The tears on Cherry’s cheeks were fat.
In the months after Tom left—and the months after it became clear that he wasn’t coming home—Cherry’s tears had changed.
There were days when her eyes felt so full, the tears ran in rivulets. She’d swear that crying had never felt that way before—that before, she’d cried drops, and now, she cried streams. There must be some science to it, one sort of crying for transient pains and another sort for crippling grief.
When Russ rang the doorbell, Cherry was covered in dog hair and thirsty from crying.
The first thing Russ said when she opened the door was, “Are you okay?”
“Yeah,” Cherry lied. “I’m fine. Come in.”
It was already less of a lie now that he was there.
Russ was letting Stevie jump on him, scratching her neck and saying things like, “You are a monster, aren’t you? You are akaiju. Did you fight Godzilla and win?”
He looked charming, attractive. Laid-back. He looked easy.
He looked up at Cherry, still scratching Stevie’s fur. “Is she weirdly...oily?”
Cherry laughed. “Apparently that’s natural. I wash my hands constantly.”
Russ looked in the dog’s eyes. “It’s like dating a woman who uses a lot of product.”
Stevie dropped to her back so he could rub her belly.
“This’ll go on all night if you let it,” Cherry said. “She’ll just keep moving to give you new angles.”
“She has somanyangles...”
Cherry got a dental chew out of the pile of treat bags that sat on Stevie’s kennel. (Stevie could reach these bags, but never bothered them; she was either very dumb or very well-behaved.) “Stevie,come.” Stevie came. Cherry gave her the bone, and the dog immediately trotted away to gnaw on it in peace.
Russ was trying to brush himself off. “Here,” Cherry said, handing him a lint roller. She had them stashed all over the house.
He smiled at her and went to work on his sleeves. Russ was wearing a wool sports jacket and cotton chinos. He’d come from a work thing.
He was very bad at lint-rolling. Cherry took the roller back from him and started on his jacket.
“Hi,” he said.
“Hi,” Cherry said, smiling at him.
He kissed her cheek. “Are you sure you’re okay?”
“I am. Just a little undone, sorry. I should go look in a mirror.”
“You look great,” he said. “Just...” He lowered his eyebrows.
“I had a moment. It’s already passing.”
He glanced around the room. “Your house is incredible.”
He was looking at the blue ribbons painted around the front door. Cinderella’s mice were hidden near the floorboards. Cherry was a closet Disney adult.
“Did your ex do all this painting?”
“I did it,” she said.
“Really?”He turned back to Cherry. She was still lint-rolling his sleeve. “It’s fantastic. I missed all this the last time I was here.”
