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“I bummed this,” said Tommy. “You know I quit.”
“No, you’re always smoking.”
“Not always.” He handed it to her.
She took a drag and handed it back. She scuffed her foot against the fitted-together stones that made up the ground here.
“He’s not any kind of prize, you know. He went to Morgantown for college, apparently, but he dropped out, came back here, started working a string of crappy dead-end jobs, and—”
“He’s, like, the manager,” she said. “He’s my boss. It’s not dead-end. He gets benefits and shit.”
“That’s not the kind of guy I see you with.”
“What? You see me with some bass player in a band whose lead singer can’t stay on stage?” She was sharper than she should have been.
“I have a fucking degree. I’m going to use it eventually,” he muttered. “You know, there’s nothing us stopping being one of those couples you were talking about this morning. You handing me my coffee while I’m leaving the house in a suit and blowing kisses to your pregnant belly.”
“I’m not having children,” she muttered. “Like I’d pass this on.” She pointed at the wings.
He sighed. “It doesn’t show up for generations, so—”
“So, I’m passing it on to my great grandchildren?Ourgreat grandchildren in your little fantasy. I don’t think so.”
“Okay, well, whatever. We’re going to end up there. That’s where we end up. You just got to let me… I don’t know… get this part out.”
She snatched the cigarette from him, got up, smoked furiously. She was shaking.
He held out his hand.
She gave him back the cigarette. “You said to me that you were not monogamous and that you’d never be monogamous and that—”
“Are any men of any species actually monogamous? Like, in the wild, don’t the males of all species just instinctively—”
“You areincredible,” she said.
“It’s not… you and me, it’s different. I love you, Dahlia. I’min lovewith you.”
She shook her head. “Are you, though?”
“Yes,” he said, and his eyes were shining again, the way they had been before, and she had to look away, because she was feeling guilty again, a deep well of badness coming up from inside her.
“You know what? I believe you,” she said.
“Good, because it’s true. I love you, and you love me, and—”
“That’s the thing, I think…” She shifted on her feet. “I’m not sure if I do love you.”
“What?” Tommy got up. “You fuck this guy how many times—”
“I just think, maybe Iammonogamous. And I think if I am, I might not be able to love two people at the same time. And I’m not saying I’m in love with him. I don’t know him yet. So, maybe I’m not. But I’m starting to fall for him, and because of that, I’m falling out of love with you. Do you… do you get that?”
He sat back down on the swing, looking stunned.
She folded her arms over her chest. “I guess you don’t.”
“He’s not some kind of shining star. He’s older now, and he doesn’t make as much time as he used to, but he’s no poster boy for monogamy himself. I talked to Lucy, and she said he was a fuckboy with a capital F. She said there was a time when she was pretty sure he was just working his way through all the available girls in town. So, you know, maybe you just have a type.”
Her face twisted. He’d meant that to hurt. It had.
