She leans closer into me. “You know one of the hard things about the divorce? Not being able to tell you how proud I was of you for everything you’ve accomplished.”
“I felt the same way,” I say. “Every time I’d see one of your movies, I’d want to call you and tell you how amazing you were.”
“You watched my movies?”
“All of them,” I say. “But not in the theater, because I knew I’d get caught and it would end up onTMZ.”
Kim smiles. “I watched yours, too. I love watching you work.”
This feels pretty incredible to hear. “Yeah, okay. Maybe I can give myself a little bit of credit.” I pause. “How’d it go with Roger? Are you okay?” I don’t want to be jealous, and I’m not, exactly. More . . . sad that he got that time with her when it would have been me, if I hadn’t been such an idiot.
“It went well, actually,” she says. “He said he was really happy for us, and he sounded like he meant it. He’s seeing someone new, so that’s good.”
I have a stupid question that I know I shouldn’t ask, but I have to anyway. “You don’t have any regrets, do you? About not marrying him?”
Kim looks at me in surprise. “No. Can you imagine what would have happened if Ididmarry him, andthenyou and I talked about everything that went wrong with us?”
I sit with that for a moment. “I like to think we would have been responsible, but I don’t know.”
“I don’t know, either.”
As wrong as that is to admit, it also feels good to know.
There’s a long beat in which Kim chews on her lower lip, and then she blurts out, “Do you really think you’ll be happy with me? I know I’m probably not as fun as some of the girls you’ve dated.”
I gape a little, not sure where this came from. “You’re absolutely the most fun of all the girls I’ve ever dated. Did I say something to make you think otherwise?”
She frowns. “When I talked before about my parents keeping me from falling into the celebrity party scene, and you said I wouldn’t have, because I’mKim. And you’re probably right. I mean, I know I’m rigid and rule-following, and that doesn’t usually equate to fun.”
I pull back and look at her. “First of all, you beingKimis always a good thing. I love the responsible side of you. And I have more fun with you than anyone, ever. Remember that time when we drove up the state, stopping by movie theaters and going to see our own movies with random fans?”
“Ha, yes. Our security hated us for doing that, but we got some good press.”
“We didn’t do it for the press. We did it because we wanted to. And we had the most fun I’ve ever had watching movies.”
“Then we had kids,” Kim says. “I was never comfortable doing that with the kids.”
“Me neither. But maybe sometime we could do that again, just you and me.”
She gets tears in her eyes. “God, I love you so much.”
That’s something I will never get tired of hearing. “You do, don’t you?”
“Have I not been clear about that?”
A lump forms in my throat. While we’re being honest . . . “I took it wrong, I think. When you said you didn’t want to get married again.”
She squeezes my hand. “I said I didn’t want to get married againyet—”
“And I thought maybe that meant you weren’t sure about us. You weren’t sure you wanted to be married to me again.”
Kim’s eyes widen. “No, that’s not—”
“But I think I get it now,” I say. “Tell me if I’ve got this right.”
She closes her mouth.
“You do want to get married again,” I say, “but not in the middle of all this. Our lives are a disaster, and it would be better to get married when our wedding can be free of that kind of stuff.”
