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“Babe?” he said softly.
She turned her big brown eyes up to his. “Hmm?”
“Did you hear back from Frank yet?”
She took a deep breath and looked back at the TV, where a rerun of an old sitcom played at low volume. “No, not yet. I left him another message, but he hasn’t gotten back to me.”
Michael felt a flash of irritation. “What’s his problem? He said he was ready to finalize everything. Why is he dragging his feet now?”
“I don’t know, Michael,” Ellie said, tension creeping into her voice as well. “He’s probably just being flaky. He was always flaky when it came to our marriage. It’s really not a surprise he’s being flaky with the divorce.”
“Well, maybe if I talk to him—”
“No,” she said immediately, “absolutely not.”
Michael didn’t respond right away. The irritation he felt was trying its best to mature into full-blown anger, but he didn’t want to be angry right now. So he took several slow, steady breaths and tried to convince himself to just let this go.
He failed.
“Ellie, I’m not going to threaten him or anything. I just want to—”
Ellie sighed and rolled off of him and out of bed. She stalked to the dresser and Michael couldn’t help but notice once more how breathtaking she looked. Considering the subject of their conversation, the thought was far less welcome than it would normally be.
Ellie pulled open one of the drawers and pulled out a pair of underwear and a T-shirt. She pulled them on, her movements brisk and businesslike.
Against Michael’s will, the irritation matured. He lifted his hands and let them drop onto the bed. “So we’re fighting now?”
Ellie shrugged and said in a tone as businesslike as her movements, “I’mnot upset.”
“Oh, don’t give me that bullshit, Ellie,” Michael said. “Every time we bring up Frank, you shut down.”
“I’m not shutting down, Michael!” she protested. “I just don’t have an answer for you. You act like a divorce is this simple thing that can just happen with a snap of the fingers. It’s not that easy.”
“I never said it was easy, Ellie, but it’s been two and a half years that you’ve been trying to divorce him.”
“Really?” she said, eyes flashing as she tugged a pair of sweatpants up over her hips. “I didn’t realize.”
“I’m only saying that there are ways to expedite that process, but every time I bring that up, you blow it off.”
“Yes, because it’smydivorce, Michael.Notyours!”
“Well, it affects me!” he argued. “How am I supposed to have a future with you if we keep waiting for Frank to get out of your life?”
“By being patient and not trying to force things,” she snapped.
“So why can’t I meet him then?” he asked. “Do you really think I’m going to… to what? Threaten him? Hurt him? Scare him?”
She rolled her eyes and threw her hands up in frustration. “No, Michael, I don’t think you’re going tothreatenhim. I just don’t understand why my current boyfriend needs to meet my ex-husband. Does that not strike you as weird?”
“Well, you met my ex-girlfriend,” Michael said and immediately regretted it.
Ellie’s eyes shot daggers at him and her voice was sweet and venomous when she said, “Well, we know how that turned out, don’t we?”
Several months ago, Faith had joined Michael and Ellie for dinner. It was, to put it bluntly, a disaster. Turk had stopped just short of attacking Ellie and Faith very clearly didn’t like her. What was supposed to be a chance to smooth things over between his partner and best friend and his girlfriend instead drove a wedge between Michael and Faith that nearly ended their friendship.
And apparently, it had left a sour taste in Ellie’s mouth that still remained.
“At least you met her,” Michael insisted lamely, too frustrated to give up the argument even staring down at the hole he was digging himself.
