AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“No, when did you check with my job?”
My heart stopped. “About a week ago? I had to plan it all and needed time to set it up before I told you.”
He took his glasses off again and ran the fingers of his other hand through his thick dark curls. My heart fell.
“What? What happened?”
“They just booked me for this big job in Chicago. I’m there all of April. It’s a lot of money; I can’t say no.”
The air whizzed out of my little balloon of hope and anticipation. “Can you postpone it? Or just ask for a little time off in the middle? It’s our first real vacation.” And I meant that. This would have been our first vacation ever in the five years we’d been together. The best I had ever gotten were day trips to the city for a show, or occasionally a nice dinner. Or visiting his family in Ridgefield in their McMansion, which was always a joy. By which, of course, I meant I hated every minute.
I’d been hoping this trip would bring back a little spark to our relationship. We’d been in a fairly quiet routine for years, and it felt like he was drifting away from me. He spent more and more time in his office, playing some war game or other, and he didn’t like it when I interrupted him. While we shared a bed and slept in it together, he hadn’t touched me in months. I wanted nothing more than to break down the barriers that seemed to grow larger between us more and more each day. And what better way to do that than a tropical vacation with beautiful beaches, private villas, and a scantily clad girlfriend? If this didn’t work, would I lose him?
“I already told them yes. It’s too much money to ask them to work around me. They’d just find someone else. Can’t you just cancel it?”
Don’t cry. Don’t cry.
“Nonrefundable. All of it, the flights, the accommodations, it’s all nonrefundable,” I mumbled.
“Then just invite one of your friends along instead. You can have loads of fun with Nikki. I’m sure she’s just dying to go somewhere like that.”
I jumped up as he turned away, spilling a lot of the lemonade on myself. Can’t return the bikini now. “Wait, I made you dinner. Salmon.” I hoped the gesture would clue him in to how special I wanted this night to be.
“Oh, that’s nice. Where is it?”
I sighed, defeated. “Kitchen table.”
“Great. Smells good. Thanks, hon.” He picked up the plate and silverware and retreated to his office.
“Happy Anniversary, Fred,” I whimpered.
I slumped into the bedroom and sat on the edge of the bed, grabbed my cell phone from the pile of clothing and punched in Nikki’s number. By the time she picked up, the tears were already streaming, but I tried to keep it together as much as possible. “So, was he floored by your tropical treat?” asked Nikki, already aware of my secret plan. I opened my mouth to speak but couldn’t find the right words. “Gems? Is everything okay?”
“No,” I squeaked. “He has to work.”
“Work? What do you mean, he has to work? I thought you cleared it with his boss and everything?”
I couldn’t hold it back anymore and let the tears take me. “He can’t go!” I sobbed.
* * *
Fred left for Chicago on the twenty-ninth, leaving me to rearrange my anniversary-turned-spring-break-trip alone in our expensive and tiny apartment. We didn’t even have a pet—he was allergic to practically all fur—and the silence was really getting to me; so much so, that sometimes I had to leave a TV or radio on in the background to keep from going crazy. Nikki occasionally stopped by for dinner after work to help me, and to keep me from going off the deep end, though she’d never say it to my face. But she was genuinely excited about this trip. She’d gotten her passport seven years ago when she got engaged to Joseph. He promised to take her to beautiful exotic places on their honeymoon.
They went to Atlantic City.
Joseph’s ideas of exotic locales aside, about a year into their marriage, Nikki discovered that it wouldn’t last when his affair with a fifteen-year-old boy came to light. His sentencing was swift, but it still took over a year to finalize their divorce. After, Nikki concluded that she and marriage were not meant for each other.
Less than two days before we left for Fiji, I sat on the couch, my revised itinerary and other important papers laid out in neat piles before me on the coffee table. It had all become a bit blurry from my exaggerated scrutiny of each detail. Everything had gone wrong already with Fred not going. I needed everything else to be perfect.
“Hey girl,” Nikki said, dropping her purse and jacket on the floor and plopping down next to me. “Still obsessing?”
“The flight out of JFK is just before five pm on Friday. We arrive in LA a bit after eight, which gives us plenty of time to collect our bags and check in with our next flight. We leave LA that night at 11:30, arriving in sunny Fiji around six in the morning on Sunday.”
“It’s a thirty hour flight?!” Nikki shouted.
“Do I really have to go over this again?”
She smiled, mischief gleaming in her eyes. “I enjoy hearing you explain how the Date Line works to me over and over. And your frazzled annoyance amuses me. But I know. East to west adds twenty-four hours; west to east loses twenty-four hours. Still, I feel like I’m getting screwed out of a full day in paradise.”
