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“I’m the only one home. Robbie is here, and you weren’t answering.”
“Robbie. That you met?” She has to be mistaken. He would never come here.
“Yes, the one I met. Your friend from college. He looks upset.”
“He always looks upset.” I grouse, walking to get my towel and water from the corner. I reach down to grab the bottle and come to my fucking senses and the nasty sight of my own mottled, wrinkled, broken skin.Fuck.
I suck on my teeth and turn back to her slowly. She almost jumps, turning to leave, but I call out to stop her.
“Eleanna. I was burned as a child. By the worthless parents that dumped me at a fire station. That’s the short, pathetic story, and now you know it.” I walk up to her and stretch myself as tall as I can to stare down at her with all the fury I’m holding in. “Do not. Come back here. Again.”
She nods, yet another batch of tears pooling in her eyes. They take my rage to new levels.
I make my way out to Robbie in the foyer. Sure enough, Robbie does look more twitchy and nervous than usual. My day just went from bad to worse. “Robbie, my man! What a surprise!” I play pretend so my wife doesn’t realize how close Robbie and I really are.
“Sorry to interrupt,” he says quietly.
“Not at all,” I motion for him to follow me back to my office.
“Smells amazing in here,” he says as we walk. I don’t reply in case my lovely little wife can hear us. Behind multiple closed doors, tucked away in my office, both of us relax. Well, as much as we can, given the situation.
“So? Who died?”
“No one yet, but I’m positive thatmy cousin has an ulcer.” One of us has a leak.
“Your cousin in New York?”
“Here. In Austin.”There is a leak somewhere here.
“Here in Texas? How is that possible when he, uh, doesn’t eat acidic foods.”I don’t have any support staff here.
“That’s the question. Hey, how’s your driver, Ric?”
“Perfect health, except he’s almost deaf.”Loyal to me and I never speak freely in front of him anyway.
“And your new wife?” He looks at my exposed arms as he asks the question.
“Madly in love with me, just having trouble with her contact lenses.”Loyal and hasn’t seen anything.
“Madly in love with you?”
“I’m fucking dying here.” I drop the pretenses. “You don’t even know. My house is overrun. Candles, throw blankets, lamps—why the fuck do we need so many lamps? Red vases, red pillows, so much red in my house now. But it also…goes, somehow? Like everything was bland beforehand which is annoying. My house was fine! Music is playing sometimes, she is always baking. Always, man. Breads, cakes, cookies, all perfect with—“
“Coffee.” He grins.
“I still blame you for that! Coffee everywhere. Always my favorite variety. Is she pumping beans into the AC, because how does it smell like coffee in my bathroom, Rob? My fucking bathroom! And the texting. I told her only emergencies? Apparently, what’s for dinner is an emergency. When it’ll be served is an emergency. Every damn night. And she changed the menus. All the food is better. She makes it herself, I’m pretty sure, and leaves it for me with a note, a Post-it written in, you guessed it, red marker. And! The worst of all, she changed all my clothes.”
“What?”
“Oh, yes. My clothes, motherfucker. Even my boxers! Is nothing sacred anymore? I don’t know how she found these things, but everything I own now is lighter than air and drier than the most expensive dri-fit shirt on the PGA tour. It’s European or something, even my suits, even my tuxes! All in the right sizes. Kill me, Rob. There are fifteen guns hidden in here, take one and shoot me in the head.”
“So she really does.”
“Does what?”
“Love you.”
“No. She doesn’t even know me.”
