Fix You

Here’s a lesson for all of you fellow women out there: when the guy you’re with cooks you dinner, your relationship is either going to get a thousand times better, or a thousand times worse. Maybe he has a romantic night planned, or maybe he's off to join the army and you'll never see him again. Maybe he’s going to propose, or maybe he’s going to tell you that he ran over your dog.

Nevertheless, when he’s cooking you dinner, especially if he’s a hockey-playing idiot you somehow fell in love with, something life-altering is about to happen to the both of you.

I mean, I should know. It’s happened to me before.



Here’s the story. It was sometime in the summer of 2010 – late June, early July, whenever, I can’t remember the exact date. I came home from another boring day at the office to the smell of something… I guess it kind of smelled like food.

“Kris?” I called as I shut the door behind me. “Kris, what is…”

I put my bag on the table near the door and walked into my apartment. I figured it was Kris. It had to be Kris. He was the only person with the key to my apartment, and probably the only person I knew who could fuck up cooking something as simple as cereal.

I turned and walked into the kitchen, and low and behold, there he was. He was quite the sight, standing nervously in the kitchen. He was in a grey Stanley Cup Chicago Blackhawks shirt, of course, and athletic shorts. He turned around, completely shocked when he saw me. There was a frying pan in his hand.

“Kris, my dear, what are you doing?” I couldn’t help but giggle, walking over to him and wrapping my arms around him.

“I thought… I thought you were… I wasn’t expecting you until five,” he stammered, turning a bit pink.

I started laughing. “My boss let me off a little early,” I smiled, pecking his lips. “Now, what is going on? Why are you cooking? Has somebody died?”

“No,” he smiled a little. “Nobody’s dead, I don’t think. I wanted to… wanted to cook you dinner.”

I rested my head on his shoulder, staring at the counter by the oven. “Hamburger Helper macaroni and cheese,” I giggled, picking up the box. “My favorite.”

“Shut up, I can’t cook, you know that,” he told me.

“Which is why I am confused as to why you want to make me dinner,” I told him, putting the box down and pulling away from his embrace. “May I ask why you’re holding a frying pan?”

“Don’t you cook mac and cheese in a frying pan or something?” Kris asked me, deadly serious.

I started laughing. “No, babe. I think you need some assistance. Let me help you.”

“Ella – ”

“Don’t you ‘Ella’ me, Kris Versteeg,” I said, poking his chest. “I love you, but I don’t want my apartment to burn down.”

He sighed. “Fine, okay. You can help.”

I laughed a little, taking the frying pan and putting it back in the cupboard where it belonged, getting out a pot instead. “This,” I told him, handing it to him. “This is what you use to make mac and cheese.”

He smiled shyly, glancing down at the ground. “Hey. You get an A for effort,” I told him, kissing him softly. “You’ll get it eventually.”

We spent the next fifteen minutes cooking mac and cheese together. I showed Kris that when you bought food that came in boxes, it usually had the recipe on how to cook it on the back, which meant that he could now survive if he ever had to live broke and alone for the rest of his life. Then we followed the directions and made some damn good hamburger mac and cheese.

“Okay, okay. You stay in here because I haven’t done the stuff in the dining room I was supposed to do before you got here,” he told me, kissing me again before scurrying off into the other room.

“Please don’t break anything,” I called after him with a giggle, before turning to the cupboards again and dishing out some mac and cheese into two bowls. I smiled a little. At least he knew what kind of foods I liked that were easy to make.

Three minutes later, he came back into the room, grabbing the serving bowl of mac and cheese and making a motion to follow him into the dining room. Oh, God. I didn’t know what I was expecting, but I grabbed our bowls and followed him anyway.

The whole dining room was dark, but Kris had lit candles in the middle of the table, in between a bottle of red wine. The nice tablecloth was being put to use, as well, which made me smile. He had opened the curtains so we could see the city skyline in the distance – Chicago, my one and only home.

“Kris, what the hell?” I asked him. “This is so great… are you sure nobody’s dead?”

He laughed as we put the bowls down on the table and he pulled out the chair for me. “Nobody’s dead, I promise,” he assured me. “But I have something I gotta tell you.”

Oh, God. This isn’t good. He wants to marry me. Wait, I’m too young. Marrying a hockey player? My dad would be delighted, but my mom, on the other hand…

Maybe it’s something even worse. Fuck. What if he has some sort of life-threatening condition? What if he never plays hockey again? What if he has cancer?

We sat there for a minute, eating in complete silence. My brain was going at a thousand miles per hour. Something he wants to tell me? What’s so important that he has to do all of this to prepare me for his announcement? What if he found another girl? What if he’s broke? What if he crashed his car? What if he has to move in with me? Well, I guess the latter wouldn’t be that bad…

“Ella.”

“Huh?”

“I asked you a question,” he smiled at me.

“Oh, uh… what was the question?” I asked, probably looking like a dumbass.

“If you wanted some wine.” He held the bottle up. Oh. Of course.

I nodded a little, watching as he poured some into the glass. It was my favorite. Something had to be up… something absolutely had to be up. I couldn’t help it – I started thinking the worst again, just as I usually did in these situations.

I was pulled away from my thoughts when Kris said my name again. “Ella.”

“What? Oh, sorry,” I murmured, glancing down at the table. “Just thinking.”

“Are you okay?” Kris asked me, reaching over the table to grab my hand, stroking his thumb over my fingers. Just his touch made me feel a bit better.

“Kris, what’s wrong?” I asked him. “Why did you do all of this? What happened? What do you need to tell me that involves you making me dinner, and lighting candles, and using the good tablecloth, and – ”

“Ella,” he smiled a little bit. “Calm down. This is going to be okay, I think you might even like this news.”

“What is it, then?” I asked him after a second of silence.

He sighed, grabbing my other hand and staring at me for a moment. “Ella,” he said quietly.

“Yes?” I said, urging him to go on.

“Well…” He sighed, and put a little smile on his face.

Here it comes. He’s gonna drop the bomb. I held my breath and watched as he opened my mouth and said these six little words that changed my life forever.

“Ella, I got traded. To Toronto.”