Chapter 2

Divorce, I learned, is mostly paperwork interrupted by grief.

There were no courtroom speeches. Nobody threw wine in anybody’s face. Two lawyers exchanged emails about bank accounts while Daniel moved from my house directly into Rachel’s apartment.

He insisted through his attorney that the relationship had only become romantic after our separation.

Maybe that was true.

I stopped caring enough to investigate.

We sold the house because neither of us could comfortably keep it alone. Daniel took his car. I kept mine. We divided savings.

Willow & Pine remained mine.

One week after Daniel left, Diane and I signed our investment agreement.

She slid the documents across the conference table.

“You okay?”

I looked down at my signature.

“Ask me in six months.”

She smiled slightly.

“I mean about this.”

“So do I.”

That night I drove home to the furnished rental I had taken fifteen minutes from the shop, sat on the floor because my couch hadn’t arrived yet, and ate Chinese food from the carton.

My marriage was collapsing.

My business was expanding.

I felt guilty whenever I was excited and furious whenever I was sad.

Daniel married Rachel seven months after our divorce became final.

I didn’t attend.

Their wedding pictures found me anyway because people have a strange belief that screenshots are somehow less intrusive than showing you the original post.

Rachel wore a dress that probably cost more than my first year’s profit at Willow & Pine.

Daniel wore the watch she’d bought him.

There were pictures from Maui, Paris, Napa Valley.

Captions about choosing happiness.

For a while, I checked their social media accounts at night.

I’m not proud of that.

I would lie in bed at two in the morning looking at photographs of my ex-husband drinking champagne beside an infinity pool while I had spent the evening reviewing inventory.

I hated them.

Then I hated myself for caring.

Slowly, real life became louder than theirs.

Business improved.

We expanded the original shop instead of opening a second location because Diane and I decided the numbers made more sense. I hired a full-time employee named Beth, who was fifty-eight, recently divorced herself, and completely unimpressed by drama.

One afternoon she found me staring at my phone.

“Bad news?”

“My ex is in Santorini.”

She considered that.

“Do we sell anything made in Santorini?”

“No.”

“Then I don’t see how it affects today’s receipts.”

I looked at her.

“That’s annoyingly healthy.”

“It’s taken three therapists and twenty-seven years.”

I put my phone away.

About a year after the wedding, the glamorous pictures stopped.

I noticed only because Karen mentioned it over coffee.

“Rachel canceled the lake weekend.”

“Okay.”

“She never cancels anything.”

“Maybe she discovered laundry.”

Karen hesitated.

“Things aren’t good.”

“I really don’t want to know.”

She nodded.

Then told me anyway.

Rachel’s three million had turned out to be surprisingly mortal.

She’d paid off debt, bought the car, rented expensive places, then bought a huge house. She traveled. She purchased furniture, jewelry and clothes. She invested some money, then withdrew from those investments whenever cash got tight.

Daniel had quit his job.

When Karen told me that, I asked her to repeat herself.

“He quit?”

“Last fall.”

“To do what?”

“Nothing, apparently.”

I laughed before I could stop myself.

That was the first clue their relationship had been built on a fantasy neither one understood.

Within months, stories drifted back to me.

Rachel was furious about Daniel’s spending.

Daniel was furious that she was suddenly tracking his spending.

She asked why he needed expensive lunches when he wasn’t working.

He asked why she needed another handbag when she already owned twenty.

She accused him of treating her like an ATM.

He accused her of lying about how much money she had left.

The house had taxes.

The cars had insurance.

Travel had bills that arrived long after the photographs.

Money, unlike Instagram, required maintenance.

One evening Karen stopped by the shop while I was closing.

“They’re selling the sports car.”

I taped a box shut.

“Good for them.”

“The credit cards are bad.”

“Karen.”

“Sorry.”

I looked at her.

“No, you’re not.”

“No.”

I smiled despite myself.

A year earlier I would have devoured every detail.

Now hearing about their misery felt like eating too much sugar. Pleasant for about thirty seconds, then vaguely sickening.

My life had become ordinary again.

I liked ordinary.

Then Daniel appeared outside my house.

It was a Wednesday evening. I had takeout in one hand and a tote bag filled with product samples in the other.

He got out of his car when I pulled in.

“Marin.”

“No.”

“Can I talk to you?”

“No.”

“Ten minutes.”

I walked toward my door.

He followed at a distance.

“I’m not asking to come inside.”

“Good.”

I finally agreed to sit on the porch.

I brought one glass of iced tea.

For myself.

Petty, yes.

I can live with it.

Daniel looked older. Not ruined, not pathetic. Just tired.

His shirt needed ironing.

“I made a mistake,” he said.

I sipped my tea.

“Which one?”

He winced.

“Do we have to do that?”

“You came to my house.”

He rubbed his hands over his jeans.

“Things with Rachel aren’t working.”

“I’m shocked.”

“She’s become obsessed with money.”

That almost made me laugh.

“She won three million dollars. Your entire relationship started with money.”

“It wasn’t just that.”

I waited.

He looked toward the street.

“Okay. Money was part of it.”

There it was.

The closest thing to honesty I had heard from him in two years.

“I was miserable at work,” he said. “I felt like everybody was moving ahead except me. You had the shop, and it was finally taking off. Rachel suddenly had this life where everything seemed easy.”

“So you left me for money.”

“It wasn’t that simple.”

“It sounds extremely simple when you explain it.”

He sighed.

Then, unbelievably, he said, “You could’ve warned me about her.”

I set down my glass.

“Excuse me?”

“You knew how bad she was with money.”

For several seconds, I couldn’t speak.

Then I laughed so hard my eyes watered.

“You watched her buy you thirty-five hundred dollars’ worth of presents at dinner.”

“That’s not—”

“You watched her rent apartments, buy a sports car, take constant trips, and throw money around like confetti.”

“I knew you’d say this.”

“What was I supposed to do, Daniel? Prepare a PowerPoint before you moved in with my sister?”

He covered his face.

“I know how it sounds.”

“It sounds exactly like what happened.”

Silence settled over the porch.

Then he said it.

“I want another chance.”

I stared at him.

“Another chance at what?”

“Us.”

“There is no us.”

“We could talk. Counseling, maybe. Slowly.”

He had clearly rehearsed this.

“I know I destroyed your trust. I’m not saying everything goes back to normal tomorrow.”

“No.”

“You haven’t even thought about it.”

“I thought about it while you were talking.”

He leaned forward.

“People make mistakes.”

“Leaving your wife for her sister after she wins the lottery isn’t a typo.”

“I’m trying to take responsibility.”

“Then accept the consequence.”

His face hardened.

“You didn’t exactly fight for me.”

Everything in me went still.

“What?”

“When I left, you signed the papers. You never once asked me to stay.”

I stared at the man I had once planned to grow old with.

“You served me divorce papers beside toast.”

“I was confused.”

“You moved into my sister’s apartment.”

“I know.”

“You married her.”

He looked down.

I stood.

“No, Daniel. You weren’t confused. You made choices. You just don’t like where they took you.”

He rose too.

“Marin—”

“Go home.”

At his car, he turned back.

“I really am sorry.”

I believed him.

Strangely, that made it easier.

“I know,” I said. “It still doesn’t change anything.”

I went inside, locked the door, and ate cold noodles over the kitchen sink because my hands were shaking too badly to sit down.