crying.”
“Astrid, it’s me. You don’t have to keep your emotions in check around me. You’ve thrown vases and goldfish bowls at me, remember?” Charlie said, trying to lighten the mood. Astrid smiled fleetingly as the tears continued to flow. Charlie felt helpless and at the same time frustrated by the absurdity of the situation. His smoking-hot ex-fiancée was on a romantic Chinese junk with him, literally crying on his shoulder about another man. This was just his damn luck.
“You really love him, don’t you?” Charlie said softly.
“I do. Of course I do,” Astrid sobbed.
For a few hours, they sat quietly side by side, soaking in the sun and the salty spray as the junk floated along the calm waters of the South China Sea. They sailed past Lantau Island, Charlie bowing respectfully to the giant Buddha at its peak, and skirted past tiny picturesque islands like Aizhou and Sanmen, with their rugged out-croppings and hidden inlets.
All the while, Charlie’s mind kept churning nonstop. He had coerced Astrid into coming on this afternoon sail because he wanted to make a confession. He wanted to tell her that he had never stopped loving her, not for one moment, and that his marriage one year after their breakup had been nothing but a mindless rebound. He had never truly loved Isabel, and their marriage was doomed from the start because of it. There were so many things Charlie wanted her to know, but he knew it was too late to tell them.
At least she had loved him once. At least he had four good years with the girl he had loved since he was fifteen, since the night he had watched her sing “Pass It On” on the beach during a church youth group outing. (His family had been Taoists, but his mother had forced all of them to attend First Methodist so they could mix with a ritzier crowd.) He could still remember the way the flickering bonfire made her long wavy hair shimmer in the most exquisite reds and golds, how her entire being glowed like Botticelli’s Venus as she so sweetly sang:
It only takes a spark,
to get the fire going.
And soon all those around,
can warm up in its glowing.
That’s how it is with God’s love,
once you’ve experienced it.
You want to sing,
it’s fresh like spring,
you want to Pass It On.
“Can I make a suggestion, Astrid?” Charlie said as the junk made its way back to Repulse Bay to drop her off.
“What?” Astrid asked sleepily.
“When you get home tomorrow, do nothing. Just go back to your normal life. Don’t make any announcements, and don’t grant Michael a quick divorce.”
“Why not?”
“I have a feeling Michael could have a change of heart.”
“What makes you think that will happen?”
“Well, I’m a guy, and I know how guys think. At this point, Michael’s played all his cards, he’s gotten a huge load off his chest. There’s something really cathartic about that, about owning up to your truth. Now, if you let him have some time to himself, I think you’ll find that he might be receptive to a reconciliation a few months down the line.”
Astrid was dubious. “Really? But he was so adamant about wanting a divorce.”
“Think about it—Michael’s deluded himself into thinking he’s been trapped in an impossible marriage for the past five years. But a funny thing happens when men truly get a taste of freedom, especially when they’re accustomed to married life. They begin to crave that domestic bliss again. They want to re-create it. Look, he told you the sex was still great. He told you he didn’t blame you, aside from blowing too much money on clothes. My instinct tells me that if you just let him be, he will come back.”
“Well, it’s worth a try, isn’t it?” Astrid said hopefully.
“It is. But you have to promise me two things: first, you need to live your life the way you want to, instead of how you think Michael would want you to. Move into one of your favorite houses, dress however it pleases you. I really feel that what ate into Michael was the way you spent all your time tiptoeing around him, trying to be someone you weren’t. Your overcompensating for him only increased his feelings of inadequacy.”
“Okay,” Astrid said, trying to soak it all in.
“Second, promise me you won’t grant him a divorce for at least one year, no matter how much he begs for it. Just stall him. Once you sign the papers, you lose the chance of