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Cory insisted on paying for everything—the household bills, groceries, nights out. Every now and then I’d offer to pitch in—no more than temperature-taking, looking for cracks in his generosity. But the reality was that it was easier for him to control me if he controlled the money.
I needed to flip that narrative.
We were at yet another bar with Nate when I saw an opportunity. We’d been there for several hours when Cory signaled he was finally ready to go home. He pulled his card from his wallet and handed it to me. “Pay while I use the restroom. Sign my name and tip $10.”
The mirror behind the bar was edged with Valentine’s Day hearts. In it, I watched Nate lean closer to a woman seated to my right, reaching out to twirl a piece of her hair.
“I have a boyfriend,” she said, pulling away.
“Let me get you another drink,” he said. “Just as friends.” He signaled the bartender for another round.
As the bartender passed me, I handed him Cory’s card. “Close it out for us please?” I asked.
I stared at the doorway leading to the men’s room, silently urging the bartender to hurry. When he returned, he placed two beers in front of Nate and his friend, then handed me Cory’s card and receipt.
I signed with a flourish and fit the card in my palm, waiting.
“I’m not going to drink that,” the woman next to me said.
“I’ll bet I can change your mind,” Nate responded.
“No means no,” I muttered under my breath, leaning my forearms on the bar and positioning my elbow a few inches away from her full beer.
When I saw Cory approaching, I let my elbow kick out as I turned to greet him, knocking the full glass over and spilling beer down the woman’s back, using the chaos to slide the card into my back pocket.
“I’m so sorry,” I said to her, reaching for some napkins.
“Jesus, Meg.” Cory snatched them out of my hand and quickly mopped up the mess, people shuffling their stools away from the large puddle now dripping onto the floor.
I slipped into my coat as the bartender took over, wiping the rest of the beer up with a bar towel.
“Let me drive you home,” Nate said to the woman.
“That’s okay,” she said, holding her arms stiffly at her sides. “I’ve got my car.”
“I’m really sorry,” I said again to her, then offered Nate a tiny shrug. Tough luck.
As we walked toward the door, Nate called after us, “Don’t forget to give Cory his card back, Meg.”
I glanced over my shoulder. Nate stared back at me, his eyes narrowed, waiting.
I reached into my pocket and handed the card back to Cory as cold air from outside blasted into my face. Through the window I could see Nate, alone at the bar, a fresh drink in front of him.
That plan was bound to fail—if not in the moment, then in the days following. Cory would have asked for his card back eventually, and I would have had to give it to him. But the night was still a success because it showed me that I couldn’t steal what I wanted. Like the laptop, I needed to figure out a way for Cory to give it to me willingly.
***
The next morning Cory announced he was making a grocery run after his staff meeting that afternoon, and asked me to put a list together and text it to him by the end of the day. When he arrived home that night, he was short-tempered and exhausted. “The market was a mess,” he said, putting the bags on the counter.
I kissed his cheek and said, “Take a hot shower and change your clothes. I can deal with the groceries.”
“The staff meeting was a shit show,” he continued, as if I hadn’t spoken. “My math department chair is completely useless, and we lost out on a major grant opportunity because he forgot to submit the paperwork.”
I pulled a cold beer out of the fridge and handed it to him, “Go. Relax. Dinner will be ready in thirty minutes.”
As I put the groceries away—fair trade organic coffee, grass-fed organic milk, and two filet mignon steaks that cost $12 each—my mind tallied up what this midweek trip must have cost. Two hundred dollars perhaps? That was about what my mother and I would have spent on food in a month.
I seasoned the steaks and popped them into the broiler. Then I threw together some romaine lettuce, a couple red peppers, carrots, and cucumbers—all organic, of course—for a salad while the steaks cooked. By the time Cory returned in sweatpants and wet hair from the shower, I’d set the table, lit the candles the way he liked, and poured the wine.
