COME ON, CASS, you can do this.
Standing in the center of the room, I closed my eyes and blew a strained breath toward the ceiling. This day had been long overdue, and while I’d reached a point in my life when I was finally ready to do this, I wasn’t prepared for the emotion accompanying it. Taking a minute, or several, I heeded my therapist’s advice. Once the chaos of the holidays had ended and my overall workload slowed, I’d made the decision to resume our weekly sessions. Truth be told, I was lost in an entirely new world of grief, and I was done attempting to work through it on my own. Nearly three months had passed since I’d started seeing her, and within that time, she’d encouraged me to embrace my feelings instead of running from them. According to her, feelings were meant to be felt, experienced.
They were our hearts’ ways of communicating.
So, for the next several minutes, I listened to the story my heart needed to tell. I listened to its heartache and pain—its fear. I listened to everything it had to say, and then I promptly collected myself and started the task I’d set out to do. One by one, I pulled Adam’s articles of clothing from their respective hangers, folding them neatly and then tucking them into the boxes scattered across the surface of my bed. Tears fell as I packed up the memories: his favorite shirt, the hoodie he practically lived in throughout all of winter, and the track and field jacket he was entirely too proud of owning.
I was in the middle of sealing the fifth box when Jenny came to check on me.
“Hey. You okay?” she asked, her concerned eyes leveling on me as she leaned against the doorjamb.
I nodded, smiling through the tears. “Yeah. I’m good.”
“You sure?”
“Yeah. Promise.” Sniffling, I reached for another box at the same time Jenny’s arms curled around me. I immediately spun in her hold, surrendering to the comfort of her embrace.
Her breath was warm in my ear as her cheek pressed against mine, soaking up the wetness from my skin. “I’m so proud of you, you know that? I know this isn’t easy for you, but I am so damn proud of you for having the courage to finally take this step.”
I cried into her shoulder, not because I was sad, but because for the first time in nearly twenty months, I felt as if I were going to be okay.
I was going to be okay.
Untangling our arms, Jenny swiped her fingers under her eyes. “I’m going to run and pick up the pizza. I’ll be back soon. Did you need anything else while I’m out?”
“A bottle of wine would be nice.”
She winked at me. “You’ve got it.”
In the span of time Jenny was gone, I managed to finish packing up Adam’s belongings. I even moved all the boxes to the living room, stacking them beside the front door so they were ready for Monday’s scheduled donation pickup, and all the while, my thoughts occasionally drifted to Sam.
We hadn’t spoken since he’d confessed to being there the night of Adam’s death, and he hadn’t made any attempt to contact me thereafter. For the longest while, I convinced myself that was what we both needed: time, space, distance. It was probably still what we needed, but I couldn’t deny how much I missed him. His smiles, his laughter. I missed the person he’d helped me to become.
There were still days when I didn’t feel entirely whole, but when I’d been with him, it was the most whole I’d ever been.
“Hey, Cass?” Jenny’s voice boomed across my living room as she shuffled through the front door.
“Yeah?”
She waltzed into the kitchen, dumping the pizza, bottle of wine, and a brown box on the counter. “Were you expecting a package to be delivered?”
I frowned, quickly doing a mental check as I pulled two plates from the cabinet. “No, not that I’m aware. Why?”
“This was sitting on your front porch.” She pushed the box toward me.
“That’s weird. Is there a return address?” I set the plates down, looking closer at the mysterious box that had to be at least a foot long by a foot tall.
“No. And actually, there’s no label at all.”
“Huh. Well, let’s open it then, shall we?”
Grabbing a knife from my silverware drawer, I carefully ran it along the tape securing the box. Curiosity had me tearing through the flaps, my hands digging through the mountain of protective tissue paper until they located a bubble-wrapped object.
I pulled it out, setting it on the counter as well as the card tucked snugly beside it. Any other time, I would have been interested in reading the card first, but my fingers were already moving to unveil whatever was hidden beneath the endless amount of protective bubble wrap.
Jenny gasped.
My heart stuttered, my pulse dipping and thudding as I admired the beautiful piece of art resting in front of me.
The three-dimensional heart featured five sides, each one fused together by hundreds of shards of glass. The center was hollow, except for two smaller glass hearts that danced as the entire piece spun from the cord it was attached to.
I no longer needed to read the card to know who had sent it. I recognized the skill and artistry used to craft its magnificence—the gold and silver glass from the vase I’d intentionally broken to prove a point.
“Oh my God. What is that? It’s gorgeous.”
I smiled sadly, watching as the afternoon sunshine poured in through my kitchen windows, refracting off the colors and causing the silver flecks to glint like a thousand tiny diamonds.
“It’s proof.”
“Proof.” Jenny’s nose crinkled. “Proof of what?”
“Proof there’s beauty in the broken.”
The look she gave me told me she didn’t understand and I might as well have been speaking a different language, but it was okay, because she didn’t need to. The underlying message in the gift was for me and me alone.
“Any idea who might have left it?”
I simply nodded, still in too much awe to verbalize any thoughts.
“Who?”
I glanced at her then, unable to put a stop to the tears filling my eyes. “Sam.”
Jenny’s shoulders sagged, her expression sobering as she walked around the island and sat on the stool beside me. She rested her elbows on the counter and shoved her hair behind her ears. “I never did get to apologize.”
“For what?”
“For the way I spoke to him that night.” She frowned. “I don’t know how much of our conversation you heard, but I said some really cruel things. I told him Adam was a good person and it was a shame his heart didn’t go to someone more deserving.”
“No, Jen …”
“I know. I know. It wasn’t right. Gosh, Cass. I was just so angry and hurt, because I’d actually believed he’d slept with her. You were finally happy. After so long of walking around like you were only half alive, you were happy. And then you weren’t.” She dropped her eyes to hide the guilt and the regret. “I was terrified we were going to lose you again, and, that if we did, there’d be no saving you from the grief.” Her gaze lifted to mine. “How many times can a heart break before it’s considered completely shattered?”
I shook my head, the memory and Sam’s words rushing to the forefront of my mind. “It doesn’t matter, because that’s the thing about hearts, Jen,” I whispered, returning my attention to the suncatcher he’d given me, my fingers running over the delicate lines which had once been empty cracks. “They’re like glass. No matter how shattered they appear, they can be recreated into something new—something just as stunning and equally breathtaking.”
AFTER JENNY LEFT that evening, I curled up on my couch, my bottle of Moscato in one hand and the envelope from Sam in the other. I was afraid to open it, terrified of what the little card might say. Nearly three months ago, when Jenny forced Sam to walk out of my house, and essentially out of my life, it had felt like the end but not goodbye. It hadn’t felt like a true goodbye. But this … I feared this card was his way of finally letting go, and I realized maybe this was how our story ended.
Maybe books and movies and our own childish fantasies skewed reality. Maybe happily ever after didn’t always involve a prince or the castle, the white picket fence with the golden retriever frolicking in the yard. Maybe happiness could be found in the journey of the heroine. Maybe true happiness was her finding herself and learning how to pick up the pieces to live her very best life.
That was enough, wasn’t it?
Sometimes it had to be enough.
Bringing the bottle of wine to my lips, I took a healthy sip and then set it down on my coffee table.
I stared at the envelope and ran my fingers along my neatly scrolled name. An ache pulsed in my chest, and I used the heel of my palm in an attempt to rub it away. It was no use. It was deep in my heart, its cure miles away and too far out of reach.
Downing another gulp of liquid courage, I closed my eyes. I breathed until I felt as though I had the situation under control, and then I tore through the sealed flap on the white envelope. The card was simple, like Sam, fine lines and smooth edges. I flipped it open, read the words, and as if on cue, the tears started. They flowed down my cheeks in silent streams.
I was right.
This was goodbye.