“Of course!”
I lost myself in the craft of painted canvas shoes for a good hour. I spoke in a silly voice to make Suja laugh and ended up feeling better myself. When I walked her to the door, my smile wasn’t as forced anymore.
She paused. “You’re going to remember Mom’s surprise party tomorrow night at Maggiano’s, right?”
“Wouldn’t miss it.”
But that was when Mitch decided to show up as if he hadn’t been missing for a couple of days, waving at a departing Suja and then waltzing through the front door like he owned the place.
My smile disappeared.
“Come to get your things for good?” I asked.
His smile disappeared, too. “Nope.”
I followed him through the house to the bedroom that used to be ours. “I know you’re sleeping with Tabitha, so why don’t you go live with her?”
Why did you say that out loud?
He froze, his back to me. “You have quite the imagination.”
“No, I have a friend who’s a private investigator.”
His shoulders sagged. “I keep forgetting that.”
“And I saw the two of you at karaoke.”
He drew his scrubs over his head and walked to his chest of drawers, where he started taking out workout clothes. “Maybe that’s because you wouldn’t go with me. Maybe there were lots of things you wouldn’t do for me.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
He locked eyes with me. “What do you think it means?”
“I think you’re looking for excuses to justify your own selfish behavior and that you’re scared to death of turning fifty, which makes you a cliché.”
“I think you’re jealous that I can get a younger woman.”
I laughed out loud. I couldn’t help it. “I wouldn’t care except for the part where we both pledged till death do us part. Last I checked, I wasn’t dead.”
“You might as well be.”
I ran a hand through my hair. “These arguments aren’t getting us anywhere. Being in each other’s presence is causing nothing but high blood pressure, so—”
“Speak for yourself,” he said as he stepped out of his pants and put on running shorts. “I’m perfectly fine and living my best life.”
“You need to live your best life somewhere else.”
“You wouldn’t have this house without my money.”
“You wouldn’t have made that money without me. Just because you don’t value my contributions doesn’t mean they weren’t there.”
“Well, I’m not leaving,” he said. “Except to go on this run.”
He went out the front door, and I grabbed a pillow to scream into. After about my third muffled expression of rage, Mom said, “Feel better now?”
“No. I’m never going to get rid of him.”
She walked across the room and wrapped me into a hug. “Oh, come now. I didn’t raise a quitter. If we weren’t getting to him before,then he wouldn’t have stayed away for a few days. We haven’t even brought out the big guns.”
