December 29

RAMONA IN CHICAGO...

R AMONA’S ARM BUZZED ALONG WITH THE HAND VACUUM AS SHE ran it across the fabric of her sofa cushion for the fourth time that day. Her hand chased the path of the nozzle and she brushed away remaining debris, although there wasn’t any. Cleaning was simply a perfect channel for nervous energy. Since her conversation with Latrice, Ramona had built up the nerve to reply to Malik and do what she needed to, which was establish a time to speak. This would be the first time in months that he’d return to her place. Now overlooking this season’s frozen lake, in warmer times it used to be the home they shared.

It was midafternoon, but the sun had already started to set, darkening the sky over Chicago, too quickly stripping one valuable weekend day that stood between Ramona and a return to work. A return to the same thing, the same grind, the same office and view, but this time, without even so much as an illusion to look forward to. It was jarring, to have felt so free, to be fed a diet of hope and happiness in some other place, only to return home and feel now like the best of things had already happened. What Latrice said, about asking for a happy ending, haunted her still. She wondered even now what that meant with someone like Malik.

In happier times between the two of them, the weekend meant the ease of him bringing her a coffee from his early rise and trip to the gym. It meant her cooking breakfast for them—the sizzle of eggs in olive oil—her remembering to season them just the way he liked. It meant conversations about what they’d watch. And then, being nestled up on the sofa together, navigating the stream of content that provided innumerable ways to be entertained, or educated, or provoked. And at times they made plans: she’d work a stable job in finance, one she could tolerate—this one wasn’t so bad—and save for retirement. He’d build his career as a personal trainer, get more clients, make more money so they could afford a home together, a fixer-upper maybe.

He never noticed and she hadn’t shared her penchant for decorating, or the fact that she’d picked the specific finance department of a specific architectural firm because it placed her just close enough to what was being created, even though once her condo was complete, she wasn’t creating anything more herself. But she had listened to Malik’s dreams and his proclamations. She’d lain under him and decided to enjoy what she could of that also. She made do with what life had given her, the best to expect with him and the lives around them—the examples that formed what she believed, even now. In all the time before Malibu, Ramona was still looking for what she deserved. And if nothing else, she learned that one week wasn’t enough, not enough to twirl around in for a few moments, a tasting menu of joyful times and some terrible ones. As it always does, reality came in too quickly, pruning the sprouting parts of her that blossomed with the idea that maybe, just maybe, she could get away with expecting more.

Malik’s arrival was Ramona’s appointment with the last reckoning of her escape attempt. His arrival was announced with a knock. Ramona wondered why he didn’t use the key he still had, or if he’d kept it, or if you’re supposed to return it, like a ring that is no longer a promise. Her ring, now held in her hand, shone brightly in its velvet housing until she closed the cover with a satisfying snap. She left the box on the table just out of sight. As she walked back to the door, she straightened herself, her dress, smoothed her hair, still wanting to be memorable. She pulled the door open, revealing the man she hadn’t seen in months beyond his images in photographs.

“It’s been a long time.” Malik’s deep voice, his words, carrying the energy of him, took Ramona by surprise with this sudden proximity. Her face flushed with a rush of embarrassment, of what he knew now that he wasn’t supposed to know. This arrival wasn’t the return she’d been hoping for. What at first seemed like such a good idea a week ago, to escape and pretend, how silly that was, how ridiculous it felt standing in front of the one person who knew as much of the truth as she did.

But Ramona managed her breath and widened the door opening. She opened her arms, letting him take her into a hug. “It’s good to see you.” She exhaled the words into his neck, catching a whiff of his familiar scent. Breaking the spell of habit, Ramona pulled herself away, took his heavy coat, and invited him in. It was challenging not to do the dance of his arrival, what they were accustomed to doing when he was last there. Where should he sit now? Where would she sit? How close? And what to do with her hands? Wookiee rushed over to him, familiar and panting happily, like nothing had ever happened. Malik bent down to pet him, asking if he was missed. Ramona wondered if she was.

While Malik was preoccupied with Wookiee and his tufts of fur, Ramona went to the kitchen and poured herself a drink. She’d found a specialty shop, Binny’s in the South Loop, where she could get just one bottle of that rich, cinnamon porter that she’d enjoyed so much on her trip. She offered Malik a glass.

“So, you drink beer now?” He seemed surprised and waved off the offer.

“I’m trying a few different things,” Ramona replied.

Malik shifted on the sofa. “Like planning our wedding as if we hadn’t agreed—”

“Malik—” Ramona held her hand up as if to protect herself from the truth.

Malik persisted. “We agreed it was better to call it done, Ramona. We did the counseling and the conversations and everything but the work...”

“The work takes time. I thought I was giving you time,” Ramona said.

“Not on a deadline.” Malik sat forward, further animated. “We can’t try to make a relationship work just to save a wedding date.”

Ramona cringed but quickly regained her composure. “I thought we made something good—”

“ You made something good.” Malik turned all around him, taking in Ramona’s living space. “Your life is together, on course. Mine is all dreams. All dreams still. And it—”

“We could make those dreams together... Could have , could... have... made...” Ramona corrected herself.

“Not every dream is a team sport, Ramona.” Malik slid closer to her across the cushions beneath them, took her hands in his, and met her eyes straight on. “Do you wonder why I never asked for the ring back?”

She shook her head no, although Ramona had held on to that ring as a symbol of hope. That he hadn’t asked for it back to her was the possibility that he’d return. He’d have to, she’d thought.

“Because I do owe you .” Malik squeezed her hands held in his. “I owe you for your inspiration, Ramona. I owe you for believing in me. I owe you for making a home for me, for us. For slowing down the race you’ve been running and inviting me to catch up. I owe you for the appreciation in your eyes almost every single time you’ve looked at me. And Imma be real with you, if it takes me showing up at a wedding to repay you for everything you’ve done for me, and to say vows and to walk back down that aisle into something I know that neither of us are ready for, I will. I will do it. But tell me, Ramona, tell me that that is not what you want.”

“There was someone...” Ramona had no idea why she said it in that way, but, who did Malik think she was? That she was that desperate? She hadn’t wanted a fake wedding. The feelings were supposed to be real. Something in her snapped against a moment so strange and so unnecessarily selfless that she couldn’t stand it any longer.

Malik’s eyebrows raised. A vacuum of silence activated between them, stilling the room. As the seconds passed, with each tick... tick... tick, for Ramona, anticipation was thick. She watched the subtle changes in his face—he bit his lower lip, a tell. His chest rose with a deep inhale. He brought his hand up and rubbed the lower portion of his cleanly lined fade. A muscle twitched along his jaw. Ramona realized she was holding her breath, as was he.

At last, Malik let out a long sigh. His shoulders deflated, and his head shook as if denying himself the next thought. “I don’t get to ask you who,” he said finally.

With relief, Ramona sat in the pause of wordlessness that followed. As she exhaled herself, it became clear. And she nodded her head gently, yes , as if allowing herself her own next thought. “And I don’t get to ask you,” she said. She understood now. It was over, long over.

For the first moment in the presence of Malik, Ramona thought of Jay. She thought of him freely, without the hesitation of before. It seemed like the right time now to close the door that was left open. She didn’t need uncertainty anymore.

“The ring... let me—” Ramona turned to retrieve it from where she’d placed it.

Malik caught her hand as she turned, pulling her back to face him. “I don’t want it back, Ramona.”

“Why not?”

“Because I gave it to you. I want you to keep it.”

Ramona’s jaw dropped. As she looked at Malik, Latrice’s words returned to her mind, bouncing around like an echo. People don’t know you if you don’t return the gift , she’d said. Ramona loved Malik still, perhaps always would in some way, but that didn’t mean she knew him, or that he knew her—especially if she hadn’t let him. She felt quite complete in that moment as herself, enough without him, or the ring, or anything it once represented. It was time for him to know her truthfully, who she was now .

“Malik, one second.” Ramona turned away from him, stood up, and walked over to where she’d placed the velvet box that held the tiny disco ball. She picked it up, brought it over to the sofa, and held it out between them. “I don’t want this,” she said.

Malik looked shocked. “But I... I bought it for you. And...”

Ramona reached down to take his hand, pulled it toward her, and pressed the box into his palm, wrapping his fingers around it with hers. “Malik... I appreciate you, but this is a gift that I don’t want. I don’t want it. And so, I am giving it back.” Ramona didn’t need any reminders of who she’d been before, living far from satisfied. It was time for a new era, especially now that she had every intention to ask for more.

CHELSEA IN MALIBU...

T HE ORANGE BOX INTENDED FOR R AMONA SAT ON C HELSEA’S counter forgotten about for days. Chelsea was absorbed in other colors, the colors of Chicago, that she was frantically mixing from memories and painting in strokes on her canvas. It wasn’t until she started an image of the View of the Frozen Lake from the Window —a description she thought of as a working title for the piece—that she thought of Ramona, and consequently what she might owe her other than a debt of gratitude. She’d borrowed her home, her bed, her coat for one day, ostensibly her life, in a manner of thinking about it, most certainly her wonderful family... and Carlos. But Carlos was not borrowed. No, Carlos was a gift, the best part of the trip. And to him, her gift was to want for him what he wanted for himself.

Thinking about her gift, which was Carlos of course and the glorious experience of Chicago—she remembered that Ramona had a gift from Joan, one that she had no reason or desire to borrow, and that should at least be returned so that Joan could pass it along herself. Presumably, most people would likely want what was in such a fancy box.

The tide was out, but Joan was nowhere to be found on any of her outside deck levels. Chelsea decided to take the box on a short walk outside of her front door, fifty feet to the right, up the walkway next door, all the way to the double doors on the side of her neighbor’s long garage. Joan’s house was built with an extra level of living space and an entrance into a grand foyer, with a view straight out to the sea. When the door opened, it was Joan, squarely in the center of that majestic ocean view behind her, looking as if she wasn’t particularly happy to have company.

Chelsea held up the orange box. “Is this a bad time?”

Joan’s face instantly changed to a look of surprise. “Where’d you—”

“It was on my deck, saw it when I got back.”

“Did you... read the note?”

“I saw it said ‘Ramona.’”

“Then, you’ll see it gets to her?” Joan made no move to open the door wider. Usually, she invited Chelsea in.

“It’s not my gift. It’s yours .” Chelsea held out the box to Joan, a slice through the icy atmosphere, leaving her arm outstretched between them. She was not going to allow Joan to shift one more thing into her court.

Joan snatched the box, and as she did, a white piece of paper floated down to the ground between their feet. Joan bent down to pick it up. “What’s this?”

“Ramona’s address.” Chelsea turned back to head down the walkway, but then remembered something and turned back to Joan. “You know, she has the most amazing life... but I still have no idea what it’s like to walk in her shoes. I wondered how that box landed on my deck. I hope that nobody called the patrol on you .”

Before she turned to head back down the walkway, Chelsea saw Joan’s face contort, like her mouth was ready to drop. She was satisfied that Joan would know exactly what she meant without another word. And perhaps it would be uncomfortable between the two of them, a bit icy between neighbors, for a little while. But Joan should feel a little uncomfortable , Chelsea thought. The luxury of comfort is just an illusion, one that keeps us from truly knowing one another, stuck in a box of fear. And Chelsea had had enough of being afraid, of being stuck, of hiding ensconced in this small world and its trappings and its limited colors. An idea was brewing for Chelsea, one that started a warmth in her belly and a smile to spread across her face. It’s time , she thought. It’s time .

JOAN IN MALIBU...

W ITH ONE HAND, J OAN CLOSED THE MASSIVE DOUBLE DOORS TO her home. With the other, she held the square orange box that she’d delicately prepared and designated for Ramona, with the same card attached, folded over, all slightly warped now for having sat for some time exposed to the elements. Joan undid the ribbon and inspected the contents. Thankfully moisture had not reached the interior, at least as far as she could tell.

Her mouth was pursed, tight with distaste. It wasn’t anything she’d eaten, because Joan faithfully practiced intermittent fasting and, other than a daily green juice, did not eat before noon. Rather, she was perturbed by her encounter with Chelsea. Not that Chelsea had been rude, but Joan felt... judged. She thought about it as she carried the box toward the dramatic spiral turngree to descend from her upper living area to the lower one, the much more informal one, heading to her personal suite. On the way, she dropped the box on her kitchen island corner, leaving it and its contents and the note alone so that she could continue with her thoughts where it suited her best.

In front of her mirror, in the extreme privacy of her personal suite, in her bathroom where the most personal of her private activities took place, Joan took a deep, long look at herself. She looked at her forehead, smooth enough, frozen even, as the injections there ensured. And down, below permanently dyed brown eyebrows, to her blue eyes, still crystal blue, mostly, and the sunbaked crinkles around her eye sockets that were stubborn enough to resist the intensive attention in appointment after appointment of treatments with her facialist. She searched the reflection of herself to see if she could find any hint of what she’d done, whether she wore it like a stain. The decision she’d made—she wondered, was it somewhere, and did it make her a term so objectionable she’d dare not even think it?

Imagining how other people might view her, Joan’s mind wandered to the moment days ago, standing outside on Chelsea’s deck. She was so sure that no one would ever suspect her of not belonging, even though it was not her home, even though she had not been invited or particularly welcome, even at night. And only now she wondered what it might be like to have no bit of the benefit of doubt, no share of a presumption of belonging, of innocence, of a right to be there or somewhere else and what it might feel like. But that feeling, even just imagining it, for Joan was uncomfortable. It placed her on both sides of a door in her mind labeled The Past —a door with a lock on it and a double bolt because she’d come so far from there, and no, no, no , she thought, no need to consider it.

She belonged in Malibu, with her friends and acquaintances, in seats at their tables and together at the Club, buckled into their private planes and invited, always invited to their soirées. She had the house and the clothes and the car and the well-known last name to prove it. She’d made a mistake, one simple little mistake that anyone would make... well, anyone in the position to make it of course. But in turn, she’d made Ramona feel so welcome , hadn’t she? And thus, what harm in the end? Because without Joan, what would Ramona’s trip have been? Without dinner at Geoffrey’s or the Malibu Pier? Without her welcome basket of pastries? And she would have succeeded in the ultimate pièce de résistance, both the lamb and the roast, and Ramona’s seat at the table on Christmas no less—but there had been that objectionable Jay who’d stolen her time. Jay who’d made her miss the gift that Joan had carefully placed, a final gesture to make all amends.

Jay , Joan thought, as her self-inspection continued. She brought her carefully manicured nail, gel polish only of course, to her face, and traced along the new vertical lines in her recently acid-polished cheeks. Small, fine lines that looked dangerously close to wrinkles. She was cracking, aging, perhaps, just like her ex-husband had witnessed. It drove him to something younger, richer in beauty, maybe a wiser investment. A man like him, and weren’t all men like him? Jay too, roaming her beach, or was it their beach? Didn’t Ramona say that he lived down the narrow strip of sand from her? Thinking of Jay as her neighbor made her think of him differently, almost instantly. Perhaps, because he lived there, he might belong there. If he belonged there, his classes might then be a service to the community, and then possibly his diligence and consistency of showing up every day meant that he could be trusted. Maybe he wasn’t traveling along the sand, shacking up in house after house of his students. Perhaps she would join one of his classes one day, her neighbor Jay, and he would be useful, as Ramona’s friend, for a last item of unfinished business.

Is that gray hair? Joan’s inspection traveled upward, back up from the creasing she’d discovered while frowning, past the chiseled nose that turned slightly upward a bit further when she smiled. Up, up, her gaze traveled, back across the creasing alongside the blue eyes that sat under brown eyebrows, to the perfect highlights that framed her face. At the top of the golden-toned, honey-blond highlights overlaid on a Cindy Crawford–brown, there was a very clear narrow (but visible!) strip of gray. A strip of gray that extended from her scalp to the edge of all that hair-color perfection. A strip that screamed the truths about Joan that she truly dared not confront. Joan actually yelped, a cry for help that nobody would hear. A cry that would translate into a text message to her stylist. An emergency! she wrote. And that was as much thinking as she would do on that day, and perhaps ever, on the topic of Ramona... other than the one little detail that remained. The one that she would handle the same way she handled everything else in her life—she would ask someone else to do it.

JAY IN MALIBU...

A T THE END OF HIS CLASS, PERHAPS THE LAST PERSON J AY WOULD expect to see walking toward him, down on the sand, was Joan Fox. Not that he didn’t expect Joan on the sand. To the contrary, she walked often, with similarly clad friends, similarly waiflike, sun visors sometimes, or other measures more drastic, as if the overall elements were more of an enemy than an enjoyment. More typically she shouted at him—although said nothing to him—from her perch on high behind the glass-enclosed deck space of her palace by the sea. So, now, to see her walking quite intentionally in his direction, holding something that looked very much like an orange box, was a puzzle until she lifted her hand up like a blade to cover her eyes, looked at him, and for once actually spoke to him.

“Hey, I need you to get this to Ramona.” Joan lifted a wiry arm holding a box in her hand. Jay recognized it well. The contents in a box like that were expensive, and also quite popular with the women and some of the men he’d come to know in Malibu.

Jay did not know what to make of this. But Joan was far from the most challenging personality he’d encountered. Especially considering his prior life on the East Coast. Once, at work, he’d been screamed at by a principal on an M&A deal and then had a stack of papers thrown at his head. Perfect aim, considering his boss never moved his spit-shined leather tie-ups from their perch on his mahogany office desk. “That’s interesting,” he said to Joan casually. “Why me? Seems like it’s your gift?”

“Isn’t she your friend?” Joan asked, seeming genuinely confused.

“Isn’t she your friend?” Jay shot back.

Joan, quite befuddled now, stammered for a few beats before responding. “I left it for her... on Christmas night. I presume she was... with you .”

Jay watched as Joan’s lips formed into a tight line, pursed almost, unamused. Jay merely blinked at her, deciding what to say next. True, Ramona had been with him on Christmas night, and the morning before she left. But what did that have to do with Joan, who’d caused the initial mess of Ramona’s arrival?

“And how do you know she didn’t leave it on purpose?” Jay asked her.

“Who would leave Hermès?” Joan said with a puzzled look.

“Why wouldn’t you just send it?”

“Because I figured you might need a reason.”

“A reason for what?” Jay widened his stance in the sand.

Joan blinked. “Oh, I don’t know. A reason to be in touch, perhaps.”

She stood and looked at him as if he were slow to the punch line, the one who had missed the point, while the shoreline wind whipped her hair like a Baywatch promo. It made absolutely no sense, that this woman would spend a small fortune on a gift, find out that it had been left behind, and then ask a virtual stranger to send it along, when she could full well do it herself. But then again, Jay also knew this type. Joan was of the tribe that did nothing herself, from her cleaning, to her hair color, to her nails, to her childcare, to the maintenance of her grounds, to making the money that sustained her opulent lifestyle. And of course, did not apologize. Why apologize when you can send a gift, pay an expensive merchant to say the three most expensive words in the entire English language— I was wrong —on your behalf? So, Makes sense , he thought. Why wouldn’t she walk up and, in the first words she’d ever spoken directly to him, effectively demand his cooperation.

Not that Jay needed a reason to reach out to Ramona, or even to do something for her. In fact, he adored doing things for Ramona and wished there were more things for him to do for her. More places to take her, to see her smile erupt that each time felt as rare and as special as a meteor streaking across the sky—a thing to wish upon. Or to hear her loud laughter, when she was really amused, when she forgot herself and let it roll from her like the sound of the purest of fun. No, it wasn’t a problem of doing something for Ramona, it was the issue of doing something for Joan.

And then, Jay called out to her, words that escaped from him, erupted almost, because his irritation was on delay. The audacity of it, of Joan, of people like her who’d maybe never own up to anything.

“Why don’t you just apologize?” he said.

To see Joan react was like watching the clouds cross the sky for a storm. The blanching of her face, the flinch of terror that passed just as quickly as a bird’s shadow on the beach. Her mouth dropped open, as if she were shocked to be asked the most appalling thing. And in the silence between the two of them, the ocean continued its noise, lapping at the sand like quiet applause. The seagulls circled the sky above them, searching... down below. But it took only seconds of stillness for Joan’s composure to return. The impenetrable defense activated as it had innumerable times before. With her free hand, she pushed her hair to the side, out of her face... as if she had nothing to hide. And then, in a slow ripple of relaxation, the smooth and carefree countenance returned just as quickly as it had disappeared. And Joan smiled and tilted her head to the left.

“Apologize? For what?” she said with cheer, smiling, as if nothing had ever been wrong. She outstretched her arm farther, reducing the distance between Jay and the box she still held.

And now Jay, looking at Joan, was stunned, bewildered, but not surprised. After all, it was Malibu, a place where people came for the sun and the surf, and to enjoy but not necessarily to confront themselves. Not like Ramona had, like she had to. But Joan did not have to. And chose not to. So, there was no hope for Joan, no use in challenging. She was not going to change.

“You know what, you’re right,” he said, shaking his head. “You’re right.”

“Hmm.” Joan’s straight line of a mouth turned up ever so slightly, and it almost looked like she was going to smile. But she held out the box and pushed it at him with insistence. When he did take the box from her, as soon as it left her hand, “Very well, then,” she said, and turned abruptly back in the direction of her house. She walked forward, with Pilates-honed posture, gliding all the way to the base of the staircase. And up she climbed, never once looking back.

The box, now in Jay’s hands, was made of thin cardboard and wrapped with a decorated brown ribbon. Between his fingers and the box bottom, there was something sliding, a scrap of paper. He pulled the paper from under his fingers and opened it. It had an address, one he presumed was Ramona’s, on Lake Shore Drive, in Chicago.