8 #2
All of a sudden, the need to talk grabbed me.
It was so strong it almost pulled me out of my seat.
My mouth was opening. My ass coming up from the chair.
The first cigarette Ralph stole had lipstick on the filter, and after we smoked it, I checked my mouth in the mirror ten times.
Twenty. I was sure the lipstick was still there.
Sure it would give me away. I didn’t think about the smell of the smoke.
You can spend the night in the barn.
It’s good for him. Toughen him up.
The room tilted. The air was close. Too warm now. Sweat soaked the back of my shirt. Ed was looking at me, eyebrows slanted, and I waved a hand as I got to my feet and moved away from the circle.
Following the trampled line in the carpet like it was a magic path. Ralph played games like that. This is a magic forest. This is a magic castle. A line of scraggly pines maybe twenty feet long, with honeysuckle growing up around the edges.
Why are you wearing those fucking flowers in your hair?
I left the clubhouse, and the night met me like an indrawn breath, like something sucking me out into the cold. Quiet. Still. The stretch of parking lot, and the security lights like little stars.
Shivering, I paced a little, back and forth in front of the small office building.
That didn’t help so I wrapped my arms around myself.
My breath bloomed in front of me. It was good that the night was so quiet, and the only sound was my boots scuffing the asphalt, because inside my head it was red and bright and loud.
The buzz in my pocket jolted me out of—of whatever it was. Like being asleep, I guess. Like sleepwalking. My eyes watered with the cold. It was sharp in my nose. But it was like being awake again, looking around the empty lot, seeing it for the first time.
I took out my phone. Noah’s name flashed on the screen.
For a moment, I thought about dismissing the call. But it might be about the house. About a contractor we needed to negotiate with. A scheduling problem. It could be a million things, and none of them could wait.
“I was thinking about the living room,” Noah said as soon as I answered. “What about this: Christmas village?”
I waited, and when he didn’t say anything else, I asked, “What about it?”
“What do you think about that idea?”
“What idea?”
Noah made an exasperated sound. “What if the theme for the living room is ‘Christmas village’? Wouldn’t that be cute?”
I wasn’t sure why hearing his voice was grounding. Why it felt like I could just listen to him like this and feel all of that chaos drain out of me. Because he was familiar, maybe. Because this was all old hat, and I knew how to do it.
“No themes,” I said.
“Well, that’s ridiculous. Of course we’re doing themes.”
“No, we’re not. We’re doing simple. We’re doing easy. We’re doing fast.”
“That doesn’t mean we can’t do a theme!”
“No. Themes.”
“You don’t even have to do anything!”
“No.”
“I don’t understand why you’re being such a stick in the mud about this. Christmas village is going to be so cute!”
“Because the last time you tried to do a theme, it was underwater fucking bedroom, and you bought, like, fifteen water lights I was supposed to install, and every time we fucked it felt like we were humping on the Titanic!”
Silence.
You dumbass, I told myself. You big-mouthed dumbass.
Laughter erupted on Noah’s end of the call. “Oh my God, I forgot about underwater bedroom.”
“I don’t know how you could forget about it. You bought all those fucking koi.”
He laughed again. “Okay, but this won’t be like that, I promise.” And because he was Noah, and it never mattered what I said anyway, he added, “The theme for the kitchen is gingerbread.”
“Oh my fucking God.”
“Why aren’t you home? I want to show you the little houses I bought, and I’m standing on your porch, and I look super cute, and I’m freezing my ass off.”
My radar dinged at I look super cute, but I ignored it. That was the kind of thing Noah said to anyone, anywhere. It didn’t mean anything.
It took me a moment to answer his question. Even though we’d been together—been married. Even though he knew the worst of it, the way nobody else did, it was still hard to say out loud sometimes.
“A meeting,” I said.
A beat. And then, “Everything okay?”
“Yeah, you know. Just gotta keep going.”
“No, I meant…” He paused again. “You sounded off. When you answered.”
I toed the asphalt and tried to think of an answer. The best I could come up with was “Yeah.”
“Do you want to talk about it?”
And that was such a Noah thing too. Because he meant it.
If I wanted to talk, he’d listen. And he wouldn’t interrupt.
Wouldn’t ask questions. Wouldn’t judge. There had been a time—when I’d been at MagnaCare, and shortly after leaving—when it seemed like I couldn’t shut up.
The words just kept coming out. And Noah had always been there to listen.
On that little loveseat in his apartment, his feet tucked under him, a pink chenille throw across his lap.
Or sitting on the floor, legs crossed, looking up at me.
Or in the kitchen, with a pot of tea steaming the air between us.
He’d put his hand on top of mine, and it had been so long since someone had touched me.
So long since someone had wanted to touch me.
And that night, when he walked me to the door, I kissed him.
A part of me was still stumbling around in surprise about that.
Still wondering why he hadn’t thrown my ass out the door. Wondering why he’d kissed me back.
Another ding on my radar. Because this—all of this—was exactly what had gotten us into this mess in the first place.
I cleared my throat. “No, I just meant, yeah, I’m fine.”
He didn’t say anything. I could hear his disbelief.
“We’re almost done here,” I said. “I can be back in half an hour or so if you want to wait inside.”
More of that silence. “Do you want me to wait?”
Ding, ding, ding.
“Whatever you want.”
When Noah spoke again, something had changed in his voice. “Well, I can’t come by tomorrow because I’ve got something.”
And if I needed proof that I never stopped being a jackass, I said, “What?”
I heard the tone as soon as the word left my mouth: a shadow of the cop voice—demanding, authoritative, on the edge of belligerent. Or maybe accusatory.
“Oh my God,” Noah said, and he sounded pleased as fucking punch. And then he laughed. “It’s not a date.”
“I didn’t say it was a date.”
But now the tone was teenagerish, and way too defensive.
“Oh my God,” Noah breathed again.
“Never mind. I don’t fucking care. Do whatever you want.”
“Stop being a baby. My family is making gingerbread houses at the Acadia—the hotel offers a workshop every year, and of course my mom insisted.”
“Doesn’t sound terrible.”
“I’d rather watch you stuff things in holes.”
A laugh broke out of me.
He made a noise that sounded smug and, if I were quoting my grandma, way too big for his britches.
But then the silence caved in beneath us, and off in the distance a storm door rattled shut, and I could hear Noah breathing.
It was like the nights he’d come home from a shift, and I’d wake up just enough to know he was there. To hear familiar breaths in the dark.
“I’m going to go,” Noah said.
“’kay.”
“Unless—” He stopped again. “Howie, you know if you ever need to talk to someone…”
He let the offer trail off.
“Yeah,” I said.
He waited. And then he said, “Goodnight.”
I stood there for a few more minutes. Then I started for the truck. I’d gone a few yards before I realized it had started to snow.