On the one hand, it seemed completely out of character. He didn’t do things for me. Not like this, not without asking.
On the other hand, this was exactly like him, or like the Sean I’d known in high school. That Sean helped me shovel snow without me asking. He bought me flowers once in a while just because. I hadn’t seen that Sean in so long, though. I hadn’t seen any version of Sean—good, bad, or ugly—in five years. Not in person. I’d seen the video clips, read the articles and watched the interviews. But those were just moments, soundbites and scripts.
After a while, he noticed me staring and raised a hand in greeting.
I didn’t wave back. My head was still stuck in the puzzle of who this man was. Here and now, who was he?
Finally, I broke out of statue mode and proceeded to my car and to work. I had a routine, and I needed to stick to it. My routine kept me sane; it made my grief manageable.
Having my celebrity-former-best-friend living next door was really going to mess with my mojo.
I went to work and upon returning was glad that Sean was nowhere in sight. He didn’t show up throughout the evening, and as I readied for bed, my mind tumbled in confusion, unable to reconcile the situation. What was his motivation? How much had he changed? Was he here to stay? Did I want him to stay?
I opened my window to let in the cool night air and crawled into bed.
Sean’s presence pressed in on me, demanding attention, demanding that I feel some way about it, but I simply didn’t know how to feel, so I shoved it aside. But once I had cast that conundrum from my mind, the inevitable emptiness was there, ready and willing to envelop me in its dark embrace. The stillness of the night stole my oxygen. The sound of my breathing—and only my breathing—reminded me of all I’d lost. The grief welled up from the pit of my stomach, and as I tried to swallow it down, tried to breathe it away, music drifted in through my open window. I turned my head to listen, welcoming the distraction as I tried to figure out where it was coming from. Then it dawned on me. Sean must have opened his own window and started to play. It was just his guitar at first. But his voice joined after a while, turning one of his upbeat songs into a slow lament.
My heart was torn once again. I still didn’t know if I wanted him here or if he should be allowed to intrude on my life. But that music and the familiarity of it distracted me and lulled me to sleep with the reassurance that I wasn’t alone.
♪♫♪
Sean and I lived in a stalemate for more than two weeks. My stubbornness impressed even me.
Sean found some little thing to do for me every day. Despite the fact that I wouldn’t invite him into my house, he still did something. He left me flowers. He trimmed the tree in my backyard (not well), fertilized my lawn, and tried to fix the broken slat in my fence.
Suddenly, he was making an attempt to be mister handyman when he’d employed gardeners and housekeepers since he was twenty. Some things he did okay at. Other projects took him several tries to get it right. He accidentally broke Kersplunkus, my garden gnome, and had it replaced within two days.
Meanwhile, I was going out of my way, forcing myself to be more social than I’d been since…before. Heidi and I went to a movie one evening, and I had lunch with both her and Gemma a couple times. I was trying to prove to myself that I was fine, that I didn’t need Sean to come in and save me.
Anytime Sean and I saw each other outside the duplex, he would give me a smile. I would give him a confused, stubborn glance and walk on by.
Every night, I opened my window, and every night I heard his guitar and his voice drifting from his half of our duplex, floating into our backyard and through my bedroom window. I let him sing me to sleep.
♪♫♪
The stalemate broke seventeen days after he moved in. I knew he was in our shared backyard, weeding the little corner garden bed on my side. The last two weeks of having Sean lurking around each corner had given me ample time to dwell