Perfect Together by Kristen Ashley

“You do drinks, I’ll serve up,” I offered when he had the plates on the counter.

He looked at me, nodded, then moved out of the kitchen to his wet bar where he stored his wine.

Though, Manon told me, in the other wing of the house there was a walk-in wine room that was, “So rad, Mom, you wouldn’t believe.” Apparently, you could see it from the pool. However, I had not seen it as I had not been in that wing or near his pool.

Remy had lived there two and a half years, and I’d been in the living room and family room.

And that was it.

I shook off these thoughts, and how they were distressing me, and got down to sorting the food.

When I opened the lids, it was no surprise to see he got me my favorite. Combo platter with pulled pork and brisket.

It was also no surprise Remy got a combo too: pulled chicken and turkey.

He had always, from the time I’d met him, had a mind to healthy living.

This didn’t mean he didn’t drink or eat sweets or snack. He did.

Just that, for the most part, he selected healthy choices and never really went overboard on anything.

It also meant, even after he quit training for triathlons, he ran, went to the gym and lifted weights, and always played rugby.

Rugby was his thing. He went out of his way to follow the MLR in the U.S., the same with the European, Australian and New Zealand leagues.

He was so into it, he’d played in a league in New York, and one of the first things he’d done when we moved to Phoenix was find one here.

Then, in usual Remy fashion, five steps ahead of any game, he got deeply involved in the junior league, building that up, as well as the senior league.

He did this because he loved the game. He did this because he wanted others to love it.

And he did it because he knew he couldn’t play in the adult league after a certain age because he might get hurt, being mid- or late-forties and playing with guys in their twenties and thirties. But he wouldn’t want to quit.

He’d also given this to our boys.

Sabre and Yves both played junior, Yves still active, and Sabre had found a team in Tucson.

They loved playing and I loved watching, regardless of the fact that, more often than not, they’d end up bloody.

Still, they were all very good at it, the best on their teams (I will admit to some prejudice about that). And it was an interesting sport, far more than any other (I will admit to some prejudice about that too).

I, on the other hand (and I’d given this to my daughter), loved food, but hated physical activity.

I’d struggled with this in my twenties and thirties.

But in my forties, I realized it was who I was.

I was not sedentary by a long shot. And although I could go overboard, sitting around eating wasn’t my way of life.

My epiphany to being at one with this came when, one day, I heard that Tina Turner said she stayed in shape, and had those amazing legs, simply by walking every night after dinner.

That might be a fib, and it should be said she made this comment while she was touring, and I’d seen her on stage, so walking wasn’t all the exercise those great gams got.

But it made me think.

And after some reflection, I realized I liked to walk too. I also liked to stretch.

So I didn’t knock myself out, but I did both.

Not every day, but regularly, I’d walk. Sometimes I’d do it twenty minutes, sometimes I’d get into the music or podcast I was listening to, and I’d walk for over an hour.

But even if that was as and when, nearly every morning before I took a shower, I did some stretches and some crunches to keep my limbs supple and my core strong.

But that was it.

And unless I found something else I liked, it always would be and I was okay with that.

This was even if (the same as when I first met Remy) I’d carried extra weight. I’d then put on some when I was pregnant with the kids, and I didn’t take it off. And sadly, my coping mechanism after Remy left meant I’d added a size.

But two nights ago, my ex-husband said he wanted to fuck me in my tub.

And since then, I’d reflected on those words.

After he left, I’d convinced myself there was a time when Remy wasn’t attracted to me.

But taking some time (a lot of it), I realized he had never, not once, given me indication he was not attracted to me sexually or aesthetically, this being during pregnancy, post-pregnancy, in the years in between as life happened, which meant age happened, and both happened to me.

In fact, I’d always been curvy, from the minute I met him. Sure, I was curvier now, but he got three kids out of that.

I also remembered that I was not one of those women who had to put up with her man admiring other women, because he never looked. Never. Not once that’d I’d noticed in decades.

It was me for him.

He was just into me.

Then.

And, apparently, now.

Which might be why Myrna hurt as bad as she did and why I’d talked myself into thinking he’d lost interest in me.

For Remy, it had always just been me…until her.

Though, it was perhaps more important, after struggling with my body image and confidence as many girls and young women my age did, I got over it, and not just because my husband made no bones about the fact he was very attracted to me (even if that helped a ton).

I was around beauty for a living.

I saw it in its classic sense. I saw it in its atypical sense. I saw it in its edgy sense. I saw it in its unexpected sense.