Christine Brae - The Year I Left

Other Books by Christine Brae

The Light in the Wound

His Wounded Light

Insipid

In this Life

Eight Goodbyes

The Year I Left

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the authors imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Copyright 2019 Christine Brae

All rights reserved.

Edited by Jim Thomas (JimThomasEditor.com)

No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system now known or to be invented, without written permission from the publisher, except where permitted by law.

ISBN: 978-1-944109-91-2

Published by Vesuvian Books

www.vesuvianbooks.com

For all of us who once suffered in silence. Come out into the light

we deserve to live in the sunshine just like everyone else. CB

Part I: MY FALL AND WINTER

A thousand half loves must be forsaken to take one whole heart home.

Rumi

Chapter One

S ometime in the late summer when the air began to tingle and the leaves started to fall, I opened my eyes one morning and my view of the world had changed.

Just like that. I can still see it in my head. The way I let it all unfold. It was a train wreck waiting to happen, and I let it.

I left for a business trip that morning with my house in total disarray. I had no good reason for refusing to take Charlie to his school bus, and despite having some time to change our dogs water bowl, I chose not to do it. There it lay, next to the unwashed food dish, crusted with the remains of last nights dinner. I figured Jack would get home from the gym and handle it all.

Piles of paper gathering dust on the floor and debit card receipts busting out of a little white box screamed for my attention. I ignored them. My home office, the place where I used to hide all day, was like a war zone.

And it wasnt like we had money issues. Paying our bills was the least of my worries. Jack had made a killing when his startup was bought out, and I was the head of client services at a global real-estate company.

I just stopped giving a damn. Nothing interested me. I was beset by indifference. I just couldnt keep up anymore. The sleepless nights, the exhaustion, the constant streaming in my head. Everything seemed so insignificant, so mundane. My successes, my accomplishments, they had lost all meaning.

All I wanted was a chance to get out of the house, to leave that life for the only thing I seemed to do well these dayswork.

That was my morning.

And this was my afternoon.

I took a deep whiff of the cool sea air, filling my lungs to the brim with relief, grateful for the reprieve of being far from home. Our San Francisco sales office was located right by the Embarcadero, a quick walk from where I sat. The wharf was crowded that afternoon, something I hadnt expected in mid-September. Save for a few young students on field trips, there were tourists everywhere. The sun was so bright that the tips of the waves sparkled like diamonds. I dont know why I thought of gilded stones and shiny white pearls, but I did. I imagined them bobbing up and down in the water while I leaned on the wooden rail surrounding the deck.

Maybe its because of my mother and my grandmotherthey both loved pearls. Whenever Jack wanted to buy me jewelry, I begged him to stay away from those misshapen, ugly white things. They age you. Make you look old.

Well, we are kind of old, hed tease.

Youre old. Thirty-five is not that old, Id snap back. Although it did feel old when youd married at twenty-five and this was the only life youd known.

Hello? A womans voice coupled with a light touch of my shoulder filled me with a surge of energy. There she was, my friend Valerie, leaning in to give me a kiss on both cheeks, her long brown hair blowing in the wind, almond-shaped eyes squinting from the suns glare.

Hi, you! I squealed before wrapping my arms around her and glancing around for another familiar face. Dylan? I asked.

He had to take a call at the office. Hell meet us for dinner tonight.

She opened her purse and handed me what Id been waiting for all morning. I leaned my head toward the flame and lit that glorious cigarette.

Birds gathered at our feet, dirty, bedraggled pigeons. I stiffened up and let out a shriek as one of them came too close. Valerie flapped her hands and stamped her feet. Shoo, she mewed, sounding more sexy than scary.

We cant stay here, I said. Theres too many of them. My fear of birds had started when I was only three years old. I think its because I had broken out in hives the first time Id touched feathers. After that, my older sister Trish would use a feather duster to scare me into submission while we were growing up.

When they all flew away, I calmed down somewhat. Hey, before I forget, I got us a room at the Clift on Geary. Its by Union Square, so you know what that means? I asked.

Val continued to stomp at the birds even after they had scurried off. She turned to face the ocean.

So, yes?

Oh, she said. Actually, I booked my own room so I can work late into the night.

Huh.

I slipped past her and closer to the water. Oh, God, that feels so good. I turned my head to the side to avoid blowing smoke in her face.

Valerie scrunched her nose in response. I watched her shift her weight from right leg to left, a familiar motion required by the stilettos she wore with every single outfit. As consultants whod developed the sales tracking system for our company, wed worked together for a year now. In the realm of professional relationships, I shouldnt have allowed our friendship to develop as it hadit went against my own advice to wait until the end of the project. But wed hit it off so well, I convinced myself that being friends with a coworker was no ones business.