A video text came in from Reggie, Elle, and their men, who were spending New Year’s Eve together. It was a video shot earlier in the evening of five-month-old Kendall toddling around with a noisemaker saying, “Happy Bae-Bae.” I smiled immediately. I figured that would be my name for the next generation. I called them, and we chatted.

I was still under the influence of a five-month-old when my phone buzzed. It was a text from Mac.

“Ha. I am on a fishing boat down in the Bahamas with a bunch of ugly guys smoking cigars and drinking very old scotch. Why is a lovely lady like yourself working? Don’t those boys in Atlanta know what to do with a beautiful and ambitious woman?”

“Domestic turbulence, Lily Bart, remember? Don’t forget to send the pictures.”

“Will do, Lily. Wishing you a better new year, Mac.”

I settled into the quietness. Something caught my eye. It was a present wrapped in red and green paper. A leftover Christmas gift. I picked it up. It looked like a wrapped book. It was for me, from Griffin. Questions arose in my mind. Should I open it? Why hadn’t Griffin given it to me already? I ripped open the packaging. It was a book of poetry by Mary Oliver. There was a note:

Bae,

I know you like your vintage poets, but I think you will enjoy this woman. I do. I have marked my favorite poem: “Wild Geese.”

You do not have to be good.

You do not have to walk on your knees

for a hundred miles through the desert repenting.

You only have to let the soft animal of your body

love what it loves.

Tears welled in my eyes. It was the third line that fixed in my thoughts. I finished reading.

… the world offers itself to your imagination,

calls to you like wild geese, harsh and exciting—

over and over announcing your place

in the family of things.

Her words, Griffin’s thoughts, and maybe the champagne made for a potent mix of yearning, longing, and sadness. It dawned on me. This book belonged to Griffin first. This poem had comforted and perhaps saved him after I chose Elliott, ironically, a year ago. It was a lamentation on acceptance and forgiveness—his and mine. Now he was repurposing these very ideas for me, with little fanfare and great kindness. The intimacy itself I had with Griffin was repairing. He had offered me some much-needed forgiveness to begin the New Year.

I reread it and found reassurance this time. I went to bed on the first night of this brand-new year keenly aware at some point I could stop repenting, love whom I loved, and rediscover my place in the family of things.

Chapter Fifty-One

Chapter Fifty-One