I'm not married anymore. It's not official, but I've decided.
Was I ever married, though? What kind of marriage is played out on the occasional weekend, in hotel rooms and restaurants? No home, no routines, no everyday life together.
No husband anymore. Literally, he sneaked back to the States without even telling me, that dirty worm. It hurt, Helen, I just wanted to cry and crawl up in a corner. And then, there was Pierce. He did something so stupid and heroic and stupid, and somehow that lit something in me too. I will not cry over Donald anymore, I am in charge of my life.
I am also incredibly hungover, and I think I made out with him, with stupid, heroic Pierce. It's kind of hard to tell, though, the entire evening is covered in a red haze.
" Wait, this isn't my tent! How did we end up here?"
She could hear how slurred her voice was and it made her giggle.
"It was your fault," Pierce said, his tongue didn't sound like it was completely cooperating either. "I was gonna walk you home, and then you started to tilt and took me with you. And I followed, because I'm such a gentleman."
It came out 'chentleman' and that sent them both into fits of laughter. She grabbed his arm, because the world really was tilting quite ominously. Rude world.
"Yes, you are! You declared peace today and everything!"
He grinned down at her.
"I know, I did! And you! You colored your hair for me!"
"Not for you, dummy, for the theme. I'm great with themes, you know. I'm a great hostess, my soon-to-be ex-husband said so, remember?"
Ex-husband. Ex. Ex. Ex. That was such a good word. She could feel it bounce around inside of her and it felt wonderful. Like an erasure. An un-doing.
"I'm a new woman, you know. Happy life, happy, happy ex-wife."
He nodded enthusiastically.
"I know! This new woman stood in front of a firing squad for me today. She is brave as hell. And very hot, you were always way out of that big lump's league. You're a hottie and he's a big nottie."
"He was naughty!" she exclaimed. "He was so naughty!".
She didn't understand what made him laugh so hard, but it was delightful, so she joined in.
"No," he gasped, "he was a nottie, not hot like you. When you kissed, it was like watching Fay Wray wrestling King Kong."
She grabbed his arm even harder and shrieked with laughter. She felt so good, like her body was filled with tiny, happy bubbles. She was so very light, like a Donald-shaped weight had been cut off.
"You should have just made that cast go all the way up to his head and hid him in the shed," she said and gestured vaguely in the direction the shed might be.
"Noted. The next guy who comes along, I will plaster first and ask questions later."
"Yes. You. Will."
She poked her finger into his chest for every word.
"No, you won't," she continued, "because the next guy is gonna be perfect. He is gonna love me and respect me. And buy me a house and a dog. A small one that will dance for treats."
She backed a couple of steps and did her best impression of how her dog would dance. That made the world tilt again and she giggled.
"Did you know I used to do ballet when I was a kid?" Of course he didn't know, but all of a sudden it felt so important to tell him. "I was really good, too, for the Christmas show I got a solo and everything."
She raised her arms over her head in a perfect position, and for a second she could feel what it had been like, to dance alone on that stage. It had felt like flying.
The rays of the rising sun hit him where he stood, the red dye made his hair look fake. Stiff. Like he was one of those cheap, plastic little dolls with hair you could just lift off. He looked like he was a prop on her stage. She laughed again, and was about to tell him, doll-boy, but then she saw the look on his face. He was staring at her, his face so serious all of a sudden.
"What?"
She lowered her arms.
"It's just… you. It's you."
He moved towards her, a bit hunched over and with that serious look on his face. For a moment she thought he was going to tackle her, but instead, he pulled her close and kissed her.
She froze for a second, but then she threw her arms around him and kissed him back. Because why not? Just some hours ago, she had found out that her husband had left her. Literally, he had left her on another continent, put a world between them. She had dyed her hair red with cheap, horrible dye that made her hair feel crunchy, and would probably never come out. She would have to cut it off, finally getting the buzz cut she so desperately wanted as a kid.
She had drunk her bodyweight in red wine and punch that had tasted like banana for some reason.
So if the day ended with her kissing Pierce, why not? Nothing really mattered anyway, everything was unimportant, just scattering in the air like the exhaust fumes spewing from the plane carrying her soon-to-be ex-husband away.
Pierce's hands wandered to her lower back. They felt good there, big, and warm. Out of place, out of line, but that was only exciting. She arched into him, her body fitted into his so well, and kissing him was effortless. Natural, like it was the exact thing she was supposed to do at that exact moment. It was different than the other times he had kissed her, when he had wanted to put on a show before others, or it was just a ploy to annoy her. Or that strange, surreal night in the hut.
Right there, standing so close together in the early morning sun, there was no performance, no panic, no fear. Just his warmth against her, the taste of red wine and bananas on his breath too.
She stood up on her toes, as much as her boots would allow, because she was going to be a ballerina once, before everything got complicated and there was war and blood and no husband, only a world that kept tilting and her old arch nemesis keeping her from rolling off its surface.
She ran her fingers through his hair, and they got stuck in the tangle of it. It made her giggle.
"What?" he asked against her lips.
She leaned back and looked up at him. His hair hung down in a stiff wave over his forehead. It looked ridiculous. He smiled at her, and that was cute. He was cute, she had to give him that. Not nearly as cute as he thought he was, but still.
"Your hair is weird, doll-boy."
"Yours is beautiful, doll-face."
His grin grew.
"How do you even do that? Everyone else looks like buffoons, Charles looks like he has escaped the circus, and Potter looks like a leprechaun, but you look like you should be on the cover of some glossy magazine. How is this whole thing happening?"
He made a circle in the air with his finger, framing her head. She grinned back at him.
"I have my ways," she said and shook her head, making her hair swoop around her shoulders.
Bad move. Very bad move. The world tilted again, and not in a fun way. It felt like she was on a ship caught in a storm, and a wave of nausea drifted through her. She closed her eyes and grabbed the fabric of his shirt. She exhaled slowly and somewhere along the way the exhale turned into a groan.
Time to call it a night. She could dance with Pierce. Get ridiculously drunk in front of him. Protect his brave, stupid ass from the MPs. Stick her tongue down his throat, apparently, but she would not throw up in front of him. Could not, would not.
"You okay?"
"Mmmhmmm," she mumbled, eyes still pressed shut. The ship was still rolling.
"Well, your face just turned a bit green, so you, sweet Maggie Malone, are looking exceptionally Irish right now."
He slurred Irish, and that made her giggle. That was not a very smart move either, it made something unpleasant move inside of her. No. No, no, no, she pushed it down with all her might, no throwing up, Major, absolutely not. She very carefully opened her eyes and looked up at him.
"You know," he said. "You're drunk when you're beautiful. Let's get you home. I wanna make sure no North Korean modeling scout comes along and snatches you up. Put you on the cover of glossy magazines. Red Menace, they will call you."
Her head was a tangled mess, and she couldn't really sort out of what he was saying, but it sounded sweet. He held his arm around her waist as they made their slow way across the compound. A tiny voice in her head moaned about what people would think, but the rest of Margaret was too busy keeping her head still to worry about tiny voices living inside of it. Besides, there was probably no one in camp sober enough to notice.
"You gonna be okay?" he asked when they reached her tent. "Need anything?"
"To go back in time and not have the last seven or eight drinks," she said very slowly, still focused on keeping the content of her stomach where it should be.
He grinned at her and swayed a little. Or maybe that was just her. Then he lifted her hand to his lips and kissed it. The small voice in her head moaned again, but Margaret quelled it. It was the sweetest thing anyone had done for her in a long time. He was a gentleman, he just hid it very, very well.
"Good night, Captain," she mumbled and very carefully started to make her way inside. She hoped she wasn't out of aspirin, she needed to take at least three before she fell asleep. Not two like the recommended dose, she was just a rebel like that. A real menace.
"Hey, Margaret?"
She very slowly turned again and tried to get him to snap back into focus.
"I'm proud of you. You are back; I can feel it."
She could feel it too. Behind the tilting world, the nausea and the unpleasant thing moving deep within, was the essence of her again. Margaret, not Mrs. Penobscott. Not that anyone really had called her that, but still.
"Thank you," she mumbled. "Proud of you too." She wasn't entirely sure she was pronouncing her consonants anymore, but hoped he got the gist of it.
"Good. You can tell me all about that when we meet again, when I'm not at risk of ending up with all those drinks splattered all over my shoes. Go to bed."
She did. She didn't have the energy to look for aspirin or even drink a glass of water. She tugged a little at her red T-shirt but getting it off her body seemed like too monumental a task, so she just kept it on, among with her pants and boots.
Her hair made a crunching sound when her head hit the pillow. Great.
She floated away on a rolling ocean of banana-tasting kisses, and pirouettes under the spotlight.
And a small dog dancing for treats.