Total pages in book: 96
Estimated words: 91783 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 459(@200wpm)___ 367(@250wpm)___ 306(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 91783 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 459(@200wpm)___ 367(@250wpm)___ 306(@300wpm)
“You don’t have to do a single thing. But let’s get the word straight, because people use it to mean two different things at once.” I pull the mic closer. “Forgiving her and letting her back in your life aren’t the same. You can forgive her and still keep her out for good. Forgive her so it quits eating you. That part’s for you, not her. Whether she’s ever your friend again is separate. She’d have to earn that back slowly, and she might not make it. You’re allowed to miss the friend and still not want the person who did this anywhere near you. Don’t let anybody talk you into treating those as the same thing.”
“So I can forgive her and still not want her at my wedding.”
“You can forgive her and not want her at your birthday dinner. Forgiving her means you’re over what she’s done. It doesn’t put her back in your life. That part she earns, or she doesn’t.”
Bex points two fingers at the next light and mouths something through the glass. I punch it.
“You’re on The Love Line with Liam.”
“Hi, yes, okay, we’re both here.” A woman, brisk, a little wound up. There’s a man breathing on the line beside her. “You’re on speaker. We need a tiebreaker and we agreed, whatever you say, we do.”
“That’s a lot of authority to hand a man you’ve never met. What are we settling?”
“The holidays,” the man says.
“Every year,” the woman jumps in, “every single year, we do his family. And his mother treats me like the help and corrects how I load a dishwasher—”
“It’s not every year —”
“It is every year, Brian.”
“Okay.” I let them run into each other once, then I cut in. “Time out. Both of you. You’re not actually fighting over the way a dishwasher is loaded. What’s really going on here? Sir, you go first. Why do you spend every holiday with your family?”
A silence with breathing in it. Then, quieter: “Because every time we skip them it feels like I’m telling my mom she came in second. To her face. On a holiday.”
“And ma’am why don’t you want to spend the holidays with his family?”
“Because his mother makes me feel like an intruder in the family I married into. And nobody ever takes my side. He just lets her.”
“Okay. Now we’re talking about something real. He feels like loving you costs him his mother. You feel like nobody in that family is on your side, least of all on a holiday. You both feel unprotected. So, here’s the deal I’d give you if you two were sitting in my bar.” I lean in. “This year, you go to his family. First, before yours. But Brian, when you walk in, you’re watching out for her. The second your mother starts in on anything, you’re the one who steps in, out loud, in front of everybody. Not your wife. You. Can you do that?”
Quiet, then: “. . . Yeah. I can do that.”
“And you walk in with a plan, a set time when you’re going to leave and go to your wife’s family. Then next year you flip it. And if that doesn’t work for everyone, start your own traditions and have both families at your house. The holidays are supposed to be fun and entertaining. Not stressful. We host every year, but I know there’s going come a day when my daughter-in-law wants her children to open those early morning Santa presents at their house, and you know what, my wife and I will be there, if invited. And if not, we’ll greet them with open arms when and if they come to our house later in the day.
“Life is too short to fight over the holidays. You stop letting either family pull you back and forth or you start doing your own thing and if they show up, great. If not, that’s on them. Not you. You in?”
“We’re in,” the woman says, and the man says it half a second behind her. They’re almost laughing now, and the fight’s gone out of the line.
Behind the camera Paige has both hands pressed over her mouth, her eyes huge above them. She jabs a finger at the phone screen, then gives me a thumbs up. Whatever’s happening on there must be good.
“You’re on The Love Line with Liam.”
“My wife has dementia,” he says. “Advanced now. Most days she doesn’t know who I am.” He stops. Starts again. “I’m with her every day. I feed her. I read to her, the mystery novels she used to love, even though she can’t follow them. And lately I catch myself . . .” His voice thins. “I catch myself wanting somebody to talk to who talks back. A hand to hold that holds mine back. And I feel like the lowest man alive for it. She’s right there in the next room. How do I get to want anything when she’s right there.”