I’ve spent an entire week locked away in my apartment. I’ve only showered once during that time and the only fresh air I’ve breathed was on day two when I stepped outside to get the mail. My eyes are puffy from crying, my hair looks like I’m starting dreadlocks, and I’m afraid to look at what’s growing in my armpits. Each delivery person who has brought some needful thing to my house has given me increasingly strange looks. I finally realized that I’m fourteen cats away from being crazy cat lady.

Today, I’m drawing the line.

I get up, shower, and dress in something that isn’t made of spandex. I step outside and turn right, heading down the street to the store. I turn in under the sign that proclaims TUMBLEWEEDS. Never having graduated from college, all Trevor wanted me to do in life was drape myself over his arm, to look good and smile and say all the right things to his friends and associates. At first, that was fine with me, but after a few years, I wanted something more out of life than trophy wife status.

For years, I listened to Trevor’s friends’ wives talk about difficulty finding a local spot to shop for high-end “outdoorsy” stuff. Having been born and raised in Texas, I couldn’t imagine having that problem, but most of those women were more accustomed to glitzy parties back east rather than five-star lodges decorated with antlers and cowhides. So, I started thinking about opening a boutique that offered casual, luxury clothing appropriate for the west. Trevor wouldn’t hear of it. He didn’t want his wife to be a business owner. “Business owner,” he’d say with a sneer, like that was such an awful thing. So of course, that’s the first thing I did when the divorce was final, and I had a sizeable chunk of money to spend. I opened Tumbleweeds.

The bell overhead rings delicately when I swing through, and Janice’s head pops up from behind a rack of sweaters. She’s the store manager and someone I’d now consider a friend.

Her face lights up in a smile. “What are you doing here? I didn’t expect you for another couple of weeks. During your call, didn’t you say you were planning on being gone for a month or so?”

“My trip didn’t last as long as I expected.”

“Everything okay?”

I muster a smile. “Yeah, everything’s fine. Just needed to get back. I thought I’d reach out to that new leather crafter I told you about. I think hand-stitched suede would go nicely with our collection, don’t you?”

“I think it would be to die for.”

I nod in agreement. “I’ll be in the back if you need me.”

I walk through the store, glancing at the racks and custom shelving as I pass, like I have since the day they were installed. Today, however, things feel different. The satisfaction I usually feel isn’t as vibrant and alive in me; in fact, this place almost feels hollow, like whatever life inhabited it is gone.

I know nothing has changed with the store, though. Numbers are going in the right direction, and it’s already a success by anyone’s standards, especially for being a new venture. No, this isn’t because of anything related to Tumbleweeds. This is related to Nixon Holt. This is just another symptom, another unwanted consequence of getting involved with the wrong man. I might’ve stood a chance if I hadn’t slept with him, but that night…

Every time I think of the way he looked at me, the way he stared down into my eyes like he never wanted to let me go, I know without a doubt that was a turning point. It could’ve been a turning point for the better, but unfortunately, it was a turning point for the worse.

I step into my office and close the door. I set my purse on the chair in front of my desk, and, before I can chastise myself out of doing it, I take out my phone and hit the home button. The screen lights up and shows only a text from Hope and one from Dad. Hope has apologized at least a million times since I left, apologized for not being more understanding about my reasons for leaving the first time. My guess is that, since the cat’s out of the bag with Nixon, Hannah told her everything that happened with Jason. It doesn’t make it any less painful, but it helps to know that something good came from that awful time in my life. It eventually repaired the hard feelings my baby sister harbored toward me. Of course, there would’ve been no hard feelings if it hadn’t happened, but there’s no point going down that road. I can’t rewrite history. I can only work with the present.

Other than those texts, my phone is undisturbed. No missed calls. No new voicemails. It’s been four days since Nixon’s last call. He called often at first, before I left Texas. Dozens of calls, several messages. Over the following two days, once I returned to Colorado, he called a dozen more times and left me three more messages. The next day, one call. The day after that, nothing. And there’s been nothing since then.

Nixon has given up. Walked away.

He’s done fighting.

It couldn’t have been love if he could give up that easily.

I sit down at my desk and squeeze my eyes closed as I wait for the burning to go away.