Michael looked up from his laptop. “Pauline?”
“Lunch tomorrow.”
“Alright.” He went back to work, but I noticed the tension creep into his shoulders. The way his jaw tightened slightly.
“You okay?”
“Fine.”
“You sure?”
He looked at me then. “I just want you to have fun. See your friends.”
“But?”
“No buts. Go. Enjoy yourself.” He reached for my hand. I studied him for a moment, why did he looked so worried? Was he anxious about the fact that I was going out without him? But why?
I met Pauline at the mall the next day, we wandered through stores with no real purpose, trying on ridiculous outfits and making each other laugh. She dragged me into a lingerie shop and held up something that was mostly straps and optimism.
“For your husband,” she said with a wicked grin.
“That’s not lingerie. That’s geometry homework.”
“Exactly. Make him figure it out.”
I bought it anyway, along with two other things that were equally impractical. Pauline looked entirely too pleased with herself.
Over lunch at a café tucked away from the main corridor, she leaned forward with her elbows on the table. “Okay. Spill. The carnival? The ferris wheel? What happened after?”
My face went hot immediately.
“Oh my god, look at you!” She grinned. “That good?”
“I’m not discussing?—”
“On a scale of one to ten, how dead are you.”
“Pauly—”
“Come on. I need to live vicariously through you. My dating life is a disaster and yours is apparently amazing.”
“Fine. Eleven.”
She squealed loud enough that people at the next table turned to look. “I knew it! Michael Ashford has that energy, you know? That quiet intensity thing?—”
“Can we please talk about literally anything else?”
“Fine, fine.” She took a bite of her salad, still grinning. “Though I’m filing this away for future teasing.”
I took a sip of my water. “Speaking of which… why are you back in Vegas?”
“Oh. Yeah.” She looked down at her plate. “I’m actually working on something.”
“Working on what?”
She hesitated, then leaned in slightly. “You know Simon Tucker?”
“Should I?”
