“I’m honored you would ask me, Joseph. Really. Would you mind if I took the weekend to think about it?”
He gestures with an arm. “Take whatever time you need. It’s not like you say yes and then it happens”—he snaps his fingers—“like that. We’d have to get a lawyer and all that jazz.”
Just the thought of ‘a lawyer and all that jazz’ overwhelms me.
When I get home that night, Gabriel is waiting for me. He’s sitting on the couch, head bent to the open book on his lap. In the past year, Gabriel has become a reader. Mystery, mostly, and a thriller here or there. He jokes that in another life, he wants to be Hercule Poirot.
I walk up behind him, and his head tips back. His gaze sinks into me, and my fingertips roam over his neck.
“How’s your book?” I plant a kiss on his forehead.
He drops the book and holds my face in place, adjusting himself so our lips meet. “Good,” he answers. “You taste like chocolate.”
I straighten and round the couch, going to sit beside him. “I swiped a piece from work.” My stomach growls audibly. “Still starving though.”
“Dinner reservations are in an hour.”
I bite my lip. Gabriel smirks. “You forgot, didn’t you?”
“No.”
“Liar.”
“I forgot,” I admit.
“Ryan and Carrie? Oyster bar?” His eyebrows lift as he attempts to jog my memory.
I wrinkle my nose. “Do we have to go there? I hate oysters.”
Gabriel raises his palms, proclaiming his innocence. “Ryan and Carrie’s pick. Not mine. Want me to smuggle in a ham sandwich for you?”
“Um, yeah?”
He laughs and wraps his arms around me. “I love you.”
“I love you, too.”
It’s awful.This whole situation is awkward and awful.
Gabriel asked Ryan how he plans to use his vacation days this year, and it was like opening Pandora’s box. Every couple argues, and most have a handful of hot-button topics, but this level of fighting doesn’t bode well for the future of the relationship. Ryan and Carrie have only been married three months longer than me and Gabriel.
“Mexico isn’t safe right now.” Ryan’s tone teeters on the verge of breaking. “The cartels aren’t staying away from tourist towns like they used to. Don’t you watch the news?”
Carrie rolls her eyes. “Do you ever get sick of being afraid of things?”
He gives her a tired look. “I run into burning buildings. You make it sound like I hide in a safe space and suck my thumb.”
She blows out a loud, disgusted breath. When I first met Carrie, I thought she was gorgeous with her curly blonde hair and hazel eyes. The more I got to know her, the less I saw her as conventionally attractive.
Gabriel’s hand finds my thigh under the table, and he squeezes gently. My gaze meets his, and the corners of his mouth turn up ever so slightly. ‘They’re not ok, but we are great.’ I know that’s what he’s saying to me. The benign smugness we share is like a shield, a notion that reinforces a truth I already know. Gabriel and I will go on when others fail. Like natural selection, but for marriage. I turn my head in his direction, my nose brushing his upper arm.
Gabriel’s hand stays on my thigh after I straighten up. The air on the opposite side of the table is taut, needing only a moderate gust to snap. I’m fearful of the scene that will ensue if that happens.
“Carrie, how is work?” I ask, to steer her attention from Ryan.
“Good.” She stirs the straw in her pink drink. She hesitates, then admits, “It’s actually a shit show. I’m knee-deep in a tax fraud case and I just had a paralegal quit on me.” Her eyes find Ryan, then skitter back to me. “I’m exhausted,” she says under her breath.
I’m not sure why she’s whispering. Is she trying to hide her exhaustion from Ryan? Why would she do that? He’s her husband. They may be at odds on some things, but he should bethe person she goes to with all her woes. Then again, considering what I just witnessed, maybe not.
