Along Came Trouble(9)

“‘Insane’ is a strong word,” she said. “And I’m almost always nice.”

“You’re always nice to me and Henry, but you’re basically a bitch for a living.”

“That’s different. That’s professional bitchiness, and I get paid good money for it.” Entertainment law rewarded bitchiness, especially when you were an advocate for artists who lacked any real power over the giant corporations that exploited them.

“Speaking of which, when are you going to look at that contract I sent you?”

“Soon. Henry woke up early, and I didn’t get through it this morning.”

“Where is he?”

“With his grandma.”

She finished up with the socks and began folding Henry’s T-shirts. There were no shorts or pants in the basket, because on Monday he’d flat-out refused to wear pants, and by this morning pantslessness had become the new reality. She’d put him in Maureen’s car wearing a tank top, a diaper, and a pair of sandals. As far as she knew, there were no obscenity laws governing what two-year-olds wore.

Jamie rubbed his face. “It’s only Wednesday, isn’t it? She’s early.”

Maureen usually had Henry from Thursday afternoon through Saturday morning, a sort of substitute custody, since her son wasn’t allowed to co-parent. “Yeah, but she offered to take him to the zoo in Columbus today. She said it was ‘because of all the stress.’ I’m pretty sure that’s code for ‘because of what your brother did.’”

“No way. Maureen likes me.”

“Whatever you say.”

“I’m eminently likable.”

“You know who really seemed to like you?” she asked. “Carly. Maybe you ought to give her a call.”

Jamie’s sunny expression dimmed. “Fair warning, if you’re going to make me talk about Carly again, we’ll be talking about your love life, too.”

“I don’t have a love life.”

“Exactly.”

Ellen ignored the jab, as well as the way the words love life had catapulted Caleb Clark’s face into her brain again. That smirk. Those happy brown eyes. “See, the key difference between your love life and mine is that you’re making a big mistake, which makes yours worth discussing—”

“There’s nothing new to discuss.”

“—whereas I’ve mastered the art of not making mistakes.”

“You haven’t mastered anything. You’re just refusing to play the game at all.”

“Who’s refusing? It’s not as if men are lining up to worship me.” She stacked a neat pile of tiny T-shirts in the basket and moved on to the towels.

The truth was, she didn’t have room in her life for a man—didn’t have room in her life for a life, really. On the days when Maureen took care of Henry, Ellen took care of her clients. The rest of the week, she had to mother and clean, cook and organize, fitting her income-producing activities in at the margins.

“If they were beating down your door with bouquets, you’d still give them the boot. You’re totally closed off, Ellen. All work and no play.”

“I play with Henry. And quit trying to distract me by taking the offensive. You have something good going with Carly. You should be here trying to fix it.”

He huffed an exhale, a resigned sound. “You know she told me to take a hike.”

“So? She probably didn’t mean it. Carly is impetuous. That’s one of the reasons you love her.”

“Nobody said anything about love.”

“I did. I’m saying it.”

“It was a fling. Now it’s over.”

Ellen didn’t believe him. She’d never had a meaningless fling, but she’d been watching Jamie have them since puberty, and she knew what they looked like. His affair with Carly was different. He didn’t see it, but that was only because he was kind of an idiot.

“I don’t buy that.”

“You should. Carly doesn’t love me. She thought I was cute, and now she thinks I’m a hassle. But if you’re seeing love everywhere you look, maybe you’ve got more romance left in you than I thought.”

“No, don’t worry, I had my romance gland removed.”

More like assassinated. Marriage to an adulterous alcoholic poet would do that to you. On the plus side, it turned out to be full of useful life lessons. Downsides of Codependency 101. By the time Ellen had filed for divorce, she’d been more than ready to try her hand at self-reliance. Her life was finally hers, and that was the way she liked it.