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He picks up a Syrah, studies the front, then sets it down with a dismissive wave. “Boring.”
He reaches for a Merlot next, clucks his tongue, then taps the front. “Yep. This is the one. Perfect new wine. Theresa will love it.”
I furrow my brow. “How do you know?”
“Because it has ducks sword-fighting on the label.”
“That’s how you pick wine for your wife?”
He shoots me a duh look. “How else would I do it?”
Fair point. I wouldn’t know. I don’t have a wife to buy wine for. Or even a girlfriend, since I fucked that up.
“Theresa has a theory—the more interesting the illustration, the better the wine.”
“And how does that theory hold up?”
“So far it’s been on the mark. She contends that winemakers who spend time on clever labels also spend time on the vino. Ergo, the pick-by-drawing method.”
I peer at the jousting water fowl, and of course it makes me think of Ruby and all the funky things she draws.
But everything makes me think of Ruby. How could I think of anything but her? The woman I said goodbye to two days ago. The woman who went to bed alone in a hotel room I intended for the two of us. The woman I can’t get out of my head.
Instead, I’m with Max, helping him shop for a dinner he’s going to be making for his wife.
It’s so fucking domestic.
And incredibly cool. My buddy, the guy I’ve known for years, loves to do simple things like this for his woman, the mother of his child.
We head to the checkout. He buys the wine, then we leave the shop and walk along Ocean Avenue.
As the early evening sun warms my face, he turns to me. “So, you want to know what to do next with Ruby?”
“Yes. Yes, I do. Was it always perfect with Theresa? You must have hit a rough patch at some point, right?”
He laughs, but it’s not at me—it’s with me. “No, Jesse. I am the only man in the history of the world who has never pissed off his wife.”
“Lucky bastard,” I mutter.
“Of course we hit rough patches. In the early days, her grandmother wasn’t thrilled about her dating a guy who wasn’t Korean, and Theresa refused to get engaged without her halmoni’s permission. We bickered about that for a few months before Grandma finally got on board. And we struggled when we were trying to get pregnant too. Theresa was emotional and depressed, and so was I. Neither one of us knew what to say to the other for a while. Hard patches are hard. But they’re also normal.”
“So what do you do?”
“Talk it out,” he says. “But . . .”
“But what?” I ask, agitation whipping through me. I have a feeling he’s going to say talking won’t work for me.
“I’m not sure that’ll work for you.”
Yup. Sometimes, knowing your friends this well sucks. “And why’s that? Why can’t I talk to her? Or, I don’t know, show up on her doorstep with ten thousand flowers? Or hold a boombox over my head outside her window?”
But even as I list all those options, they sound wrong.
So un-Ruby.
Max arches a brow. “You don’t have to throw a parade or buy out a flower shop for her. There’s a place for the grand gesture, but this isn’t it.”
My shoulders sag.
“Hate to break it to you,” he adds with a sigh, “but sometimes you just have to bide your time. Give your woman space. I think that’s what has to happen here, bro.”
I grit my teeth and clench my jaw as we stop at the light. “I’m in love with her, Max. And I fucked it up. But this can’t be the end. I want to prove to her that I can be what she needs.”
“But you already said your piece. You explained why you did what you did. You apologized. And she said she needed space. Judging from the times I’ve met her, Ruby seems like a straightforward, honest person. I don’t think she said that so you’d do the opposite, Jesse. I think she said it because she actually needs space.”
I hate this advice.
I hate that I can’t solve this problem by doing something. Can’t fix it with a wrench, or a new set of tires.
All I can do is wait, and that’s not in my nature. “How the hell am I just supposed to . . . sit here? Doing nothing?”
Max is quiet for a beat. “Isn’t that what you did with the list?”
The words cut me to the core with their unadulterated truth.
He’s dead right. I waited with the list.
I waited two long years. I waited until she was ready.
Maybe that’s exactly what I should be doing now.
But first I have to talk to her, one more time. I have to let her know that I’ll wait for her as long as she needs me to.
