I got out and walked back toward the sleek mass of metal and money.\u00a0 The problem was obvious soon enough\u2014the left rear tire was flat.\u00a0 Actually, it was nearly shredded.\u00a0 You get that sometimes; sharp bits of junk fall from the trucks hauling on the freeways.\u00a0 Sometimes they take a tire, sometimes not.\u00a0 They took this one for all it was worth, and I calculated it was a lot.<\/p>\n
The driver\u2019s window whispered smoothly down and I saw the face of the most gorgeous man that I have ever wanted to kill.\u00a0 Sitting behind the wheel as calm and indifferent as he tried to seem the day I moved out was the boyfriend I no longer had.<\/p>\n
What he was doing near my new apartment, I couldn\u2019t guess, and I never bothered to ask.\u00a0 It would be pointless.\u00a0 Any answer would be in the category of none-of-your-business anyway.<\/p>\n
He popped the trunk and got out, leaning over to unlatch the spare.\u00a0 He appeared casual and comfortable while he lifted the tire out of its recess beneath his unspoiled trunk liner.\u00a0 The layer of filth clinging to his fender made him decide to stand.\u00a0 I gave him one brief but thorough look that he certainly didn\u2019t miss, although he showed no recognition of it.\u00a0 He was wearing a suit that showed he still had both relative youth, and yet had more money than ever before.\u00a0 Money that some other women will share, as I move on to again take care of myself alone.<\/p>\n
In fairness, I was not a good girlfriend and probably deserved to lose him.\u00a0 In the five years we dated I slept with as many men as in my lifetime before him.\u00a0 Well, maybe a few more than that.\u00a0 Maybe a lot more.\u00a0 Funny how a woman seems to lose her looks at the same time as a man grows his bank account.<\/p>\n
From the corner of my eye, I saw him standing there studying his phone, either being patient or trying to hide his impatience.\u00a0 We had nothing but time when we met, younger and poorer and yet having everything we could ever want but not knowing it.\u00a0 He wanted me to quit, but I wanted to quit only with a guarantee of becoming a wife and mother.\u00a0 The more I tried to be wild and entertaining, the more he looked elsewhere for a respectable woman for whom he\u2019d leave me.\u00a0 I grew to resent every party, every wild night every moment I\u2019d spent on him.\u00a0 But it occurred to me that he\u2019d never actually asked me to be wild; I had been all on my own.<\/p>\n
Let him have his freedom, I thought.\u00a0 He seems happier than I could ever make him.<\/p>\n
He finished the tire, put the tools away, and I closed the trunk for him.\u00a0 \u201cThank you,\u201d he said.\u00a0 For the first time ever, I heard him say those words and mean them.\u00a0 After all I thought I had given him, and after all that time, this was the first time I\u2019d given him what he needed.\u00a0 A goodbye.<\/p>\n
I watched his car get smaller and smaller, as he drove away.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I got out and walked back toward the sleek mass of metal and money.\u00a0 The problem was obvious soon enough\u2014the left rear tire was flat.\u00a0 Actually, it was nearly shredded.\u00a0 You get that sometimes; sharp bits of junk fall from the trucks hauling on the freeways.\u00a0 Sometimes they take a tire, sometimes not.\u00a0 They took […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1128","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\n