“No. Wai?—”
The line goes dead, and it’s just me and my sullen reflection in Nash’s bathroom.
Nash, who I’m still married to but am supposed to be divorcing.
Nash, who doesn’t know about Bennie.
Nash, who is helping me find missing gold he doesn’t believe in so I can save the store and pay for my mom to get brain surgery.
Maybe I’ll ask him to cure cancer while he’s at it.
One more splash of my face, and I force myself out of the bathroom.
In the kitchen, I fumble through my purse and, overcome with confusion and guilt, put Jonathan’s ring on my finger. I ignore how it feels too big and gaudy.Pre-wedding jitters.
“What do you want to do today?” Nash asks, easily and like I didn’t nearly have an orgasm from him sucking my finger followed by an existential crisis in his bathroom.
“Find lost gold and get divorced, actually.”
He chuckles and pulls a mug from a cabinet. “So impatient.”
I snort a slight laugh. “Well, having a mother who might forget my name next time I talk to her tends to light a fire under one’s ass.”
It’s supposed to be a joke, but the way the fun leaves his face lets me know it’s not even remotely funny.
“You want to talk about it?”
In a mason jar of milk he must have steamed while I was in the bathroom, he adds vanilla and honey, then sticks a frother in it, the low hum filling the dead air I’ve created.
“A brain tumor,” I tell him. His look encourages me to go on, so I do. I tell him about the decade she’s kept it from us, the symptoms, and the surgery scheduled for ten weeks from now. I tell him about everything except the money we don’t have and the daughter that’s his.
Over the tea that’s been steeping, he adds the frothed milk and slides it across the counter to me. I take a sip—it’s so damn good. Citrusy and sweet. He learned to make it that summer—hours of us experimenting in that little apartment. He’s clearly perfected it over the years he’s been having sex with condoms and sucking fingers like an Olympic sport.
“After I found out about the tumor, she told me about Cap—she’d never told anyone I wasn’t Ed’s—and that she never sent you the divorce papers. Unloaded all the fun stuff at once.” I give him a rueful smile that he mirrors. “That’s when I found out about the missing gold and Cap’s work to find it.” I spin the mug on the counter then remember the rest. “And one of our customers got wind. Now here we are.”
“Now here we are.” He lifts his mug in the air as if toasting the unfortunate chain of events. “Why didn’t she tell Cap about you?”
“Guess he didn’t want to go back to Fontain when she did. She felt slighted. That someone would choose to be anywhere else other than with her. Didn’t tell him out of spite even though she loved him.”
No matter how I spin it, no matter the differences in reasoning, it’s my own life story retold.
He takes a sip of his coffee,almostsmiling. “And the divorce papers?”
“Those,” I say, staring into my drink, “she withheld because she thought I loved you too much to divorce you and I’d eventually see it.” My attention goes from my drink to watching Frank run around the yard through the window to the full-blowncivil war my fucked-up conscience is waging against itself. “Hid the postcards because she knew she’d have to tell me about the divorce if she didn’t.”
“Clearly didn’t work if you’re marrying someone else.”
My eyes are back on him, ironic smile lifting my lips as I nod toward future-Emma’s ring sitting on the counter between us. “As are you.”
It clings to our silence, and I wonder what he’s thinking. Wonder if Emma knows I’m here and if she feels threatened by it. If there’s a reason to be. If I told him I’m doubting my engagement what he would say.
“About today,” Nash finally says. “I thought we could hang out. Take a break. No plans, just something with Cap this evening. That work?”
It sounds perfect—mostly because it will cost zero dollars—and with my nod, we slip eight years into the past as he makes breakfast and we talk about nothing and everything all at once. Every topic is as safe as it is easy and as far from finger sucking as it gets.
He walks me through every step of his career up to this point. I resented him for being so happy when I saw him that first day, but it’s evident how much he loves it. It’s hard to be a spiteful bitch when he’s smiling so wide and filled with so much passion.
He tells me his mom passed—whom I only met once—from heart failure. Three years later, it still hurts him to talk about. Knowing I wasn’t with him when it happened adds another hundred pounds onto the pile of guilt I carry, but the fact she died without ever meeting Bennie will haunt me for the rest of my life.
