“I’ve missed you too,” he said.
They were quiet after that, just swinging back and forth, enjoying being stoned in the nice weather.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Around six, Carver got dinner with Lillian at an upscale seafood restaurant near the yacht club, a place with buttery leather seats and plenty of wall sconces so all the old people who liked to dine here could see each other. Over crabs, as the sun went down over the water, they banged out a rough outline for their divorce and Carver’s next steps at work. He would take this next week off, come back to finish out Q2 and wrap up what was currently on his desk, then take an eight week leave of absence to think about what he wanted to do next.
“Like garden leave, sort of,” Lillian said while cracking a crab open.
She warned him that he should start contacting lawyers as soon as he could because she would be, and then they parted on good terms, shaking hands again. Lillian wanted to get back to the city that same night, so Carver turned the Maybach over to her, but asked if she could first give him a ride to the French restaurant down the street where Scott was finishing up dinner with Letty and Sana.
Lillian rolled her eyes at him for asking and called him impudent, but gave him the ride anyway, dropping him off at the edge of the parking lot.
“So I’ll see you in a week,” she said. “Don’t forget to get a lawyer in the meantime.”
Carver closed the passenger side door but leaned back in through the open window and smiled at her. She looked lovely in the low blue light; now that it was over, he felt fully free to appreciate her from an aesthetic standpoint. “You’re going to conflict out all the good ones, I already know this.”
“Yeah, which is why I’m telling you to hurry up and get one before I do that. Come on. You have to make this alittlefun for me. Don’t make me take that yacht away from you.”
“Lil, why take the yacht? You don’t even like the yacht. You’re always saying a real boat needs a sail, you don’t like the wood I picked for the bedrooms, you don’t like how I did the kitchen —”
“That’s the game, Carver,” Lillian said, rolling her eyes. “I’d take it becauseyouwant it. Don’t tell me your brain is already going, are you going to show up at the office next week wearing a poncho and playing the bongos?”
“Okay, okay. I’ll call lawyers tomorrow.”
“Good boy. Now get off the car so I can get the fuck out of this place.”
“Aye aye,” Carver said, blowing her a kiss and straightening up.
Lillian blew it back and drove away, peeling out of the parking lot. Carver watched her tail lights disappear down the coast, heading back in the direction of the city, then turned and made his way to the restaurant.
Scott had texted him only fifteen minutes agosounds good, we’re wrapping up here, so Carver expected to have to loiter for a bit, but as he approached the entrance he saw Scott, Letty and Sana standing off to the side, chatting. Sana was holding a foil swan, something Carver hadn’t seen in ages. In many ways this restaurant was trapped in the nineties: their Parisian menu hadn’t changed since he was a kid, nor had their signage, decor or landscaping.
The three noticed him walking up and greeted him warmly. Carver smiled, then sidled up awkwardly next to Scott, dividing the group into its natural couples but not standing closer to him than he currently felt allowed to.
“How was dinner?” he said.
“Very good,” Letty said. She was dressed like her regular self, in jeans and a leather jacket. “Their bread is always incredible.”
“It’s literally just bread in here,” Sana said, lifting the swan. The henna on her hands was starting to fade.
From behind them, a woman’s voice said, “Carver?”
Carver turned and saw two of his parents’ yacht club friends, Tim and Donna Wise, strolling toward them through the parking lot. They were relatively nondescript people who he only recognized thanks to Donna’s bright copper hair and Tim’s constant habit of wearing a polo and a sports coat with khakis. He put on his good son smile and waved to them, and they smiled back and stopped to chat.
“And Violet!” Donna said, and Letty waved, wearing her good daughter smile. “So nice to see you guys. It’s been a while, hasn’t it? Neither of you come down to the club much anymore.”
“No, not anymore,” Carver said. He felt the faint impulse to add, ‘My wife and I are members of NYYC, actually,’ but what did it matter? Donna and Tim would be impressed, of course, but who gave a rat’s tiny ass about these people? And what wife, anyway? Instead, he said, “This is Violet’s wife Sana, they just got married yesterday.”
“Oh!” Tim said, his eyebrows jumping. “Right. Over at BCC. I saw something about that on Nora’s Facebook.”
Donna glanced around the group as if looking for help with how to react. “Was it a nice wedding?”
“It was lovely,” Sana said. Her tone was so genuinely warm and happy that it seemed to put Tim and Donna at ease. Letty smiled at her.
“And this is Scott McCaffrey, I don’t know if you’d remember each other,” Carver said. Scott, who was being quiet so far tonight, nodded and smiled.
“Dot’s son!” Donna said, smiling at Scott. “Yes, we remember. Your mother is a riot. She has this very funny story about getting caught skinny dipping in the Sound.”
