Andy stared at the orange envelope at the bottom of Maya and Carina's freezer among the big bags of peas and strawberries and a bunch of spotty, blackened bananas. She read the writing on the front over and over again. Petition for dissolution of marriage. Even though she was the one who had filed for divorce, she couldn't believe things had gotten to this and she couldn't bring herself to sign them. It felt like just yesterday that she and Robert were at the courthouse, getting ready to start this new chapter of their lives together. His vows and the promises they had made each other on that day echoed in her head and she suddenly felt that intense, all-consuming electric feeling in her chest, a feeling that she had tried so hard to numb down this past year. She loved him. She was in love with him.
Without giving it a second thought, Andy snatched the cold envelope and slammed the freezer shut. "I'm going on a drive," she announced to her roommates, who were cuddling in the living room and feeding each other gingerbread cookies.
"With your frozen divorce papers?" Maya asked, perpexled. Before she or Carina could add anything else, Andy had already grabbed her keys out of the bowl, slapped on a jacket and was already out the door.
Before she knew it, Andy was parking on the street, right in front of Robert's house. She turned the car off, exhaled loudly and took a few moments to process everything.
She hadn't been back here since the night she left, over a year ago. The house looked just as she remembered it, besides the wreath hanging on the door and the twinkling lights wrapped around the balcony railing. Andy smiled at the little Christmas touches. Even though Robert had always claimed that it was his least favourite holiday and even referred to himself as the Grinch, he always made the effort to get into the festive spirit to make the kids on the street happy, and that made her happy.
Andy harkened back to their last Christmas together, nearly two years ago. It was a day to remember. It had started with a breakfast that consisted mostly of cookies, candy canes and eggnog, followed by a last minute costume fitting for the neighborhood parade Robert had insisted the whole station participate in, and it had ended on a much hotter note, in more ways than one. She smiled at the memory of her and Robert curling up on the couch in front of the fire. She had only lived there for about a year and a half, but all of her best memories were made in that house, with him, her husband. And she wanted to make a thousand more.
In the spur of the moment, she got out of her car and ran up to the house, nearly slipping on the thin layer of ice on the path. She pounded on the door as hard as she could over and over until she saw a figure through the frosted glass. She braced herself for what was about to happen.
When Robert heard loud knocks at the door, the last person he expected to see standing at his doorstep was his estranged wife. Estranged, because he hadn't seen her since the night he found out she had slept with his boss, Beckett, which was nearly a month ago. After her big revelation, he had walked away, so as to not say something he would later regret. She had done the same, but for the opposite reason. Once he had calmed down and collected himself, he had tried to talk to her about it. He practically begged her to give him a reason for what she had done, any reason that could justify why she had done what she had done. But unlike him, Andy was completely unwilling to have any sort of conversation about it because she didn't feel guilty about it, and given the choice to do it again, she would have, Robert was sure of it. She wanted to hurt him, and it worked. He was hurt.
As soon as Andy saw her husband materialize in front of her, she felt that intense electric feeling in her chest again and butterflies in the pit of her stomach. To her surprise, he was dressed in his robe, the one with the three different shades of brown she had gifted him two Christmases ago. She thought he would've burned it... or stuck it in the freezer, but maybe that was just her way of dealing with things.
