Kate fetches the pills, and we head into the living room for a break.
Seems like we all need one of those.
We’ve been going nonstop for two hours, which is surely part of the reason why I hurt myself. Jordan removes his baseball cap and wipes the sweat off his forehead before lounging in the loveseat beside the walkway from the living room into the kitchen. Mikey and I sit beside each other on the sofa on the adjacent wall while Kate sits in a recliner positioned in the corner opposite the loveseat.
Kate glances around the room, seemingly taking note of the chandelier and the beautiful pieces of décor—accessories, statues, obelisks—that are spread throughout on side tables and a console in front of the wall-mounted TV screen.
This isn’t the kind of home I grew up in.
Dad was never much for design.
“He really did have good taste, didn’t he?” she asks.
I see the sadness in her eyes.
The hurt. The pain.
While she was working, I didn’t notice it, I guess because she was so busy that she didn’t have time to stop and think about everything that was going on—something I don’t imagine is easy to do, especially when she’s having to walk away from such a big part of her life, the only life she knew, really.
“Fuck him,” Jordan says. “I’m surprised you didn’t take a baseball bat to all this fancy shit the moment you found out what he was doing.”
“Oh, I thought about it,” she says. “Believe me. You see that horse statue.”
On the media console in front of the TV sits a large sculpture of a horse rising up on its hind legs.
“I thought about how beautiful it would look smashed across the floor, but I was really responsible and restrained myself. I thought, ‘I’m not stooping to his level.’”
“You should reconsider,” Jordan teases.
A flash of something wicked shifts across her face as her lips curl at the edges. It’s like she’s thinking of how easy it would be for an accident to occur.
She shakes herself out of her fantasy.
“You know what I need? A fucking drink.”
“I got it.” Jordan hops off the love seat and hurries into the adjoining kitchen. He opens the fridge, in view through the entryway. He leans down, and I hear him opening what sounds like a drawer.
“You know I meant unsweetened tea, right?” Kate calls. “Not Mike’s Hard Lemonade.”
“Oh, really? I figured you’re nursing, so you wanted to make sure to get some of that good stuff to Roger. Just trying to help my nephew out.”
She laughs.
And it’s nice seeing her mood disrupted by Jordan’s sense of humor.
He makes us all glasses of unsweetened tea, and while he keeps busy with that, I notice the space between me and Mikey on the couch.
Feels like after all we’ve done, we should be sitting closer. But it’s only been a few days, so I might be getting some weird relationship impulses since I’m not used to just hooking up—not like Mikey, who can have a sexy redhead every other night.
When Jordan finishes with our drinks, we sip on them, making small talk before Kate says, “Mikey, you should’ve been here for the housewarming party. It was a real hit. Everyone in the neighborhood came and then some.” She says that in a particularly bitter and biting tone. “Went into this thinking I was going to be living here for ten, maybe fifteen years. That this was where we were going to spend the rest of our lives.” She sighs before taking a large gulp from her tea. When she finishes, she sets the glass on her knee and says, “God, I wish this was a fucking shot of tequila.”
“You and Mikey are definitely related,” I joke, and she chuckles.
“Too true.” But as quickly as she delighted in the joke, her expression turns serious again. And I totally understand. Today’s rough for her. She’s saying goodbye to the life she thought she was going to share with Lyle. It reminds me of Sam. I thought we would share our lives together, that we were fine, but then he told me that he didn’t feel the same way, that he’d lost that passion for me—that spark that he felt in the beginning.
Because I’m too serious and don’t know how to cut loose and have fun.
A boring lay, something he mentioned more than once. Mikey doesn’t seem to think I’m boring, though, but it just might be because he fills me with an eagerness and excitement that I never felt with Sam.
