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The Divorcee’s First Christmas Alone
Time to put a little spice in more than that new eggnog recipe.
Wishing you a merry, merry Christmas and the best of new years
Much love,
Cassie and Eli
My sister’s card did little to inspire happiness within me, not even a seed of it ready to sprout at a later date. I knew she jotted down the phrase for two dozen Christmas cards, and it had been months since I got more than a text message from her.
I hadn’t even met her new boyfriend — the ‘Eli’ I was somehow supposed to know so familiarly that his name was tacked on the ending note of a holiday card.
I felt the impulse to throw the card in the fireplace.
But instead I set it up on the mantelpiece, front and center amid my silver-and-white decorations, before I turned and walked from the room.
“You got somewhere to be tonight?” the bartender asked me as he dried off a newly rinsed glass.
I stirred my cocktail, which was bitter to the taste but I was too tired to argue with the bartender who’d valiantly been trying to draw me into conversation for the last half-hour. I had to give him credit; he was definitely working for his tip to try and get an older woman like me to open up.