The Apple of My Eye

Blue Christmas

Christmas Eve, 2008.

Star and I had been geographically apart for more than 24 hours, but that didn't stop us from keeping in touch via Skype, email, and the occasional phone call, which was far more zealous of us than we had ever done before—even on weekends, when before we'd usually remain incommunicado. A few hours before Christmas, I sent her what would be my last email before midnight, and impatiently awaited her reply. As soon as I had got it, I calculated, I could leave the house and go spend Christmas night with my daughter and my parents.

When I finally heard the new email notification ding, I rushed to the computer. Only to be devastated by the news that none other than David—yes, the one and only—had just showed up at Star's doorstep and begged for a place to stay the night. On Christmas fucking Eve! In the email she explained she was just about to turn him down when her mother stopped her from doing it, reprimanded her for having the audacity to hesitate, and took the sad bastard in. Whatever had happened between Star and him, the woman said, they had to put it behind them and treat each other with respect. Moreover, this was her house, and she sure as hell was not going to send David or anybody on their way with only a few hours to go before Christmas.

Star then proceeded to explain—to me, in the email—the minimalism of the accommodations David would be enjoying in her household, making sure to mention that the two of them would not be sharing anything: they would not be sharing rooms, they would not be exchanging words, they would not be sitting at the supper table together. She was only letting him stay so her mom would not drive her insane with her accusations that Star had lied when she told her they had parted ways amicably. She was only letting him stay so David would not tell his mom and his friends that she had kicked him out of the house on Christmas Eve. They already hated her guts, so she definitely didn't need the aggravation, she said. She was only letting him stay because she wanted to preserve a modicum of civility, and while she wanted him off-limits romantically, she would rather he saw her as a friend than wish her dead for all the pain she had purportedly caused him.

If you've learned anything about me by now, you know I was having none of this shit. None of it. I did not vacillate: I sent Star a quick note that unequivocally ended it all, no two ways about it. In it I said I was getting out of their way, this time for good, so she could enjoy her happy Christmas reunion with her stupid jerkoff of a boyfriend all she wanted. I really had had enough of this crap. What the fuck was I thinking, getting involved with a couple of irresponsible kids like them, anyway? They deserved each other, I reckoned, and I told her as much. I was the odd man out, right? So be it. But I would be damned if I was going to be the odd man out one second longer.

After all Star and I had been through, after the torture and torment David had caused her, exposing her to acquaintances and strangers alike like the slut he alleged she was, harassing her at the airport, calling her every name in the book and then some, son of a bitch shows up at her place like he's Tiny fucking Tim, and they take him in? Just like that? Merry Christmas and God bless us every-fucking-one? No way, Jose. That rationale did not work for me then, and it does not work for me now.

This was not about me having trust issues. At all. This was about taking responsibility for your decisions and standing by them. This was about really breaking up with someone. Friendship? What friendship? No friendship. Fuck friendship.

Had all the tumult we had been through been much ado about nothing? Were these two fuckers really going to be spending Christmas together after all the pandemonium? After all the glass smashing, the wall punching, the name calling? As if those were perfectly natural things to do? Fuck them.

And having convinced myself of all that, I got in the car with my daughter and drove to my folks'. Chloe was there when I arrived, which shouldn't have surprised me, but it did. My mom was dead serious about working toward fixing my marriage. She took it as her own responsibility to get us two back together, and she figured Christmas was as good a time as any to reunite this wretched family. I was so shattered by the whole Star-and-David thing that I offered no resistance. I didn't make up with Chloe or anything—she was still destined to have a pretty shitty Christmas, poor thing, just as shitty as mine—but I didn't push her away either.