Red Sweater Story

 

We'd decided to end it before it got any worse. Somehow that happens after three months of bliss. Although, he said it was much longer than three months. Evidently, he saw me first and longed for us to get together.

"That has to count for something," Yes, that was him when he was in a good mood. I should have known our days were numbered.

By all accounts, he was the one who could cook and make a house a home. Oh, it was cozy once upon a time. We met during a long lecture on art. Although, he didn't know anything about the classics. Maybe I didn't know either. Yes, it was like the blind leading the blind, but it was a lively dance and we knew each other's rhythm. 

We waltzed through all the museums as if it might be our new religion. Oh, those dying fools, what did they know that we didn't? Or so we thought then. It was bliss and I was mad about whatever he was learning to bake. 

He said it was no good. He wanted to throw it out. All he had was an airfryer in his little place. I'd beg him not. I would eat it, even if he thought the squirrels could take care of the rest of the leftovers.

Sure, he wanted to learn more in engineering. He had a family who thought he should do his best. Probably go home to a country and marry a cousin he never met. 

Maybe he was doing that right now.

It was getting cold now. The seasons were finally showing their true colors. And I didn't know what to think. His phone was no longer in service. That basement apartment had been taken over by some hippy chick who smelled of ganja. 

Yes, the love was gone. Didn't I see it coming?

And there I was walking the pier in the red sweater he'd left me. It was meant for a sister or someone back home, but he never got around to sending it to them. 

"You'll need it here," he insisted there was too much global warming back home, and the fact that red looked good on me. Back then he'd mentioned how I needed to be in red if we were ever to get married.

Of course, I laughed. Who wore a red sweater on their wedding day? But that was then. This was now. If only I remembered exactly what went wrong.

The waves were coming in on the beach. A part of me felt like ending it by walking into the icy water. I had never felt so bad. As if it was me who'd acted too quickly. I hadn't done enough. Evidently, I didn't know how to say the right thing. It cut deep. I thought I was getting wiser. I thought we knew what we were doing at twenty-five. It felt as if it might take another twenty-five years to figure out what relationships were all about.

"Hey, you!" Someone yelled from behind me. It wasn't a familiar voice. I turned to a stranger and just stared at the old woman with her metal detector. "Don't you know the holidays are coming?"

How could she know how desperate I was? I looked at her blankly as she approached.

"Dearie, you must be freezing out here," she said. She was bundled up in her winter hat and coat. She even wore gloves.

I hated to tell her I didn't feel a thing. Maybe I was that far gone. But she guided me back with the lighthouse in the distance.

"You need a cuppa something," she told me. I had no idea it meant a shot of whiskey and lemon in some sweet hot tea. "This'll keep you from catching a cold."

Her place wasn't much, just a little beach shack that everyone said she could sell for a fortune.

"You wouldn't have caught my eye if you hadn't been in red," she assured me. "What's the matter?" She sat out a feast of fudge and sugar cookies.

I only sighed.

"Is it about a boy?"

I looked up at her. Yes, he'd been a boy all right. 

"Well, you might even meet a man next time," she grinned. "But you know, you can't let any of them keep you from being who you want to be."

I felt myself laughing inside. I was glad I had caught her eye.