Christine lets her last tears drip onto the page. Words and letters blur, but for the first time in months, her resolve does not.

This email. These 238 words have reshaped her love for him into something she can hold.

They have given her the strength to say goodbye.

She smiles as a video collage of memories plays in her mind.

Christine met him near the Eiffel Tower - two Chicagoans who waited until they were thousands of miles from home to discover how close they were. He was escaping to Europe for the fun of it. She was there for the romance.

And she was on her honeymoon.

They sat and talked for far too long. She didn’t really forget about her husband who was back at the hotel sleeping off another hangover. But she did for one terrible moment imagine what it might be like to forget him. Her heart quickens even now to think how things might have been different had her terrible moment coincided with Erik’s sudden and awkward attempt to kiss her.

Her wedding ring? It was locked away in the hotel safe. “I paid a lot of money for that,” Cal had said, “let’s not lose it on our honeymoon, okay honey?” But where was her head? Why hadn’t she told him sooner she was married?

It wasn’t just his charm, though that was surely what caught her attention. It was the ease of their conversation. They were old friends meeting for the first time. But not the last time. They ran into each other just three weeks later at a Cubs game back in Chicago. Erik was there with his girlfriend of the moment. They went out for drinks together that night. And many more nights. It was a different girlfriend who joined them at Navy Pier for the blues festival. And still another who latched onto him (and spoke to him) like a mother to a child when they visited Brookfield Zoo not to see the animals but to collect all 11 of the Mold-A-Rama plastic animal toys.

Christine was enamored with the girlfriend-in-tow Erik. So was Cal.

But she had fallen in love with the unaccompanied Erik, the Erik of long phone calls and beautifully-written emails, and surprise “is that seat taken?” appearances at lunch.

Christine folds the paper holds it to her chest. She walks to the back door and steps onto the balcony into the cool September air. She listens to the sounds of neighbors and traffic and stares out toward Lake Michigan where the bright moon is painting whitecaps on waves too weak to whip up their own. 

Cal will be home soon. Wednesday is AA night. He’s been so good about going. 

Christine takes a long deep breath and then comes back inside. She glides across the floor, a lightness to her step she hasn’t felt in months. She sits on the bed, opens the bedside table and pulls out her diary.

“Thank you,” she says to the folded paper. She slides it along with her fading fantasy of a different life between the pages and closes the book.

Erik will be fine. He will find a beautiful brilliant someone. Someone with sapphire eyes just like his. And she will be the luckiest woman in the world.

Apart from her, of course.

Christine hears the sound of a key in the door. It’s quarter till nine. Cal’s home early.

She can’t wait to see him.