Stations of Life

by Chloe Spencer

  “No. I said seven. I just…” I shrugged my backpack off my shoulders and set it down on the ground. She watched me curiously. “I don’t know how to explain this.”

  “Explain what?”

  “I guess you could say that today I had this sort of…epiphany.”

  “An epiphany? You’re religious now?”

  “No. Not that kind of epiphany. Like I said, it’s hard to explain.”

  She shook her head and wandered over to the kitchen counter so that she could set down her mug. I followed her.

  “I thought you wanted to pick up your stuff.”

  “I did. But I realized something.” I took a seat on the stool and looked across at her. “I haven’t been fair to you. At all.”

  “Um…okay.”

  “You have been putting effort into this relationship. It’s me who hasn’t been. And that’s not fair, and I’m sorry.” I rubbed my hands together. I wanted so badly to look away from her, but if I was going to do this right, I couldn’t. “Instead of working through our problems, I’ve held them against you.”

  She sat down next to me. Her expression was a mix of confusion and pain. “Okay. I can agree with you there. But you still said that you wanted to end this.”

  “I don’t,” I said. “I’ve changed my mind. I lashed out in anger, and I shouldn’t have done that.” I closed my eyes. “Look, I don’t know how to fix this. But…but I want to figure it out together.”

  “So, in the time span of forty-five minutes…you decided that you want to take me back, and you want to come home?”

  I nodded nervously. “L-like I said, it was an epiphany. I just…had this realization that I didn’t want to let all of this go.”

  She stared back at me blankly. “Okay.”

  “Eloise?”

  “Well…it seems like we sort of…Oh God. I can’t believe I’m saying this.” She buried her face in her hands.

  “What?”

  “We flipped scripts.”

  “Huh?”

  “We’re not on the same page.”

  I wanted to vomit. “What? What do you mean?”

  “When you hung up the phone earlier today…I mean…” Eloise sniffled, covering her mouth. Her eyes were watering. “I started to think about just how much you’ve hurt me.”

  “Huh?”

  “Yeah. The cheating. The lying. The fact that every single time you’re upset or stressed out, you take it out on me. How I’ve been your emotional punching bag for the past year.”

  “I didn’t cheat on you.”

  “You were going to, Juniper. I walked in that bar and had to physically pull you away from another woman,” Eloise said. “And I think that’s when I realized…I’ve stooped to a pretty low point.”

  I stared at her. Holy shit. This wasn’t happening, was it? Was she dumping me?

  Eloise continued, “All of this…has been really damaging to my self-esteem and my own mental health. Maybe it would be best…”

  No.

  “Look, I don’t know if I want a divorce…but…maybe some more time apart would be good.” She chewed on her bottom lip.

  Shaking, I reached across and took her hand. She let me hold it. I waited for her to speak. Instead she started to cry. I wrapped my arms around her shoulders and rocked her back and forth in my arms. She pulled away, wiping away her tears.

  “I’m sorry, I can’t. Please don’t touch me right now.”

  “Eloise…” I shook my head. “Look, you just…you wanted me to come home earlier today. You wanted us to talk. Grab a bite. Why don’t we do that now?”

  “No,” she said, the tone of her voice hardening. “I think you should get what you came here for, and I think you should go.”

  My eyes watered with tears. I opened my mouth, but I couldn’t find the words. I didn’t think that she would do this. I thought that she would let me come home, and everything would fall into place.

  I took her for granted. Again. Again.

  I sobbed, my hand covering my mouth. I shook my head. I didn’t want to leave. I didn’t want to leave. I wasn’t going to leave.

  “Hey. Hey. Juniper. We just need to take a break, okay? We need a break.”

  “B-but for how long? W-when could I come home?”

  “I…I don’t know. Maybe we could give it a couple of months?”

  “A couple of months?” I cried out. “B-but you just wanted me to come home earlier today!”

  “Well…that was…” She bit her lip again, searching for the words. “That was…before you hung up the phone. A-at that time, I thought at that time you made your feelings clear. But now you’re taking them back. Do you get why this is confusing for me? Do you understand why I think we should take a break?”

  “A break is fine, but…months? Jesus, Eloise.”

  I shouldn’t have fought with her. I shouldn’t have yelled at her. I shouldn’t have cheated on her. I shouldn’t have left. I shouldn’t have walked out that door. I shouldn’t have hung up the phone. I shouldn’t have made her cry. All these mistakes, and it was too late to fix it.

  “We could go to counseling together,” I suggested. “Why don’t we do that?”

  “And keep living under the same roof? I just…I don’t know if that’s a good idea.”

  “But separating is a good idea?”

  Eloise hung her head. “Of course. Of course this is happening. I want you to want me, and when I finally conclude that this isn’t going to work out, you upend everything.”

  “I do want you. I still love you, Eloise.”

  “I don’t know if I believe you.”

  I stared at her in disbelief. She got up and walked around to the other edge of the counter. She averted her eyes from me.

  “Go ahead and take your time. Take what you need. If you must come back later, t-that’s fine with me, too.”

  What else could I do? There was no romantic gesture big enough to make up for all of this. I couldn’t just kiss her and magically make everything okay. I couldn’t take back the things that I said, or what I did. I couldn’t change the past. I could only change the future. But she was rethinking whether she wanted one with me.

  I wandered into the bedroom and flicked on the light inside the walk-in closet. I reached for my rolling luggage bag, which was up on the highest shelf. In my head I tried to calculate how much I would need in terms of clothes and what shoes I should pack. Sniffling, I texted Charlie and told him that I would be back.

  Hey. Things didn’t work out like I thought they would. Eloise wants me to leave

  He sent back a message.

  WHAT?! What is happening??? Is she kicking you out???

  Yeah. She wants to take a break

  For how long?

  I don’t know. A couple of months

  A couple of MONTHS?!

  I didn’t bother reading more of his text messages. I put my phone back in my pocket and started folding shirts and socks, then loading them into the suitcase. When I had filled up the bag halfway, I turned to see Eloise standing in the doorway.

  “What is it?” I asked her, my voice hoarse.

  “I just wanted to check in with you. Um…” She held up some sort of paper. I recognized it. It was the invitation to my grandparents’ fiftieth wedding anniversary. I had completely forgotten.

  “It’s too late for me to cancel.”

  “Did you RSVP for both of us?”

  “I did, but you don’t have to go if you don’t want to.”

  “Are you sure? I’m worried that they’ll ask questions if I’m not there.”

  “Well, of course I want you there with me. But…it’s not fair of me to ask you to be there. Not when…” I gulped back a lump of tears and placed my hands on my hips, trying to control my breathing. “Not when all of this is happening.”

  “Okay,” she said, nodding slowly. She turned to leave.

  “Eloise.”

  She glanced over her shoulder.

  “A long time ago,” I said sl
owly, “you said that I acted tough when things got hard. This was when we first got together.”

  She nodded. “Sounds like something I would say.”

  “I shouldn’t have been tough. I should’ve learned to be vulnerable.” I crossed my arms, fixating on the wine stain on the carpet.

  “There are a lot of things we should’ve learned by now,” Eloise whispered.

  “Is it too late to learn them?”

  She sighed, closing her eyes. “I don’t know, Juniper. I really don’t know. I’m trying to figure out that answer myself.”

  * * * *

  The remainder of the night passed by in a blur. I finished packing about a quarter of my closet into that one suitcase. Eloise and I hugged goodbye. I tried my hardest to memorize how perfectly her body fit against mine. She promised to call me. I called an Uber and made my way back to the apartment. Charlie was waiting for me with open arms. He nuked some leftover tater tot casserole in the microwave and listened to me cry while I tried to eat. By the time I fell asleep on the couch, it was half past midnight.

  The next morning I called in sick at work, opting to sleep in instead, and around noon, got up to try to get ready for the anniversary. I showered, picked out an outfit from my suitcase, and began the tedious process of curling my hair. Throughout the day, I checked my phone. No messages from Eloise. Before I even got the chance to put my makeup on, I started crying again.

  “Hey…” Charlie knocked on the door of the bathroom. “Hey, June. Can you open up the door for a minute?”

  Embarrassment flooded my body, and I quickly dabbed away my tears with a tissue and I opened the door. Charlie stood there, smiling sadly at me. He hugged me tightly.

  “You know you don’t have to go tonight if you don’t want to, right? If it’s going to be too hard, you don’t have to do it.”

  “I can’t not go at this point, Charlie. Look. I’m all dressed up.” I gestured to my red gown which fell at my feet. “I already said I would go and everything. If I don’t show up, people will talk. And besides, what better things do I have to do? Cry? Grieve?”

  I choked on my own words. I tried to avoid thinking about Young June, and how, by letting her down, I had let myself down. I let Eloise down. But I didn’t know how to fix things at this point. Maybe this was it. Maybe we were truly broken.

  “If you wanted to do those things, that’s okay.”

  “I don’t. I think I’d feel worse, honestly.”

  “Then at least let me take you over there.” He waved the keys to his Pontiac in front of my face.

  I smiled. “Yeah, you can drive me. That would be nice.”

  Charlie turned on obnoxious pop music for the entire ride and eventually convinced me to sing along with him. By the time I arrived at the restaurant, I actually began to feel cheerful. I stepped out of the car and was stunned to see who was waiting by the door to the restaurant.

  It was Eloise.

  She wore a white knee-length dress—the same one that she wore to the company party last winter—and a glittering ice-blue shawl was wrapped around her shoulders. It nearly matched her eye color. Her hair was in a bun again, but this time, it was neater, and it glimmered in the light like she had used a shit ton of hairspray to hold it down. She looked absolutely radiant.

  Charlie rolled down the window and nervously stared at us. “H-hey Eloise.”

  She smiled. “Hey Charlie.”

  “Everything…okay?”

  “Yep, we should be fine for now.”

  “Are…are you going to need a ride home, June?” Charlie asked.

  I looked from Charlie, back to Eloise. “I uh…you know what, don’t wait up for me.”

  “Okay! Call me if anything changes!” He waved goodbye and drove off into the mess of traffic along Hennepin.

  When his car disappeared around the corner, we finally turned to look at each other.

  I stared at her in complete disbelief. “I thought…well…you said that you would call, if you wanted to talk to me.”

  “I did. But you did RSVP for the both of us, so I didn’t want things to be awkward for your family.”

  “Eloise, you don’t have to be here if you don’t want to be.”

  “But I want to be here with you.” She swallowed and tried to blink away the tears in her eyes. “Yesterday…yesterday I thought that I was doing the right thing. And then I woke up this morning and I realized, I don’t really know what the right thing is to do in this situation.”

  “I understand. I don’t know what the right thing is to do either.”

  When you first get married, no one exactly gives you a guidebook on how to repair your relationship if shit hits the fan. No one tells you who should sleep on the couch first. No one tells you when it’s good to take a break, or when you should go to counseling. No one tells you how to ask for help or to recognize when you need it.

  When you get married, people make funny and cute speeches about the importance of “working on your relationship,” but no one explicitly tells you what that work involves. And Eloise and I, coming from families with divorced parents, really didn’t have any kind of blueprint to work with. For our entire relationship, we’ve been learning as things go along.

  “Then I thought some more, and I realized, I’m just pushing you away. But I love you, and I don’t want to do that to you.”

  “I love you too,” I whispered.

  “And I’m sorry to be doing this now, at this big-ass event with all your family. And I’m sorry that I’m such a mess. I just…I wanted to say this in person. It felt like the only way I could make this right.”

  I smiled at her. I pulled her hand off my shoulder and brought it up to my cheek. I kissed the palm of her hand once, then three times.

  “You want to be messes together?”

  “I mean,” she giggled. “For now, sure. Let’s be messy. But ultimately, I want to fix this. I want to make this better.”

  “I do too. So, what do you want to do?”

  “I want you…if you’re willing…to move back in with me tonight. And I want us to look for a relationship counselor.” She smiled at me. “I should also tell you…I found the surprise you were hiding.”

  “What? Wait, what surprise?”

  “Oh my God.” She rolled her eyes, elbowing me. “You know.” She reached into her clutch and withdrew them. The two necklaces.

  My jaw dropped. “Where did you find those?”

  “I should be asking you that question. You didn’t realize that you left your backpack at our place?”

  “Er…whoops. I forgot about that.”

  “Yeah. Well, these fell out of your backpack. June-bug, it’s been years since I’ve seen these. And I know that these are the original ones because mine has the chipped paint on the backside.” She shook her head in disbelief, her gorgeous smile not leaving her face. “How did you find them?”

  “I don’t know,” I lied, smiling from ear to ear. “I came across them when I was um, digging through my backpack for things.”

  “Do you want to wear them?”

  “Hell yeah I do.” I waited patiently as she clipped mine on, and then I secured hers around her neck.

  From down the street, I could hear some relatives calling out my name. I turned to wave at them in the distance. I turned back to Eloise, my smile not leaving my face.

  “You ready to head on in? Congratulate my grandparents? Make small talk with relatives whose names I don’t even know?”

  “Uh, yes. And are you ready for all the dancing we’re going to do?”

  “Ooh. Dancing?”

  “You’re going to break it down.”

  “Don’t know if I can do that.”

  “Drop it like it’s hot.”

  “Okay, that is one thing that I know how to do.” I held open the door for her and she followed me into the building, laughing.

  We headed towards the back room, where the party was held. Outside, there were streamers and inflatable balloons which probab
ly came from the Dollar Store. I couldn’t see anything behind the frosted glass doors, but I could hear things—the shrieking of children running around, the booming laughter of adults, and the clinking of wine glasses as people toasted each other.

  “Fifty years is a helluva long time to be together,” my uncle Theo commented to one of my younger cousins as he passed us in the hallway. “You might not think it now, but just you wait. It takes a lot of work!”

  Eloise and I stood there in the hallway, holding our breath. It was always hard going to these family functions, even after all our years together. There were a handful of conservative, uber-Catholic relatives that needed to be avoided, and of course, my dad was not one to be social, even with his own family. Ever the charmer, he tended to bicker with some other relatives, or make snide comments underneath his breath. On the rare occasion that my mother was invited to these events, she wound up bringing her newest boyfriend, which also caused some tension within the group. Really, hanging out with my family is more nerve wracking than it was fun.

  Eloise squeezed my hand once, then three times. She smiled up at me. “Fifty years. Your uncle is right. That’s a long time to be together.”

  “Yeah. It really is.”

  “Well…I think we could beat them, right? We’ve been married for four.”

  I laughed. “It’s not a competition, Eloise. But yeah. We could totally beat that.”

  Eloise touched my cheek. She leaned forward and kissed me softly, then rested her forehead against mine. She didn’t let go of my hand.

  “All right. Let’s do it.”

  We entered the room, hands clasped together, and all my anxieties drifted away, at least in that moment. As we congratulated my grandparents, and I saw her laugh, I knew at the back of my head that this was one night that would stick with me forever. I thought back to the foggy world I had been in yesterday, with the winding train that progressed through my life. I remembered each of the stations that I had visited. And I knew that in that world, a new station with this memory had been created.

  I hoped Young June would get a chance to visit it soon. I think she will love it here.

  THE END

  ABOUT CHLOE SPENCER

  Chloe Spencer is a Minneapolis based author and freelance writer who enjoys playing too many video games and rereading terrible fan fiction from her teen years. She is a writer for GameLuster, a news site focused on video games, and formerly interned with Kotaku. In her spare time, she also writes and draws for Cross X Comix, a web comic site dedicated to diverse sci-fi and fantasy narratives.