Emergency Contact(17)

After that last run-in, he’d sent three unanswered texts before he’d been sufficiently humiliated. The first because he told himself he wasn’t the type of guy who slept with someone and ghosted. The next two because his stupid brain was gobsmacked and running on a flustered delay. Now boom: Liar on line one.

This is what she did. It was as if she knew the moment he was able to wake up without wanting to die and couldn’t abide by it.

Sam stared at the text.

Call me.


Three more hours of work to go before he could stew in the dark in his room.

What the hell was “Call me”?

Only sadists left that message.

Sadists and bullies. She might as well have written:

“Gnaw off your hand.”

Sam knew he was on the right side of history. Let the record show that she was the cheater. He was the spurned lover, the cuckold, the humiliated, the victim.

GTFO with your Call Me’s!

Not that he wasn’t tempted.

Sam sighed. Maybe if he called she’d tell him where she’d buried his balls and his heart.

People cheated on people every second of every day all over the world. It’s just that Sam couldn’t believe it had happened to him. By Lorraine no less. His Lorraine.

Jesus.

He’d entombed the event of their actual breakup so deep it’d been effectively redacted from memory. Sam leaned on the counter and retrieved the original file from 103 days ago.

That fateful morning she’d told him she wanted to go to the breakfast taco spot before work. The not-that-good spot on Manor that charged extra for pico de gallo.

Sam wondered if ordering a michelada with his eggs would be distasteful. He needed something to take the edge off after the night they’d had. They’d doubled-down on martinis after a week of fighting about money and Lorraine’s crazy work schedule. And while they both knew going out was a doomed enterprise, compounded by Sam’s desire to swing by his mom’s, they didn’t care.

That morning Lorraine’s hair was pulled into a bun. She appeared admirably refreshed, and Sam was grateful that no matter how much dysfunction there was at home, he could rely on his girlfriend to be there for him. He reached under the table to touch her knee when the chips arrived. He’d shoved a few in his mouth before she told him about some guy named Paul from her work.

It hadn’t meant anything.

Though it had been building up for some time.

It had happened more than once.

Sam reacted by yelling loud enough that parents eating nearby with their young children gave him the stink-eye.

Lorraine sat there stone-faced.

“Do you love him?”

“Do you love me?”

“Is it something I did?”

“What the hell’s the matter with you?”

“Did it feel good?”

“Better than me?!!!”

She wouldn’t tell him his last name. Or where he lived.

“I don’t love him,” she said.

“Why, then?” Sam implored. He was sobbing. Inconsolable. Lorraine, on the other hand, rarely ever cried, and turned cold whenever he did. Her expression hardened, as if his outpouring of emotion slaked any desire for her to feel anything.

In hindsight he was glad it wasn’t the good taco spot because it would have been ruined forever. Anyplace that charged seventy-five cents for condiments could burn in hell. On principle.

“This,” she whispered through clenched teeth. “This is the problem. Why does it have to be this way with us? Someone having a meltdown. Paul was . . . He was a distraction. I needed to get out of this. Us.”

“No,” he said. As if that would make the moment less real. Sam shook his head, mind stalled out at the denial stage of grief. “No. We love each other. We’ll always love each other. You’re a part of me.” He searched her face, uncomprehending. It felt crazy to him that she was even another person. Her arm may as well have been his arm. That his arm had the power to turn against the rest of his body and walk away made no sense. Sam felt something in his chest crack.

“We’re addicted to each other,” she said. “It’s not healthy. Paul’s boring—don’t get me wrong—but he has stability.”

Stability. Sam knew what that meant. Stability meant rich. Paul must have been rich. Rich in the same way she was. Rich like he’d never been and never would be. Sam reached for her just as she stood up, hesitated, and then walked out.

After that morning, he’d moved into House and they’d gone months without speaking or running into each other. Sam had made sure of it. He avoided their old haunts, telling no one where he lived, and he worked as many hours as Al had for him. It was while on a toothpaste run at Walgreens that she called his name from down the aisle. Sam couldn’t believe how companionable they still felt as they hung back in the parking lot. They made small talk, and no one brought up Paul. When she suggested they run to Polvo’s for a margarita, it seemed like a great idea. A pitcher of House Ritas later, it seemed an even better idea to take their trip down memory lane all the way back to her apartment. He hadn’t drunk a drop since. Twenty-seven days. Each one a feat.

When she disappeared again she became “LIAR” in his phone, and he tried to forget.

But with a text, a single directive, he felt the pinprick of the tiniest portal open in his heart. She had such beautiful skin. Especially her clavicles. Christ, and her elbows. He loved tracing his fingertips across the crest of bone on any part of her body.