Yet, post-divorce, and now that Adam is back out there in the dating scene, he has been friendlier, chattier, and there are even times when she looks at him and wonders what was wrong with her, that she couldn’t be happy when she was with him.
She hears his car from the bedroom as she’s slipping on her shoes, and comes down the stairs yelling toward the kids, both holed up in Tory’s bedroom, watching something on the computer.
“Tory! Buckley! Computer off. Get your stuff. Dad’s here.”
“Hi.” Adam grins and raises an eyebrow as he looks her up and down, making her feel instantly self-conscious. “You look great. Got a hot date?”
Despite herself, Kit laughs. She has made an effort tonight, it is true. Her light brown hair, now streaked with gold from the sun and a few strands of her natural gray, is silky on her shoulders, straight and shiny instead of her usual natural wave.
A touch of eyeshadow brings out her blue eyes, and she is wearing a wrap dress that shows off her figure perfectly. At five foot eight, she has always been tall and rarely wears heels, far happier in her clogs and Merrell slides, but tonight she stands tall, feeling feminine and flirty, pretty in her dress-up clothes.
“I’m off to a book reading.”
“That’s it? You dressed like that for a book reading?”
He has a point.
“Oh God.” Kit groans. “Is it too much?”
“Are you kidding? You look amazing. Nice dress.”
“Thanks.” She twirls awkwardly, wondering if it is as strange for Adam to see her in unfamiliar clothes in her new environment, as it is for her to see him in his.
When she drops the kids off, she can see into the house, all the furniture that used to be theirs, paintings they bought together, books she remembers from their bookshelf.
She had always bought everything in the house, decorated herself, chosen the furnishings, Adam trusting her taste and style, leaving her in charge; so although she didn’t miss the things she saw in Adam’s house, they were familiar, they had her imprint on them.
Then she started seeing new things. A rug, some cushions. Paintings. Things she not only didn’t buy, but things she would never have bought. Not her taste. And then his clothes. Unfamiliar shoes, jackets she hadn’t seen before—and that was perhaps the moment she realized he had moved on.
This dress she is wearing tonight, a navy and white printed wrap dress, is new. One of the first things she did, after her divorce, was sort through her wardrobe and get rid of all the clothes she thought of as belonging to her previous incarnation as a rich housewife.
The little bouclé suits, the matching heels. The silk shirts and cashmere capes. It was a look that was far more her mother than her, and when she dropped them off at the consignment store, she felt the weight of trying to be someone she was not finally lift off her for good.
Her mother was horrified. “Darling!” she said. “Who gets rid of Chanel?”
“I do,” she said simply, knowing that her mother would never understand her daily uniform of Gap capris and Old Navy vests, although she has to admit, she has made an effort tonight, and not because of the possibility of meeting a man, but for her friends.
Kit thinks of the few times that she, as a new singleton, Charlie and Tracy, plus a number of other girls from the yoga studio, have had nights out, and how she determined, at the first one, that she would never again be the frumpy friend.
She had shown up, straight from work, at the Mexican restaurant on Main Street, expecting to have a quiet dinner with the girls.
In jeans and an L.L.Bean shirt, she realized her mistake as soon as she walked in. This was a Girls’ Night Out, and these Girls were definitely making the most of it. Tracy, who has the best body of anyone she knows, was in a skin-tight aqua dress, high heels, her blonde hair tumbling in rollered curls down her back. Charlie was in a green and white print dress with flat jew eled sandals, and the other girls were in an assortment of cute dresses and tight jeans, with lots of makeup and jewelry.
Frozen margaritas were being downed by the dozen, and when the lights were dimmed and the music was turned up, the girls were the first to grab the waiters and dance raucously