F*ck Marriage(17)

I’m bubbling on the inside, and not in the good full-of-joy way; all of my negative emotions are at a boil. I’m a pot of anger, resentment, jealousy, and bitterness, and I’m coming precariously close to all of those things boiling over the top, burning anyone near. He follows me out of the elevator and onto the street. We emerge into rush hour like two toddlers, teetering and dodging the stream of stony-faced New Yorkers. Somehow, we’re headed in the same direction even though I know Pearl and Woods share an apartment five blocks heading the other way.

“Where are you going?” I ask suspiciously. I don’t want to talk to him, but no matter how fast I walk he’s keeping up. At this rate, I’m going to have to run out into traffic to lose him.

“I’m walking you home,” he says.

I stop in the middle of the sidewalk and someone slams into my right shoulder.

“You’ve never walked me home. Not even when we were married.”

“Well, I should have,” he says. He says it with so much conviction I blink at him, shocked.

“What?” I say this dumbly, like my mouth and brain are stuffed with cotton.

“I should have walked you home. And I should have paid more attention to what you loved, not what I thought you should love. And I should have treated you like you needed protecting even if you didn’t.”

I look around trying to discern if I’m dreaming or if this is really happening. To my left is a Subway restaurant and across the street is an Urban Outfitters; neither of these things would ever make it into my dreams.

Woods’ face is undeniably sincere. He has a sincere face, I remind myself. It’s not necessarily that he’s being sincere. Woods is a golden retriever; even if a golden retriever has rabies you’d be tempted to reach out and pet it because—hellooo—golden retriever. My boil calms to a simmer. I let him walk me home. We don’t speak much because it’s hard to have a serious conversation when you’re walking through the mass noise of New York. When we arrive outside of Jules’ building, he bends down to give me a kiss on the cheek, and then he just walks away.

I swipe at my cheek every few minutes, but the spot he kissed stings for over an hour. I call Jules, who answers on the third ring, her voice sleepy.

“Sup?” she slurs.

I can hear her checking the time. She’s only a few hours ahead, but in college we called her the nap queen.

“Jules,” I say. And it’s all I have to say. She knows.

“Fuck Woods,” she says before I can get anything else out. “Fuck him to hell and back.”

That isn’t a bad idea. Woods was a good fuck. I don’t say this out loud—she’d freak out on me. I keep my lips shut against sexual confessions and wait for her rant to be over. As soon as she’s finished, I launch into my story and tell her what’s been happening at Rhubarb: Pearl, Diane ... and then eventually my walk home with Woods.

“Whatever, Billie,” she says. “You’re back and he’s kicking himself for ever leaving. Don’t get sucked into his dangerous remorse. I’d like to tell him off for walking you home. So slimy.”

I smile into the receiver. A man walking a woman home is slimy now.

“It’s harder than I thought. I still feel things.”

“Of course you do…” Her tone is softer this time. And I marvel at her ability to always make me feel validated. “Unless there are no feelings, you can’t just jump back into your ex’s life. That’s nuts.”

I agree about how nuts it is while quietly squirming on my end of the line. Maybe it was a stupid idea to take the job. I didn’t really think it over before I accepted Satcher’s proposal. The idea of being that close to Woods and Pearl was too enticing. A train wreck you couldn’t look away from, except I wanted to be on the train.

“It was stupid,” I say. “But I needed the job…” My voice wavers on the last part. In truth, I could have found a job somewhere else. I probably should have found a job somewhere else.

“How does Satcher seem?” she asks. Her question is odd. Satcher seems like ... Satcher.

“Fine. I mean, he’s Satcher. He had his shit together when he was in diapers.”

She laughs. We’ve all been fringe friends since college. Jules is my best friend and Satcher is Woods’. There has been a lot of social crossover over the years, though the two of them were never particularly close.

“He seems fine,” I assure her. “He likes to come to my office to gossip about Pearl.”

She laughs, but then she has to go. We hang up and I feel better right away. I touch the spot on my cheek where Woods kissed me. I don’t feel anything. Perfect.





Chapter Ten





It’s the last week of our fall-to-Christmas catalog, which means everyone is under a deadline to present at least four holiday post ideas as well as the photos that will accompany them for our winter spread. They don’t have to be entirely done, but the ideas need to be there and be fairly cohesive with our theme. During weeks like this everyone stays late working overtime, so I’m surprised when Pearl comes into the office and announces she’s leaving early.

“Early?” I say without looking up from what I’m doing.

Satcher, who is standing by my desk waiting for me to finish up signing some papers, asks the inevitable follow-up question.