The Man I Love (The Fish Tales, #1)(116)

Erik nodded while his insides squirmed. She was right, of course. Will had zero reason to be so amiable.

“He’s got a big heart,” Erik said.

“What’s all this ‘suck my cock’ stuff?”

“It’s… Never mind, I couldn’t even begin to explain.”

She folded the paper neatly and slid it back to him. “How many questions?”

He grinned at her. “I’m in a good mood. You may ask unlimited questions.”

“Are you going to call him?”

“Will?”

She nodded. “Or at least write and let him know you got it?”

His good mood wobbled on its axis. Again, she was right. He should at least let Will know. And it made him feel cornered.

“I’ll let him know I got it but…I don’t know how much more I can do, Mel.”

Melanie tilted her head, studying him for a long moment. The silence pulled out like strings of taffy, reminding Erik of early sessions with Diane Erskine. How the quiet would coil around him like a boa constrictor, squeezing words out of him from sheer desperation. The surprise benefit, all these years later, was awkward silence didn’t bother him. He could sit easily in it. Far longer than Melanie could. She always caved first.

“Baby,” she said, sighing. “Everything about Lancaster makes you go so far away from me. You get a look in your eye, like…you are somewhere you just can’t come back from.”

“It is hard to come back from there,” he said. “Which is why I don’t like going in the first place.”

“I know. I just try to demystify it by throwing questions at it.”

“You do? Really?”

She smiled, put a hand out on the table and Erik dropped his onto it. “I can’t deal with it, Mel. I admit it. If I call him, then it’s just too close a proximity to Daisy and I have no desire to get caught up in it again.”

“Caught up in what? What did she do to you?” Melanie shook her head. “I mean, I know what she did. But it’s like…you never got over it. You just left it.”

“Honey, I spent a lot of time and a lot of money getting over it.”

“Over the shooting or over her?” Her fingers stroked his wrist, close to the tattoo of the daisy. It was a gesture to soothe him. Instead he felt the bristling desperation of a trapped animal. He took a long drink, willing himself to relax. He was being ridiculous. She wasn’t trying to trap him or trick him. She was his wife. They were having a conversation.

“Over all of it,” he said. “It was all one thing.”

“It still seems so unfinished.”

“It just is what it is.”

She took her hand away, rolling her eyes. “I hate that expression.”

“Sometimes it makes the point beautifully.”

“I just find it incredible how you could completely shut down this part of your life.”

He spread out his hands. “I plead the Fifth.”

“You don’t have many male friends, do you?”

The swift subject change threw him. “What are you… Come on, I have plenty of friends.”

“Who’s your best friend?”

He smiled at her. “You.”

“Thank you, but who’s your closest male friend?

“Miles, I guess.”

“You guess? Come on, if we had had a big wedding, who would have been your best man?”

“My brother. I wanted him at our little wedding but he was having surgery.”

Elbow on the table, Melanie slid her jaw along her palm, the other hand’s fingernails tapping on the tabletop.

“What?” Erik said, sighing.

“I’m just looking at my handsome husband.”

“You’re tapping your nails and analyzing your neurotic husband. Stop. I can pay to be analyzed if I want it.”

Her nails stilled. “It’s a puzzling side of you, my love.”

“Oh now I’m a box. Well, there are five other sides to me, hopefully you like those.”

“I like all of you, I just…”

“What?”

“Nothing.” She stood up and went over to the refrigerator. “I am so glad you got your necklace back. Are you happy?”

He held it up, gazing at the charms. “I don’t have a word for what I am right now.”

“You’ll take it in to be fixed?”

“Tomorrow. I’ll take our wedding bands in to be polished, too, if you want.”

Her head popped over the open fridge door. “I can defrost some chicken? Or we can get Chinese and chill out?”

“Perfect.”

“Are you all right?”

“I’m fine. Are you done asking me questions?”

She stared him down. “Do you want pork or vegetable lo mein?”



*



Though he wasn’t outwardly curt or moody with his wife that evening, Erik was all anxious brooding within. He kept catching himself whistling bars of “The Man I Love,” which was annoying. So was the hydra in his gut, rearing a thousand emotional heads, hissing and biting at him.

He felt guilt for not attending the ceremony, then justified because he didn’t know about it. Then he was insulted at not being informed, and regretted cutting himself off to the point of exclusion. On the heels of regret came relief he avoided seeing Daisy, or worse, seeing her being awful sweet on John. David was an unquestionably dodged bullet. Then again, Erik could have seen Will—another helping of guilt. But Will was in a professional collaboration with Daisy now.