Total pages in book: 76
Estimated words: 73699 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 368(@200wpm)___ 295(@250wpm)___ 246(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 73699 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 368(@200wpm)___ 295(@250wpm)___ 246(@300wpm)
Chapter 38
Friday, November 13
San Francisco
“I still can’t believe you’re not coming back,” Kurt says. “It’s not right. Nothing about this is right.”
Lewis squeezes his husband’s shoulder as he comes to top off our Sauvignon blanc. “We talked about this, Kurt. It is right. You’re just sulking.”
Kurt pouts as he looks at me. “Okay, fine. I confess, this whole situation does have a certain appealing symmetry to it. But I don’t like it.”
“Not even my corner office, which you now get to keep?” I say, nudging his calf with the tip of my Tory Burch flat. “Hmmm?”
He gives a sassy little wiggle in his chair. “Well, okay, that part’s okay.”
“Thought so,” I say, smiling into my wine. I’m a bit surprised that my last night in San Francisco doesn’t feel sadder. Don’t get me wrong—it’s bittersweet to think that this will no longer be my home. I’ll miss the weather. I’ll miss my job. My colleagues. My girl squad. I’ll miss Kurt and Lewis most of all.
But as of today, I’m officially retired as the CEO of Coco. The reins have been handed over to Kurt as acting CEO, and the board of directors will have to vote on whether that’s a permanent position. But I’m on the board, and I feel pretty certain that the corner office will be Kurt’s to keep for as long as he wants it. He quit being an assistant a long time ago—he is Coco.
As for me?
I’ve got a flight from SFO back to JFK later in the week.
Toward what?
No.
Idea.
Yep. You’re reading that right. I don’t know what’s next. I no longer have a job. Or a home. In a few days, I’ll no longer have a husband.
Oh, yeah, and I’m a lot poorer than I was a week ago.
Why?
Because that’s what happens when you file for divorce before the conditions of your prenup are met—everything I earned in the duration of our marriage is now half Colin’s.
Oddly, the strangest part about all of this isn’t that I walked away from a rather large sum of money in order to break my prenup early. It’s that neither Colin nor I seemed to consider that possibility in the first place. We’d been so hung up on the single paragraph indicating that we must live under the same roof for three months in order to get divorced, we hadn’t bothered to explore the consequences if we filed divorce papers before that. Or at least I hadn’t. Not until last week.
That’s what I called my brother about. And when Justin called me back—quicker this time, thank God—I’d learned that it wasn’t that one of us couldn’t file for divorce before living together for three months. It was just a really irresponsible financial decision, assuming either of us had amassed any amount of assets, which, we both had.
And honestly, even if I had known about the sort-of-loophole, I think I’d still have moved to New York. At the start of all this, the prospect of giving what was essentially a complete stranger half of everything I worked so hard to earn would have been unthinkable. Three months of living in New York City would seem a small price to pay for keeping what is mine.
Now though … well, as you know, everything has changed.
I truly don’t feel I could have survived another day, much less weeks, of living side by side with Colin, knowing he was counting down the days until he could be with Rebecca. And more pressing than that, I’d realized how brutal it must have been to live with one woman while loving another.
It came down to this: I don’t need that money.
I do, however, need Colin to be happy. I need it from the very center of my heart.
And he’s not going to get there living under the same roof as me. Plus, my brilliant plan, if I do say so myself, did exactly what I wanted it to. It convinced Gordon Price that, yes, Colin and I were getting divorced, but there was nothing easy or planned about it.
Gordon Price correctly assumed that one does not willingly give up a very fat sum of money to one’s husband if love isn’t involved. I’ve told quite a few lies regarding my marriage. That wasn’t one of them. I do love Colin.
“Oh, Char,” Kurt says sympathetically as he sees my eyes watering. “No, no. Not that again.”
“I’m not crying,” I say, sniffling into the napkin he gives me.
“You are too. Is it for the guy or because you’ll miss me?”
I honk out a laugh. “You. It’s definitely because I’ll miss you.”
“I know you’re lying, and I’ll take it. Lewy! Bring the cheese puffs!” Kurt calls into the kitchen.
“I thought you went gluten-free. And vegan,” I say.
“Lewis said the diet gave me the grumpies, so I gave it up,” he says, getting a fresh tissue and dabbing at my eyes.