Page 83 of A Love Letter to Whiske
Because you see, it’d taken months of agony, of withdrawal, of anger and pain and depression and losing more of myself than I care to admit to finally emerge on the other side of my life with Jamie Shaw. Every minute hurt, until one day it was sort of a dull ache, and then with more passing time it weakened to only a pressure — that pressure in my chest. I’d completed my twelve-step program. I was clean. I wanted tostayclean.
So, no. As much as you may hate me for it, I wasn’t thinking about Jamie. Not even a little bit.
In fact, I was so confident in my ability tonotthink about Jamie that I’d decided to drink for the first time in over a year. Part of my twelve-step program was giving up literal drinking, too. Every time I drank, I thought of Jamie. I wanted to call him or dwell on his memory. So, I gave up alcohol altogether — the literal and figurative versions, both.
But tonight I was celebrating, and so I’d popped a bottle of wine and though the old me could have pounded a bottle before feeling tipsy, the new me was drunk after half. But I washappydrunk — dancing, singing, packing. I felt it, a new chapter starting, a new day dawning.
I wasn’t thinking about Jamie.
Not until the exact moment he showed up.
It was a soft knock at first, barely heard over the rain and music, and I was right in the middle of wrapping a wine glass in newspaper.
“Just a sec!” I called. I’d just tucked the glass into a box when a second, louder knock came. I huffed, wondering why they didn’t just walk in anyway. I only ever had two visitors — Brad and Jenna — and both had keys. Clicking the pause button on my Taylor Swift jam sesh, I yelled louder. “I’m coming, I’m coming!”
I was still humming to the tune ofI Wish You Would, hips swinging in my pale blue sleep shorts as I readjusted the bun on my head and pulled the door open without even checking the peephole. The air of it hit me with a whoosh, my smile bright and unsuspecting, and then I saw him.
Whiskey and water. A ghostly memory, a wound ripped fresh.
Did you know adding water to whiskey can actually enhance the flavor? It’s true. Turns out, a little dilution can be good, but in this case, it was my worst enemy. Because there was Whiskey, and there was water, but there was no dilution — no, his flavors had only grown stronger, they’d only aged better, and I knew with a head full of wine that I was in deep trouble.
Jamie was completely soaked, long hair dripping into his eyes and rolling down the bridge of his nose, the angle of his jaw, landing on the flat of his heaving chest. His eyes hit mine like a blast of fire, hidden beneath furrowed brows, and the muscle over his jaw ticked twice as he clenched his jaw. I felt the anger rolling mercilessly off his hot skin and into my apartment. His right hand lifted, fingers closed tight over an off-white sheet of card stock with mine and Brad’s names written in neat, gold cursive.
My eyes flicked to the wedding invitation and I swallowed, slowly finding him again. “Jamie,” I breathed.
“No.”
One word had never solicited such a guttural emotion from me before. I shuddered, tensing and waiting as Jamie clenched his fist around the invitation.
“Fuckno.”
He pushed through the door then, moving past me quickly, leaving my arm slick with the water still falling off him. I stood in the doorway for a moment longer, closing my eyes and forcing three full breaths.You can do this. You’re clean. You are in control.I set my shoulders and turned, closing the door behind me.
“By all means, let yourself in.”
His back was to me, the ridges of it defined in the sticky, wet t-shirt he wore. He was shivering, and I wasn’t sure if it was from the cold rain or his anger.
The longer I stared at him, the more I felt. Pain. Anger. Fear.
That last one was a new emotion, but it was the strongest. The truth was that even then, I knew what was coming. I could sense it. I was clean, but I hadn’t been tested yet — and Jamie had picked the worst possible night to give me my final exam. I was drunk, I was high off emotions, I wasnotready. And I was deathly afraid of the mistake I knew I’d make if he only pushed me hard enough.
Jamie faced my large window, looking out at the slanted rain as it drenched the city. He held up his hand once more, invitation thoroughly crinkled now in his clutches. “What the hell is this.”
It was a question, but it wasn’t asked like one — it was posed as an accusation, one I felt all the way to my core.
“I tried calling you…” My voice was quiet, weak, and I hated that because it wasn’t a lie. Ihadcalled him — even after swearing I never would again. When Brad proposed, I knew I had to be the one to tell Jamie, even if he’d changed his mind about us. Even if he’d never called like he said he would. So, I tried getting in touch with him once more, but again, I failed.
Mom sent out the invitations last week.
Apparently hismailboxworked fine.
“Oh you did?” he asked then, spinning to face me. “And what exactly were you going to tell me? That you’re gettingmarried? Please tell me you’re kidding, because I know that’s not what you were going to call me to tell me. Iknowthis invitation can’t be real. This is all some big joke, right?”
Fear and sadness drained away and my defenses went up. Who the hell did he think he was? After two years of silence, he’d showed up demanding answers I wasn’t sure he had a right to know. I crossed my arms, resting heavy on one hip. “Excuseme?” I scoffed. “No, Jamie, my fucking wedding is not ajoke.”
“So you’re getting married?”
“Yes!”
