopilot for years. The past few especially. We’ve been on this train, just going along the track, not evenlooking at the scenery, not even realizing…” He had trailed off, searching for the right words; Matt had never really been one for metaphors. “Without realizing that during the trip, we’ve changed. We’ve grown apart. We want different things. Maybe we want to get off at different stops now.”
“We…do?” Holly had felt like a person in a dream who wanted to move but was frozen in place.
“Okay, well,Iwant something else, then. And I want it for you, too.” At this point, he’d taken her in his arms and said, “I’m in love with someone else.”
Holly had pulled away from him and said, “Please don’t touch me when you say something like that to me.”
“We’re like roommates, and if this is what it feels like now, imagine how it’s going to feel in another ten years, twenty, for the rest of our lives.”
