There was never any question of a reconciliation. There hadn’t been a dramatic rift, just a dwindling, eroding sense of partnership. What remained was an exchange of items and after that, their disentanglement : all that had been done was to be finally undone in this ritual handover.
The separation had been efficiently accomplished. The flat was on the market and new living arrangements were in place. Guy and Freya showed no animosity, indeed they intended to remain on friendly terms.
‘ I found some papers of yours in with my stuff. Pay-slips, P60s, that kind of thing. Didn’t want to throw them away in case you needed them.’ Guy handed over a slim file.
‘Thanks. Most of it’s online but I’ll shred them at work.’
‘Oh and I’ve got some music and DVDs we bought. Out of date tech, but I still regret getting rid of my vinyls, so you might want to look through them and decide.’
Freya flicked through the plastic cases, ‘It’s funny how our tastes changed isn’t it? I’ll bet some of these come back as vintage in time, still, can’t hang onto everything.’
Indeed not, although the photos to be shared out brought a few tears to Freya’s eyes.
‘Are you OK? You do look a bit pale. Maybe a glass of wine. I remembered to bring the booze but nothing to drink it from. Have to take turns swigging it from the bottle.’
‘Reminds me when we went camping without a tin opener,’ Freya looked through the photos and found evidence of the camping holiday.
‘Well, at least I remembered the tent pegs.’
‘Yes, but not the mallet,’ Freya was smiling now. ‘We did have some good times though, didn’t we?’
They chatted over the remaining things to be divvied up, then Freya did a deep dive into her bag and eventually came up with a small box.
‘I think I should return this because it belonged to your mother and you may need it in future.’
‘Freya, I gave the ring to you and I want you to have it. It’s yours.’
More tears leaked from Freya’s reddened eyes.
‘It’s tough isn’t it, each claiming what we once owned together?’ Guy was getting a bit tearful too but took a deep breath. ‘So is that everything shared out? Are we good to go?’
‘Yes’ Freya said, ‘except there’s one thing which you may not want to share. I couldn’t decide whether to tell you or not, and I don’t want you to feel bound by it, but the last thing we made together is just 16 weeks old and it would be great if you wanted a part of that. But it’s up to you.’
It took Guy a few seconds to catch up with what Freya was saying, ‘You mean you’re…I mean we’re going to.. what should we do…?’
The best thing seemed to be a long tender hug before the situation could start to be unraveled.
