In Your Dreams (Blue Heron #4)(33)

Em sighed.

Thus went dinner. Naomi would cough or hack at each wrong answer. Green salad? And what type of dressing would monsieur care for? (Hack.) No dressing? Very well. Grilled salmon? (Cough.) Make that haddock. Brussels sprouts (cough) no salt, no oil. No potatoes.

“I’ll have what he’s having.” Em sighed. It wouldn’t be fair to order the roasted duck with Gruyere bread pudding and butter-glazed asparagus. Forget the chocolate soufflé that was already calling to her from the dessert menu. Anyway, she’d gained a few pounds over the winter, and her jeans had been a little tight last time she’d worn them. That being said, the woman at the next table was cooing over something cheesy and delicious smelling. Em’s stomach rumbled.

Naomi came over and bent down to murmur to Kevin, her ass practically in Emmaline’s face. “Look around, Kev,” she said. “You wanna be like those heart attacks waiting to happen?”

Emmaline looked past Naomi’s perfect ass. Didn’t see anyone abnormal. Her eyes stopped on a middle-aged couple, normal enough in build. The server was bringing them dessert.

“One piece of cheesecake? Five hundred calories. Seventy grams of fat,” Naomi said. “Picture your heart, Kev, slimed up with that shit, the muscles pumping slower and slower, clogged with cheesecake.” Kevin stared as if hypnotized.

“That’s not really how it works,” Em murmured. They both ignored her.

“Champagne on the house,” the server said to the older couple. “Happy anniversary, and thank you for sharing it with us. How many years?”

“Twenty-five,” the woman answered, smiling. They were a nice-looking couple and clearly very happy together, holding hands, smiling.

“All those two have to do is get off their lard-asses and move and stop indulging themselves at every turn,” Naomi went on. “But no. They’re here instead, stuffing their fat faces—”

“Okay, thanks, Naomi! Nice seeing you,” Emmaline interrupted.

“She’s right, Em,” Kevin said.

“What’s life without cheesecake, though?” Em said with a smile. “Just once in a while, of course.”

“See, that’s the attitude that will keep you fat, Kevin. The attitude that will keep people staring at you, wondering why that lard-ass doesn’t look in the mirror once in a while and see how repulsive—”

“Stop,” Emmaline said. “Just... Naomi, Kevin and I are out to dinner, and I appreciate you helping him get healthy, but please. You’re just being cruel.”

“She’s being honest,” Kevin said hotly.

“Well, she’s also being mean and nasty and hateful!” she snapped. “Who wants to live the way she does, in the gym all day long, never able to enjoy a meal, drinking those disgusting shakes! I’d rather be like them over there!” Em pointed to the couple. “They don’t look like lard-asses to me!”

Whoops.

The restaurant had gone silent, and the anniversary couple sat frozen, the man with a forkful of cheesecake halfway to his mouth.

Naomi lifted an eyebrow and went back to her prison rations.

Kevin asked for the check. He didn’t speak to her in the car, even when she tried to make light of the night. When they got home, he went into their bedroom and closed the door. A second later, she heard his voice as he talked on the phone. “Hey, Naomi. It’s me.”

* * *

WHEN KEVIN HAD lost a hundred pounds, he asked to speak with Emmaline.

“I think we should break up,” he said calmly. “My life is taking a different direction, and I need to focus on that.” He didn’t meet her eyes.

“We’re getting married in two months,” she whispered.

Nothing she said made a difference. She tried not to cry and failed. Tried not to beg and failed there, too.

“You don’t support me,” he said, the accusation dripping like melted butter.

“I do support you,” she said. “You know I do.”

“No, you don’t. You keep talking about the old me.”

“I miss the old you! You were happier, Kevin! I’m not talking about being fat. You were funnier and happier and enjoyed everything more. Now all you do is go to the gym and count calories. That’s no life!”

“Naomi says—”

“Please! Not another one of Naomi’s famous quotes. Not when you’re breaking up with me!” She started to sob. “Kevin, I’ve loved you since I was thirteen.”

“You don’t know me.”

“How can you say that?”

“Em, you’ll never understand. I’m finally someone I like. I’m sorry you don’t, but Jesus! Don’t tell me to go back.”

“Can’t you be healthy and still be sweet, Kevin? Because you were the nicest, best person I ever—”

“Yeah. I had to be, so people wouldn’t hate me.”

“No one hated you, Kevin. No one hates a person for being overweight.”

He rolled his eyes. “Right. Look. I’m sorry, okay? But I can’t be the true me while I’m with you. You’re holding me back.”

She wiped her eyes with the back of her hand. “K-K-Kevin, p-p-please.”

The stutter bolted upright, a delighted rictus grin on its face.