Anne shook with her anger. “Oh, you think I’m being mean? All right, let’s talk mean. You’re so scared of being heartbroken that you’re willing to break mine to try and avoid it.That’smean. You’re walking out on me. At least have the decency to own up to what you’re doing.”
“I can’t listen to this.” Sadie turned away. “I’m not walking out on you!”
“You know, you keep telling me you’re so traumatized by Fred, that you’re so worried about what might happen with us, but at the end of the day, who’s the one leaving? Who’s doing exactly what Fred did?” Anne spun toward the door again.
“That’s not fair! It’s not the same thing! I’m not wrong to need time!”
“Take as long as you want,” Anne snapped and then threw open Sadie’s front door. “We’ve got all the time in the world. Like you always say, we’re going to live another forty years. Aren’t we?”
One last look back at a stricken Sadie, her face in her hands, her shoulders shaking, and then Anne was gone. The door slammed behind her.
Chapter 13
Once she’d closed her own front door, Anne’s fury left her, too. Her emptiness was the only thing left.
As a child, she’d broken her arm and had it reset by a doctor. Right after he’d wrenched it back into place, there’d been a swollen second of numb shock before the shriek of pain that followed.
Anne was back in that second again. Only now for much, much, longer.
She sat down heavily on one of her living room chairs.Don’t leave, she’d pleaded, as naked as Anne had ever let herself be in front of another person. But Sadie hadn’t listened. Sadie had left her.
Where had Anne’s anger gone? It would feel so good to be furious at Sadie for abandoning her. Simple. But Anne couldn’t do it. The woman Anne had been just this morning, that shameless romantic with stars in her eyes and silly fantasies—that woman could shoulder the bulk of the blame instead. Wasn’t it her own fault, after all? She’d gotten her hopes up.
If she’d just gotten her brain out from between her legs and fully realized that Sadie had been communicating her doubts that whole day, maybe then—
Fresh pain ripped up her chest without warning. Anne inhaled, trying to ride through it, and curved forward, arms folded over her belly.
A soft keening sound escaped her throat. Oh no. Too much. Oh God. Too much.
No. I can’t do this.
Rocking, back and forth, so carefully, cradling herself—
I need a drink.
With that thought came a fierce rush of relief that dulled the agony. Not a lot to drink. Just a couple of glasses. Enough to dull her pain.
Her short walk to the kitchen was mostly steady, and she felt somewhat calmer with her clear goal in mind. Anne could drink by herself at one in the afternoon, because no one was around to wonder aloud if she should have a little nosh first to settle her empty stomach.
The half-empty bottle in the fridge uncorked easily. She didn’t bother to shut the fridge door, partly because the chill felt good and mostly because Sadie would tell her to shut it.
Anne chose her second-favorite glass from the open cabinet—not her favorite, not the one from the winery in Temecula she’d gone to with Sadie—and poured until the straw-yellow wine was a fingertip’s depth below the rim.
No one was here to comment on the amount. No one would know.
Slowly, so she wouldn’t spill a drop, Anne took a generous swallow. She waited for the smooth slide of cold wine in her throat to comfort her, as it always did.
She kept waiting.
Lifting her glass for a second swallow, she paused just before the tilt.
A clear itinerary spread before Anne, just as real as the quartz countertop in front of her. She could get good and toasted, then fall asleep on the couch and wake up bleary-eyed sometime around sunset. Maybe tomorrow she’d open her laptop again and email Genevieve about the investment income line on Conserve Malibu’s April budget report. Reassure her daughters, plaster a polite smile on her face for errands, and try to walk around the safe perimeter of her life like she hadn’t exploded the whole thing yesterday. Press it all down, at least until Sadiedecided what she wanted. Sayno, I don’t, I’m not, I can’t, like she always had.
Anne could try to go back.
But then something inside her would break, and maybe for good.
Heart stuttering, she put down the full glass of wine on the counter and closed the fridge door. Then she stared unseeing at the black-tiled backsplash, and unprompted, the vista of her memory rose into view.