Author: Kirsten Mickelwait
Publisher: She Writes Press
Pages: 344
Genre: Paranormal Memoir
Kirsten, at age 31, meets and marries Steve Beckwith, a handsome and successful attorney. Twenty-two years later, Steve becomes unemployed and addicted to opioids, using money and their two children to emotionally blackmail Kirsten. What’s more, he’s been having an affair with their real estate agent, who is also her close friend. Soon after their divorce is finalized, Steve is diagnosed with colon cancer and dies within a year, leaving Kirsten with $1.5 million in debts she knew nothing about. As she fights toward recovery, Kirsten begins to receive communications from Steve in the afterlife―which lead her on an unexpected path to forgiveness.
“A skillfully
written, thought-provoking account that positively reconsiders an antagonist as
an important teacher.”
―Kirkus Reviews
“What if you accidentally married your worst
enemy? With unflinching honesty and hard-earned grace, Kirsten Mickelwait peels
the shiny façade off her catastrophic marriage to reveal how she not only
survived the lies, betrayals, and lawsuits, but also found her way to
compassion. If you don’t think on your ex fondly, The Ghost Marriage will
teach you why you should.”
―Meredith May, author of The Honey Bus and Loving
Edie
“The Ghost Marriage is an absorbing
tale about what happens when you marry Prince Charming and the expected
‘Happily Ever After’ erodes into a kind of ‘Cursed Ever After.’ It’s a story of
survival, of adjusted ambition, of how to be quick on your feet when your daily
foundation crumbles in midlife.”
―Julia Scheeres, author of Jesusland and A
Thousand Lives
“With The Ghost Marriage, Kirsten
Mickelwait―in bracing, unsentimental prose― brings us in close to the disturbing
history of her troubled marriage. It’s abundantly satisfying to watch her move
through each crisis toward new compassion―for herself, but also for her
deceased ex-husband.”
―Angela Pneuman, author of Lay It on My
Heart and Home Remedies
“By turns hilarious, lyrical, suspenseful, and
touching, Kirsten Mickelwait’s memoir pulls us into the whirlpool of her unique
marriage―then spits us out into the dazzling light of what that marriage came
to mean. Supremely well written, and with a captivating honesty.”
―Veronica Chater, author of Waiting for
the Apocalypse
Book Information
Release Date: Audiobook
releases April 12, 2022
Publisher: She Writes Press
Soft Cover: ISBN: 978-0-9858579-9-8; 329
pages; $15.99; E-Book, $5.99 (have to fix these)
Amazon: Paperback https://amzn.to/3tYLlcs
On Saturday morning, I went to my usual
yoga class, then figured
I had just enough time to run to Napa
to drop off my old cable box
at the Comcast office and be back in
St. Helena by eleven. With my
ridiculous work schedule, Saturdays were
the only days I could run
errands.
I walked into the office at a little
strip mall on Jefferson Street, carrying
the box and attendant cables. There was
no one at the counter,
and the sole clerk in the store was engaged
with a customer at a side
table. Two young girls were playing on
the carpet. “I just want to drop
this off,” I told the clerk, gesturing
with the box in my hands. “Can
someone help me do that?”
“Ma’am? You’ll need to wait your turn.
I’m helping this customer
now, and I’ll assist you when I’m
through.” She went back to talking
about bundled rates to the woman seated
in front of her. I looked
at my watch. It was already ten
thirty-five. If someone helped me
immediately, I could get back to St.
Helena by eleven. If I was even
five minutes late, I worried that Steve
would just leave. I didn’t want
to lose my chance to see him in person
for another whole week or
longer.
“I’m in kind of a hurry,” I said.
“Isn’t there anyone else who can
help me?” I could see through the
window of the door to the back
room, where two people stood chatting.
“Ma’am? I’ll help you when I’m done.”
She went back to her sales
pitch.
I walked over to the door and poked my
head in. “Excuse me,” I
said.
“Ma’am! Ma’am! You cannot go in
there.” The woman at the table
was standing up now, yelling. “Our safe
is back there. You are not
allowed in there! I told you to wait.
You can’t just go bothering our
other employees. I can have you removed
from the store!”
Inside me, something broke, like a jar
of some rotten, foul-smelling
liquid being dropped onto pavement. The
cancer, the job, the commute,
the money worries, the divorce, the
betrayals, the manipulation.
Everything that I had been sealing off
behind a wall of control
and composure and hope for four years suddenly
burst forth like a
flood of raw sewage.
I turned back to face the woman.
“Don’t. You. Fucking. Yell
at me!” I yelled back, slamming the
counter with my fist. “I am a
Comcast customer, and I have to be back
in St. Helena for an important
meeting at eleven o’clock, and you’re
making me wait for no
fucking reason. There are two employees
behind that door! Tell one
of them to come out and fucking help
me!” Cumulatively, it was the
most I’d used the F-word, ever. I felt
like a fucking fool. But I was
beyond caring. The sales girl stared,
and the woman and her children
gaped at me, their eyes wide with
alarm.
Hearing the commotion, one of the
employees came out and ran
behind the counter. “Miss? I’m happy to
help you now.” She was a
woman about my age. Instead of anger or
righteousness, she looked at
me with genuine concern and kindness.
“What can I assist you with?”
It was the kindness that completely
undid me. My face crumpled.
I dropped my head into my hands and
began to weep. “I’m just trying
to return this box,” I began. May
Day, May Day! I had lost control in
front of everyone. My plane was in a
death spiral.
“Miss, don’t worry about it! It’s fine
to return the box. Just let me
look up your address.”
“It’s not about the box,” I sobbed.
Searching in my purse for a
tissue. Pushing my hair out of my eyes.
Completely humiliated. And
yet, did it even matter anymore?
“I understand, miss.” Of course she had
no idea what was happening,
but she pretended she did.
“Thank you,” I cried. “I’m so sorry,
I’m not usually like this.” I
managed to spit out my address, but I
couldn’t stop sobbing. She
typed furiously into her computer,
frantically searching for my client
account page.
“Uh-huh, uh-huh. Okay then, all set,”
she said, and gave me a big
smile as she handed me a receipt. “You
have a good day now, okay?”
“Thanks. You too.” My sobs were coming
so hard, I could barely
form the words. I stumbled through the
double doors to my car
parked just in front. I glanced over my
shoulder through the plate-glass
windows and could see everyone in the
store staring back at me,
mouths in little O’s. Then I drove
home, twenty minutes, and cried
the entire way. By the time I got home,
I was out of tears. I thought.
Steve looked terrible. His clothes hung
on him like bedsheets. His
face was gray. His hair stood up on the
back of his head from lying on
a pillow, and he was dwarfed as he sat
in my big striped armchair. He
looked about eighty years old.
We exchanged polite small talk. Rather,
I offered it, and he
absorbed it like a dry sponge. The man
who had played the victim for
the past few years was now actually
deserving of my pity.
I angled toward the hard part. The real
reason I needed to see him.
“Steve, I’m worried about what’s going
to happen should you . . . if
your condition takes a turn for the
worse,” I began.
He made a laughing sound, but without a
smile. “I should’ve
known you’d be thinking about money at
a time like this,” he said.
“That’s not fair,” I said. “We have two
children to support. It’s only
natural that I’d want to know how we’re
going to make this work
going forward.”
“You don’t need to worry, Kirsten. The
kids will be taken care of.”
“How? Do you have life insurance? Will
there be a trust?”
“I don’t have to discuss the details
with you. I love my kids, and I
wouldn’t leave them without resources.”
“It would just help me to know what the
plan is.”
“Look. I’m not dying. The doctor has
told me that, as long as I
continue with the chemo, I can live to
a ripe old age.”
“Well, that’s good news.” Also hard
to believe.
Suddenly his face crumpled, as mine had
in the Comcast office.
He put his head in his hands and
silently wept. It’s so hard to watch
a man cry.
“Are you in pain?” I asked.
“No,” he whispered. “I’m just scared.”
“But I thought you said you aren’t
dying?”
“Well, we never know, do we?”
“So what should I say to the kids?”
“It’s not really your place to say
anything, Kirsten. Isn’t that my
job?”
“But Amory has questions.”
“Then tell him to ask me.”
We sat like that for a few minutes in
silence, then Steve got up and
made his way to the front door. As he
turned to leave, I said, “Listen,
Steve.”
“Yeah?” His bony hands hung at his
sides, like a marionette’s. The
lines from his mouth to his jaw, like a
Charlie McCarthy puppet.
“I just want to say . . .” And now I
was fighting back tears too.
Again. “I’m just really sorry. I know
I’ve hurt you in the past, and I’m
sorry for any pain I’ve caused you.”
Justified or not, I had been the
cause of at least some of his suffering
since I’d ended the marriage.
He looked me in the eye. It was the
perfect moment for a mutual
absolution. I waited, hoping for his
apology too.
“Thanks,” he said. “I really appreciate
that.” Then he shuffled to
his car.
Her latest book is the paranormal memoir, The Ghost Marriage.
You can visit her website at www.kirstenmickelwait.com or connect with her on Twitter, Instagram, Goodreads and Facebook.
