He takes a swig of beer. “She cheated on me.”
“Oh. Sorry. That’s… horrible.” I watch him curiously as he shrugs. “Why did you make a joke about it? Surely you were angry.”
“Coping mechanism,” he explains. “That’s what my friend who’s a therapist said, anyway. I told her to stop analyzing me, but it’s very hard for therapists not to do that.”
“I can imagine.”
“Like a nervous tick for them.”
“You made a joke about the cheating because you were trying to process it.”
“So she says.”
“I can understand that,” I tell him, thinking back to the broom cupboard when I became oddly concerned about gathering the roaming peacocks after Matthew broke my heart and ruined my life. “Shock can make us behave in weird ways.”
“I know someone who was so shocked when they were fired, they stole the vending machine from the office. They just unplugged it and walked right out of there with it. Completely out of character.”
“What?” I stare at him. “That’s ridiculous. You’ve made that up.”
“It’s true.”
“You know this person?”
“A friend of a friend.”
“How would they carry a vending machine out on their own?”
“They were really strong.”
“No one is that strong.”
“It was a mini one.”
“Sure.” I roll my eyes. “Though I actually do know someone who was so stunned when his boyfriend proposed that he punched him in the face.”
“No way.”
“I swear it. He was so shocked, he punched him right in the nose and then said yes.”
“You’re winding me up.”
“I’m telling the truth!” I insist. “It’s my brother’s mate in New York. There’s a photo of them at this rooftop bar, both crying with happiness, one with a bloody nose.”
“Wait, the guy proposing still wanted to marry him, even though he’d been punched in the face?”
“Of course!”
“I’ll believe you when I see this photo.”
“No problem. I’ll believe you when I see a picture of the vending machine in this person’s house after they brought it home from work.”
“They didn’t get it home. They had to leave it in the lobby. Couldn’t get it through the revolving office doors. They went down with it in the lift though.”
I shake my head at him. “How would you get a vending machine in the lift on your own?”
“Easy. It’s all to do with how you tilt it.”
“You’d need a wheelie cart. No one’s that strong.”
