The waiter returns to hand me the menu, which I promptly open. Now that I’m here, I regret not finding an excuse to refuse her offer. The vibe is weird, and I’d rather be home. But then, when don’t I?
“How have you been?” Michelle asks.
I flatten my menu in front of me, ready to spill out the usual lie. “Good. A little busy, but it’s nothing I can’t handle.”
“That’s nice to know,” she replies with a genuine smile.
“How about you? How’s postpartum life treating you?”
“It’s been… a little complicated, to be honest. Maddy is an angel during the day, but it’s like she’s saving up to be a little demon at night. I’ve learned to nap when she’s sleeping, and Kev has thankfully been the best husband and father ever.”
“I don’t doubt it. He’s a good man.”
“He is.” Her loving grin is endearing, and I hope I’ll know the same kind of reciprocated love and adoration one day.
She bends to the side to check on her daughter, and I use that to continue reading the menu. “Can I be frank with you?” she asks when I’m down to the “Sides” portion.
There’s something in her demeanor that makes me uneasy. She looks… embarrassed. “Uh, yes,” I warily agree.
“I didn’t call you just to catch up.”
“Oh?”
“Yes, I—Well, first, I want you to know that I never would have done this if there wasanyother way. But Kev and I have tried everything for weeks, and we haven’t been able to…”
She doesn’t finish her sentence, but I know exactly where it was leading.
There’s a knot in my throat when I ask, “This is about Lex, isn’t it?”
She nods sheepishly, and I release a frustrated sigh.
“I amsosorry, Andrea. We’ve tried to talk to him, to understand what happened, what’s happening, but he hasn’t given us an inch. He’s Kev’s best friend and one of mine, and—We’re at the end of our ropes. He’s started drinking, which was never an issue before, and after your talk with him the other day, he told us he was moving to New York. And hehatesNew York, so that was our last straw.”
Her concerns for Lex have something dropping in my chest. I knew he wasn’t the same man I used to know, but I don’t think I realized just how much he’d changed. I kept my distance too much to notice.
“He’s a big man who can make his own decisions, you know,” I explain. “And whatever he’s going through, he did it to himself, so I’m not sure how I can help.”
“Believe me, I know he isn’t the easiest man to be with. I’m not putting any sort of blame on you. At all.”
Something in the way she said it makes an irrepressible question spurt out of me. “Were you and Lex ever a… thing?”
Her eyes widen with shock. “Oh, God, no. Never. But I was his therapist for a few years.”
It’s my turn to look surprised. “You were?”
“I was, but then I met Kev through him, and I got a little too close to Lex to keep working with him like that, so I referred him to a colleague of mine. And now… It’s the first time in over twenty years that he isn’t going to regular sessions, and it only adds to why we’re so worried about him.”
Twenty years. Lex went to therapy for over twenty years… That’s… definitely not something I could have guessed. He never struck me as the most balanced person out there, given his mood swings and all. Maybe therapy doesn’t work, after all.
“Listen, I appreciate that you’re looking out for him like this. I really do. But again, I don’t know how I can help. He’s the one who broke it off, so I’m not sure how—”
“He did?” she cuts me off.
“Yeah. We had an argument, and he ended things when I came back to discuss it. Why? Did he say it was the other way around?”
She looks so confused with her jaw hanging, it’s almost funny. But the moment is too serious for that. “He hasn’t saidanything.”
“Well, he’s the one who broke up with me, so whatever’s going on with him isn’t my fault.”
