She rolls her eyes at me, hands on her hips, and cocks one sassily.
“What? You can’t tell me that’s the first time you’ve heard of a guy…ya know,” I finish unhelpfully, unable to say the words again. My hands make the motion for me, and while I don’t know sign language, I’m pretty sure that’s definitely the motion for splooge in any language on earth.
“Neveryou.” She’s getting heated. “But that’s not what I mean.”
My brows raise in question, and she goes on.
“The club. The move.Ourmove.”
“Ah.” I wasn’t looking forward to this topic. Another reminder of how I’ve let her down—the way I couldn’t pull off our signature move, hurt my wife and myself in the process—but she wants to talk about it, so we shall. “Is your back okay?”
“It’s fine.” Her words are short, curt, and she repositions herself, crossing her legs, one placed tightly in front of the other, and her arms over her chest, blocking herself off from me.
I can’t believe I nearly dropped her. So fucking embarrassing. Man, I need to start working out again.
Not being able to lift my own wife up at the club last night? In that move we’ve done a thousand times?
That was a blow to the manhood.
Well, not my physical manhood, that sadly hasn’t been blown in far too long.
But I am realizing I’m not as strong as I used to be. I got soft over the years. Strong enough to lift the kids, play with them and the dog, but not strong enough to lift and throw my own wife around when the need arises. What’s even the point of life if I can’t toss her around and show her a good romp from time to time?
“Is yours?”
I nod my head noncommittally, shrugging with my mouth, my entire face, and one shoulder all at once. It’s been twinging a bit, but I don’t think it’s serious.
“I should probably start hitting the gym again,” I share with her, pausing before nodding thoughtfully again as I continue. “Maybe after I see a chiropractor.”
She snorts out a small laugh, seemingly against her own will, but I’ll take it.
I run my hands over the softest part of me, the highlight of my dad bod, this keg that’s replaced my former six-pack.
“These abs, this core strength ain’t what they used to be, but I’m gonna work on it, baby.”
She uncrosses her legs, opens up her stance a little and drops her arms by her side.
“Yeah, well, it probably didn’t help that I still haven’t lost the baby weight.”
“Hey,” I snap at her forcefully. Her eyes jerk up to meet mine in confusion. “Don’t you talk about my fucking wife like that.” I point at her for emphasis, and she realizes within a second I’m being playful with her and rolls her eyes yet again. “That’s the mother of my children. She gets nothing but respect around here.” She shakes her head, smiling despite herself. “Unless it’s in the bedroom. Sometimes she likes a little disrespect. But only from me,” I threaten, my finger still pointing at her.
“You’re such a fucking idiot,” she says under her breath, chuckling.
I wink at her. “Yeah, but I’m your idiot.”
* * *
All week long,I manage to wake a good half hour early to go lift weights in the garage. We have a rack out there with dumbbells, plus one of those stationary bikes that neither of us ever used more than once. I don’t understand how it seemed like such a good idea until we actually got one. But in our defense, do you know how gross it is in a garage? In Florida? In our yearlongsummer? I feel like I should get a congratulatory blowie just for stepping out here, much less actually getting a workout in every single day. I will say it’s a lot more bearable at six AM than six PM, which is why I’ve been getting up before the ass crack of dawn rather than trying to squeeze some reps in after the workday.
The week flies by, and before I know it it’s the weekend again. We haven’t had much time to ourselves since our last date, so my plan to win her over has pretty much been on hold, with one or both of us usually passing out immediately after the kids are asleep. I don’t take it personally, we’re both crazy busy during the day, and the night, and the weekend, too. But I do need to figure out our next date.
I’ve actually been planning this one since the night I first pitched her on my idea, two weeks ago. It’s a re-creation of our first date. Well, I guess that depends on who you ask. We did go out once before that, but she considers this time our first “official” date, so that’s what I’ll be recreating.
Yeah, the club date last weekend maybe didn’t work out exactly how I’d hoped. I think we both had to swallow the difficult truth that we’re a little past our prime when it comes to clubbing. But a picnic? Now that’s something I can fuck with even in my mid—almost late, but let’s not go there—thirties.
Except there’s been a slight wrench in my plans when fish number eleven (Princess Consuela Banana Hammock) dies on Friday night, we do the funeral Saturday morning, and Preston and Ford band together to tell us they no longer want to have the sitter come Saturday night. They want us to go pick out number twelve (whose name is already predetermined to be Crap Bag, the hypothetical mate of poor eleven) together and for the whole family to spend the fish’s first night together.
Fucking cute. But the slightly traumatized terrors are cockblocking my plans at the same time.
