The Great Christmas Breakup

by Fonteroy, Geraldine

  This year, Jessie and J had the best the local discount shops had in stock – while their father had money to throw away on tips to hotel porters.

  Joel and I sat in silence for a while, then he suggested I go and confront them.

  ‘They should be naked by now,’ he said unhelpfully. ‘No denying it when Mr Willy is standing to attention, is there?’

  ‘It already looks bad enough, don’t you think?’ I didn’t need to feast my eyes on my husband doing it with some size 10 earning two hundred thousand a year, did I?

  Not long after he’d entered the hotel, Carson returned, striding purposefully towards his car again. There was no parcel in sight now.

  But there was a broad grin on his face.

  Bastard! He’d bought the gift for the slut.

  ‘Wow, that didn’t take long,’ Joel commented. ‘Maybe he didn’t do anything?’

  I looked at my watch. ‘Ten minutes is plenty of time, trust me.’

  Joel sniggered.

  When it was clear that Carson was headed back towards Brooklyn, Joel didn’t bother tailing him, but we still arrived back home just after my soon-to-be-departed husband had finished parking the car. Carson had always been a super cautious driver.

  As I leaped from Joel’s car, Carson spied me, and even from across the street, the look of complete terror on his face was deeply satisfying.

  Yeah, I’d be scared too, if I were you.

  ‘Would twenty be okay?’ I asked Joel, leaning in through the window.

  ‘On the house,’ he said, ‘unless you like me to arrange for him to be beaten up? That would cost about a hundred.’

  ‘No, thanks, I’ll handle it from here. But please, at least take ten, for the petrol.’

  Joel graciously accepted, and I patted his hand and strode over to where Carson was standing.

  Unbelievably, his face was now like thunder.

  How dare he be angry!

  Before I could utter a word, my phoned binged, indicating a text.

  Lolly.

  Carson organized to come by and get you a gift. And I think he might have overheard me and Luce talking about how Robert likes you. I think he has the impression you are having an affair. Gross. Soz. Lx.

  Lolly was right, it was gross. Good. Let him think I was straying. Of course I’d told Lolly that Robert was a total psycho, but, typically, fate would have it that Carson didn’t hear that being relayed to Lucinda.

  Plus, the gift that was supposedly for me had conveniently vanished, hadn’t it?

  It was a gift for that lawyer, not me.

  Lying bastard!

  Lying to Lolly as well as to me. Didn’t he think I’d find out?

  Maybe he wanted me to find out?

  So that I’d dump him.

  Well, darling husband, your dreams are about to come true!

  Carson snarled at the sight of the phone.

  ‘I suppose that was your mate Lolly. So much for your bullshit story about window dressing. Who is he?’

  ‘It wasn’t bullshit. If you could be bothered, you could go and see the windows. Not that you’d have the time, not with all your extra curricular activities.’

  ‘That’s not what I heard. Lolly and her girlfriend made it very clear.’

  Girlfriend? No, he didn’t mean like that. Carson wouldn’t know that lesbians existed.

  ‘Tough.’

  What a nerve. Porking his lawyer ex and then accusing me of having an affair. Pot, kettle?

  I began to walk away. To pack. To leave.

  Carson stormed after me. He grabbed my arm. ‘Tell me who he is?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘This guy. How did you meet him?’

  The situation was laughable. He was betraying me and trying to flip the situation to exonerate himself.

  Well, it wasn’t going to work, MrFuckingIvyLeagueSmartyPants.

  ‘A decent person, unlike you!’

  I thought about Robert suggesting a three-way with the transsexual and wondered how I could even say he was decent with a straight face.

  Because Carson is cheating with that lawyer, that’s how.

  ‘I should have listened to my mother,’ Carson threw at me. ‘She told me you’d up and leave the moment someone better came along.’

  ‘After you being a lying, cheating arsehole, the reasons I am leaving are as follows: your rabid mother, closely followed by your insane slut of a sister.’

  ‘Come on, that was uncalled for. Mom never actually had rabies – it was a legitimate human virus.’

  I stared at him for a moment. He winked, and I realized that he was joking; treating me just like Jessie; placating me like a child.

  Taking a step towards him, he must have thought I’d had a change of heart, because he leaned as, as if expecting a kiss.

  Instead, I snatched the car keys that were in his left hand, and jumped into our old bomb of a vehicle before he had time to register what was going on.

  Racing around to the passenger seat, he got in and tried to reason with me, as I sat there, observing the displays.

  I’d had a couple of lessons when I was young – it couldn’t be that hard to drive a car, could it? Cecily 2 drove that huge truck of a thing Rufus owned, didn’t she?

  Without a licence.

  ‘Scarlet, you don’t have a licence, so don’t you dare turn on the ignition.’

  I turned on the ignition.’

  ‘Scarlet, you don’t know how to put the car in gear, just slide over and–‘

  I shoved the clutch into first and revved the engine. The engine objected but complied.

  Carson finally worked out I meant business.

  ‘Stop, you can’t! We won’t be insured if you crash. Think of the kids.’

  I turned to him. Why did I even think the watery blue of Robert Simpson’s eyes were more attractive than Carson’s? Even as angry as I was, his ocean blue peepers had a calming effect.

  ‘Then just tell me the truth,’ I said, sotto voce. ‘Have you been with another woman?’

  He didn’t even blink. Did that make him a pathological liar? ‘No, of course not.’

  I revved the accelerator, engaged the clutch and released the brake a little. The car lurched forward. Luckily it was Christmas Day and nothing in front of me.

  ‘Scarlet!’

  ‘Tell me the truth!’

  ‘I am.’

  ‘Last warning, Carson.’

  ‘Scarlet, there is no other woman, I swear on our children’s lives.’

  The complete and total prat! To lie on our children’s lives was beyond acceptable.

  Depressing the accelerator, the car began moving.

  Fast.

  And making a loud, horrible noise.

  ‘Change gears. Up to second, push the clutch in,’ Carson instructed.

  I did as I was told, and the car satisfyingly sped up even more.

  In front of us was the park, with the gates open.

  ‘You can’t go in there, it says park vehicles only!’

  ‘Then tell me the truth.’

  Carson tried to steady my steering. ‘I told you. Do you want me to lie?’

  A red mist washed over me and putting pedal to the metal, I zoomed towards the park, using the pond inside as a marker, ignoring Carson’s pleas for me to stop.

  My plan was to stop at the last minute at the edge of the water, and demand the truth.

  But that never happened.

  Instead, the car hit a tree, and everything went black.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Christmas Day, December 25, P.M.

  ‘Giving up is not an option. Tell yourself that,

  then watch how things improve.’

  Jocelyn Priestly

  WHEN WE WERE released from hospital, things only got worse; especially as we were presented with the huge bill.

  I tried not to think what had happened to my insurance since I had been fired from Flindes. Carson may be a cheater but I would be the one who made the kids ho
meless.

  Carson put the invoice in his pocket without a second glance, groaning slightly with the effort.

  Obviously the knowledge that his indiscretion had led to even more debts was keeping his anger at the cost at bay.

  And this only served to induce an even greater fury in me; far greater than that of the night before.

  We went home and opened the presents. There was no present at all from Carson to me. I had given him Jocelyn Priestly’s new calendar, discovered in a clearance at a local market.

  ‘At least it is not a re-gift,’ he commented dryly, moving tenderly to the table and taking a seat. He had bruised rips and nothing more. The car was totaled, but Carson and I were intact. Physically, at least.

  My arms, fractured but not broken, were throbbing with the effort, but I made the Christmas dinner the kids deserved, and once it was eaten, they asked if they could go up to Hammertro’s.

  ‘Why?’ Carson grimaced at the mention of the name.

  ‘He’s got a nicked virtual computer device thing that’s worth a mint. Said we would use it before he sells it on.’

  After the spending most of Christmas in a hospital waiting room, I couldn’t refuse them, could I?

  The moment the door creaked closed I confronted Carson.

  ‘Now, the truth. Or I leave.’

  ‘Scar, listen.’

  I couldn’t take any further prevarication. ‘You’ve been cheating on me! While I’ve been working on my windows and looking after the kids, you’ve been cheating with some Harvard smartarse.’

  I didn’t think that my brief infatuation with Robert Simpson deserved mention or clarification.

  Technically, I hadn’t actually gone there.

  Carson had.

  ‘No, I haven’t,’ he said evenly.

  Then the buzzer rang, indicating that someone was waiting downstairs.

  ‘That better not be Cecily 2,’ I warned Carson, as he got up to answer the door.

  ‘Why would it be?’

  ‘Why wouldn’t it be?’

  Carson peered at the videophone, then opened the door and dashed out.

  Where was he going? I raced after him and followed him downstairs to find him standing in newly fallen snow, talking to a pretty, slim, dark-haired woman dressed simply in a black wool coat and shiny, expensive-looking camel-colored patent boots.

  This must be her. The nerve!

  It’s Christmas. Tis the season not to break up families! Didn’t they teach basic decency at law school?

  I wanted to sink into the snow and weep at the sight of her crisp loveliness, a dire contrast to my blobby frumpiness. I might have done too, if my throbbing arms hadn’t stopped me.

  ‘You still deny it?’ I half-pointed at Miss Perfect, who was staring uncomfortably at the ground. ‘You still deny the affair, even though she is standing right here?’

  Carson looked at the woman apologetically. ‘Yes, Scarlet, because it is not true.’

  ‘Then what the hell are you doing in that hotel room, on Christmas Day, with her?’

  ‘What are you talking about?’

  ‘That wasn’t what you think,’ the woman said quickly, looking up at Carson for direction.

  ‘So you admit it?’ It was freezing outside but I felt as if I was burning up.

  Carson tried to placate me. ‘Scarlet, please listen . . .’

  ‘Come on Carson, confess. The gig is up.’

  ‘The gig is up? Who are you? Charlie’s newest angel?’ He had the nerve to smile.

  I began screaming, ‘JUST TELL ME WHAT ARE YOU UP TO!’

  The woman told Carson it was time to fill me in. ‘She doesn’t look well, you know.’

  Bitch! We don’t all earn the hundreds of dollars a day it takes to look like you, do we?

  Carson took my arm. ‘Scarlet, calm down, I’ll tell you.’

  Here it comes, the end of my marriage.

  I braced myself.

  ‘I was studying for my State bar exam. Laura was helping me, as I’ve been offered a job in her firm. If I passed, I start 2nd January. And this morning Laura confirmed that I’ve passed. That’s why I went to Manhattan.’

  The world began to spin. Carson was studying. And he was studying law.

  Hang on!

  ‘Why did you buy her something from LollyBliss, then?’

  ‘As a thank you, for Laura.’

  ‘Why from there?’

  ‘Why not? You showed me that magazine cover with your window – it’s very trendy, apparently. And I don’t know where to buy stuff for women, do I? It was the easiest way to buy Laura something – plus I knew Lolly would let me in if I came after closing.’

  It was a reasonable enough excuse. But he was a clever guy.

  ‘You want some proof, hah?’ His strong, lean arm was around me now. And Laura was smiling.

  ‘Actually, yes.’

  ‘Here’s your Christmas present. Laura brought them around so I could give you one today.’

  He presented me with a business card. It declared that he was a junior associate at somewhere called Wider, Locke and Brimskate.

  I still couldn’t believe what I was hearing or seeing. Carson was a lawyer? He had a job . . . as a lawyer?

  Did this mean my life of penury was over?

  That we would be able to pay the hospital bill? And buy some decent food?

  And another car. One with decent brakes and airbags?

  ‘I don’t know what to say?’ I told him.

  ‘Say that you love me, and not the other guy?’

  His deep Caribbean blue eyes, the ones I’d fallen in love with, searched my own.

  ‘Carson, I was working for Robert Simpson, that’s all. He is a complete freak. You have no idea how unlikely it would be for me to run off with someone like him.’

  ‘You promise?’

  ‘Yes.’ I sighed. ‘He didn’t even pay me for the windows I did for Chocolato.’

  Laura the lawyer put a hand to her mouth. ‘But those windows are incredible.’

  ‘You saw them?’

  ‘There is a shop near the office – I couldn’t miss it. Loads of people at work have noticed them, too.’

  ‘Mom says she wants to see them, you know,’ Carson told me.

  I had to shake my head to clear the fuzz.

  ‘Really? Cecily?’

  ‘Says if they’re good you can do up the mobile home anytime. And if you do well at window dressing that maybe you can buy her a proper present next year.’

  I grinned at that. Taking his hand, I told him that at least now we could afford something semi-decent for Cecily next Christmas.

  ‘Only semi-decent?’

  ‘Your mother would expect nothing more.’

  Laura, uncomfortable with the cozy banter, told Carson she’d see him at work in a week or so, and told me that it had been nice to meet me.

  ‘Nice, or horrifying?’ I smiled.

  ‘A bit of both,’ she replied honestly. ‘But we can work on that.’

  Carson led me indoors.

  ‘How much do they pay a junior associate, anyway?’ I asked, as we trudged upstairs.

  ‘About three times what I’m earning now.’

  I thought about my own short-lived career and losing my job at Flindes. Now was as good a time as any to tell Carson I’d been fired.

  ‘I’d take you out for a celebratory dinner if Dan Phillit hadn’t fired me.’

  ‘What? No?’ Luckily, the shine from his new job made it difficult for Carson to be more than a little concerned.

  ‘I thought the window money might make up the balance until I found another job, but then Robert bloody Simpson refused to pay me.’

  ‘Why?’ His eyes searched mine.

  ‘He wanted me to make up a threesome. I refused.’

  ‘Ahhh.’ Carson wrapped me in his strong arms. ‘Then let’s make that one of my first assignments as a practicing lawyer, shall we?’

  I didn’t understand what he was saying.

&n
bsp; ‘I’ll pay Robert Simpson a little visit. Tell him my firm will sue him if he doesn’t pay up.’

  ‘Can you do that?’

  ‘Basic breach of contract case, baby. And I should know. That’s what I’ve been doing after work all these months. Studying like a lunatic.’

  If I thought too long about how I’d treated him, when he was trying to work full time and study, I would burst into tears. Again.

  Instead, I said, ‘Oh, stop boasting, you Harvard-graduate lawyer, you.’

  And then I kissed him.

  Like I hadn’t kissed him for years.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Boxing Day, December 26

  ‘Do what you can to make things better. Think of yourself second.’

  Jocelyn Priestly

  I GOT UP EARLY, AFTER having the best sex (and only sex) I’d had in months, and flipped over the calendar. For once, Ms Priestly didn’t have me reaching for a sharp object. There was something that still needed to be done – although I was in two minds about whether to risk it.

  Stuff it! Thanks to Lolly, I had some great shop windows in my portfolio, and the opportunity to expand my business, given Carson’s new job.

  I owed her.

  Telling Carson I would be back in time to make the journey to the depths of hell – otherwise known as his mother’s trailer park – I slid on some jeans and a jacket, grabbed my coat, and raced downstairs.

  Hammertro was there, dragging a Christmas tree through the foyer.

  ‘What are you doing?’

  ‘My life is over, I ain’t doin’ no celebrating.’

  ‘Cecily 2 said no?’

  ‘She isn’t answering my calls.’

  Shame.

  ‘You did give Uncle Rabbit the money for the boxes, didn’t you?’ Hammertro’s uncle had turned out to be unbelievably handy when it came to window dressing. He had a knack for finding solutions to difficult problems and I now had his direct number, and promised to put more work his way.

  If I ever got another job, that was.

  ‘Yeah. He was grateful.’

  I had never seen the rapper so down.

  ‘Forget about Cecily 2,’ I told him. ‘She isn’t worth a moment’s second thought, you know. I’m related to her, and I can’t think of one good thing to say about her.’