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“Sophie, you look a bit green,” Neil said.
“Trust me, if you’d just seen the metaphor I saw in my head, you would, too.” I shook it off. “This isn’t something you can help me with. I guess I need to find some…trophy wife support group or something.”
“I believe those are called Pilates classes,” he said with a snarky smile. I gave him a little push. If anything could put me at ease, it was humor, especially his. And while I didn’t feel instantly all better—and this problem was far from solved—he’d at least alleviated some of the ick for tonight.
****
El-Mudad had told us not to wait up for him, but I was surprised that he wasn’t back by the time Neil and I went to bed at midnight. When I woke at around two-thirty to pee and he wasn’t in bed with us, I wandered through the apartment to see if I could find him. I held my breath as I walked down the hall; I hated being near Emma’s room, but blue light flickered from within the home theater.
The penthouse boasted a miniature movie-theater with a state-of-the-art projection television and red velvet upholstered seats that surrounded a large bed made up with a matching red-velvet cover. Neil had built it for Emma to have sleepovers with her friends, but we’d put it to a much different use in past years.
El-Mudad sat in the front row of seats; they were positioned six-across, and he’d taken one directly in the center. The Transporter played on the screen.
“Hey,” I said quietly as I entered, finishing the knot on my robe belt. “You’re up early.”
He startled then relaxed. “I wasn’t expecting anyone to be awake.”
“Not sleepy?” I didn’t want to ask him what time he got in. I didn’t want to sound like a jealous girlfriend.
“I helped myself to dinner.” He lifted up one of the aluminum pans the caterer had left behind.
I took a seat beside him. “I thought the salad was good.”
“Did the evening not go as planned?” he asked, setting aside the pan, again, and looping an arm around me.
“I suppose it could have gone worse.” And it could have. “Everyone could have died from poisoned leek soup.”
He made a grim noise. “I’m sorry it didn’t go as you’d hoped.”
I shrugged. “What about your night?”
“Lovely. I haven’t seen Grace for years.” He watched my face carefully. “I didn’t fuck her.”
“I know you didn’t. I trust you.” And I did. Neil and I both did. But for some reason, we’d been a bit jealous. “How do you know her?”
“She used to date my wife. It was nice to catch up with her. Compare battle wounds,” he said, still sounding defeated over the subject.
Two reactions warred within me: sadness that he’d been through such a painful experience, irrational jealousy that a new romance with us wasn’t enough to heal him. I forced the second one away.
I leaned my head on his shoulder. “Neil was divorced. Have you talked to him about it?”
“No. I knew he was divorced, but…” El-Mudad paused. “You never want to hear about your partner’s ex, do you?”
“Good point.”
“Sophie…” he began softly. “Did you make a decision? Or did tonight end things?”
Was that trepidation I heard in his voice? “I made a decision. There was just some friction. I haven’t told them, yet.”
He didn’t say anything but nodded and pretended to be interested in the movie, again.
“Did you want to know what I decided?” I prompted.
He shifted uneasily. “Only if you’re comfortable telling me.”
“I’m going to do it.”
“Ah.”
I didn’t like tense silences. I sat up to face him fully. “You don’t want me to?”
“The choice isn’t up to me,” he said, trying too hard to sound detached. “It’s up to you, and Neil. I won’t overstep my bounds.”
“You’re not overstepping anything,” I argued. “If you’re going to be our boyfriend, you’re going to be our boyfriend. You’re allowed to have an opinion, just like I’m allowed to ignore it.”
He sighed and spoke reluctantly. “I worry about you. The surgery. The risk. Not just because if something went wrong, if Neil lost you…” El-Mudad looked down at his hands, which lay helplessly open on his spread knees. “But because I couldn’t stand to lose you, either.”
My heart stuttered. “You won’t lose me. It’s a very common, very safe surgery.”
“So is gallbladder surgery. But that’s how my mother died,” he said quietly.
“I didn’t know.” That didn’t stop me from feeling guilty. Because even though it would bother him, I wasn’t going to change my mind. “How old were you?”
He waved a hand. “Twenty-four. I was an adult, not a small child.”
Why did we need permission to let our grief be important to us? It was something I still struggled with after Emma and Michael. My father’s death had reopened some of those wounds, especially since I wasn’t sure if I was even allowed to grieve him, when I should be angry enough to not care that he’d died.
