Every Wrong Reason

My voice trembled as I asked, “What is it?”

I had heard his breath quiver before he asked, “Do you like it?”

“Nick, what is it?”

His sigh told me everything he didn’t say. He didn’t want to tell me what it was. He didn’t want to explain his actions or motives or anything. He just wanted me to like it.

But I couldn’t do that. I had to know. I had to know where it came from.

What made him do it?

“Do you remember Jared’s old girlfriend? The weird artist one?” I sucked in a sharp breath while he paused. Finally, he admitted, “Last year. I had it made for you last Christmas.”

“Why didn’t you give it to me?” I closed my eyes to stop the tears that threatened to spill over. Last year he’d gotten me a new Kindle. Mine had stopped turning on and I asked him for one. He’d gotten the exact one I’d picked out.

It had been a great gift. It had been exactly what I wanted.

But this… This was something… else.

His laugh was bitter. “Do you remember last Christmas?”

“Yes,” I whispered. “No… I mean, I don’t know.”

“We were not in a good place.” His voice was a roughened rasp against the phone. “Jared had asked to borrow money and we argued about it. I had to work Christmas Eve and you were mad and… and I chickened out. I didn’t want to upset you again. I didn’t want to fight with you on Christmas. It was easier to get you what you wanted.”

My heart thumped painfully against my chest. “Why did you think this would upset me?” Even though I knew why he would think that. Even though I knew, I could be mean.

More than mean.

I could be house-falling-on-me-because-I’m-the-wicked-witch-of-the-east kind of mean.

“I was afraid to remind you about… about having a baby. You were so confident it couldn’t happen. You still are.”

“Nick,” I hiccupped. I didn’t want to fight with him about this again. “It’s…” Too late. “Lovely.”

“We’re a mess, Kate.” His voice sounded stronger. It was absolutely silent on his end of the phone, so when he shifted I could tell that he was in bed. I pictured him in athletic shorts and a t-shirt, his long ru

“I wish you would have given this to me last Christmas.” I licked dry lips and stopped fighting the tears.

His voice was infinitely sad when he whispered, “I do too.” There was silence between us for a full minute, but I didn’t feel compelled to hang up with him.

Despite the pain of this moment, the poignant sense of loss, I needed to be near him in some way. It was like we were both acknowledging the magnitude of what we’d lost. We were both admitting how things could have been different between us.

When the heavy moment passed, Nick let out a long sigh and asked, “How was your Christmas?”

“Ugh,” I sighed. “My mother was extra special today.”

I swear I could hear his smile through the phone. “She’s usually super special.”

“Whatever,” I grumbled. “She’s like your new best friend. All I ever hear about anymore is how great you are, how I’m the biggest idiot ever for letting you go.”

“Well, that’s clear to everyone,” he teased.

I should have been irritated, but I smiled instead. “At least your ego is still intact.”

“You have your mom to thank for that.”

I laughed at his sarcasm. “I’m pretty sure your ego was just fine before my mom decided she approved of you.”

“It’s weird, though.” When I didn’t immediately agree, he added. “That she suddenly wants to be my friend. I went through years of hell with that woman and now she decides to like me.”

“Oh, my god, I’ve thought the exact same thing!” I plopped down in the chair I’d been kneeling on, unable to look at the picture anymore. “Do you think it’s your new job?”

“No,” he answered immediately, “she doesn’t know about it. Unless you told her.”

“Oh.” I had, but not until recently. When she invited him over for lunch that one Sunday, she didn’t know.

“I’m pretty sure she had a partial lobotomy. That’s the only reason I can come up with.”

“I don’t think you’re wrong.” I felt myself smile even though I felt as if I were spi

“It was fine,” he sighed. “Jared and I went to our parents. We played Super Nintendo all day and ate too much. I felt thirteen again.”

I smiled again at the picture. Jared could be an absolute asshole, but I had always appreciated Nick’s relationship with him. They were good brothers to each other.

“He told me about when he saw you in Starbucks by the way,” Nick added. “He won’t talk to you like that again, Kate. I promise you that.”

My heart thumped in my chest. I believed him. “Thank you.” After another minute of silence, I asked, “How are your parents handling the divorce?”

He coughed suddenly and I could tell he didn’t want to answer the question. “Not as well as yours.”

“They blame me.”

“They blame both of us.”

I didn’t know what to say after that. I looked back at the art he’d made for me and felt a brand new sense of loss. “Did you write it?”

He knew exactly what I was talking about. “I did.”

“For me?”

“It’s not the first song I’ve written for you.”

“It’s a song?”

He didn’t say anything for a minute. I wasn’t sure he took a breath. There was only silence on his end, so much so that I had to check to make sure he didn’t hang up on me.

“It is a song,” he finally breathed.

Something I couldn’t name buzzed through me and made me breathless. “Have I heard it?”

“Nobody’s heard it.”

“Sing it.” I had to hear it. I had to know. I had to listen to these words he wrote for me a year ago, these words he had been too afraid to share with me while our marriage dissolved.

“Kate…”

“Please,” I whispered.

And just like me, he couldn’t say no. “I, uh, hold on a sec.”

I heard movement on his side of the phone while he moved around his room. The entire time I waited for him, I found myself chanting, don’t hang up don’t hang up don’t hang up.

But I didn’t know if it was for him or for me.

I sat frozen in place, too afraid to move, too afraid to make a sound in case I frightened him off. When the first plucks of guitar strings reached me, I realized what he had been doing.

“This is going to be rough,” he warned. Then, under his breath, he mumbled, “I can’t believe I’m doing this.”

I pressed my lips together in anticipation. I felt near tears again, but I didn’t know why.

When he started singing, my knees went weak and I would have collapsed if I hadn’t already been sitting. His voice, so familiar and achingly sweet, wrapped around my skin and sunk into my bones. I closed my eyes and listened to him sing about two people so in love they breathed each other. He sang about the world coming between them and tearing them apart. He sang about their love being wide enough to reach around the entire world and find each other again. He sang about love and loss, hope and sorrow, he sang about a girl that wanted more but a boy that had enough. And then he sang the chorus.

Love that is enough.

Love that is big enough for two.

Love that is endless enough for more.

Love that is just between me and you.

He didn’t finish it. He trailed off somewhere in the second verse and claimed he couldn’t remember the rest.

“That was beautiful,” I whispered. Emotion clogged my throat and silent tears tracked down my tears. “Nick, that was…”

He cleared his throat uncomfortably. I could picture him tugging on his earlobe. “I should have sung it for you last year.”

I couldn’t respond to that. I had no words. No ability to speak. We sat there silently for another minute. Then suddenly I had to get off the phone with him right then. I couldn’t spend another second talking to him.