Slip of the Tongue

by Jessica Hawkins

  “It’s fine. She’s heard worse,” Finn says about Marissa. “Mom here’s got the mouth of a sailor.”

  “And you fucking love it,” Kendra says, slipping her arm around his waist. Finn glances briefly at me and then away. In my experience, this isn’t how separated couples act. I swallow at the subtle display of affection, and ashamedly, feel the slightest tinge of jealousy. “At the altar,” Kendra continues, “when the priest asked if I took Finn to be my husband—”

  “She said ‘Of course I fucking do,’” Finn rushes out, slurring the words together. “Not only have I lived the story, but I’ve heard it over and over.”

  “They haven’t, honey.” She rises up to kiss his cheek, then runs her hand over the stubble on his chin. “This is new.”

  His jaw tenses. “It’s Movember. Mustache November. I’m growing it out.”

  “Great,” she says cheerily. “Maybe I’ll grow my hair out too.”

  A stiff giggle escapes me before I can stop it. She isn’t talking about the hair on her head. When Nathan understands, he also laughs.

  Finn doesn’t look amused. He moves away from her. “Let them go. They have to get to work.”

  “I do,” Nathan agrees, “and I need a shower.”

  The men shake hands. “Thanks again,” Finn says. “I owe you.”

  “Not yet,” Nathan says. “But once I fix it, I expect a six-pack. And none of that generic bull. The expensive, craft beer.”

  “Nathan,” I scold, shaking my head.

  “What?”

  Finn smiles. “You got it.”

  Nathan flashes Kendra his panty-dropper smile. I know it well, but not from this angle. Does he smile like that often when I’m not around? “Nice to meet you ladies.” His eyes linger on Marissa. He started looking at babies that way last year. At least, that’s when I started noticing it. Is it wrong for me to be jealous of a little girl?

  I follow Nathan inside our apartment, my mind spinning. I feel like a fool in a number of ways. I want to know what Nathan and Finn talked about. Why Finn didn’t mention a family.

  As soon as the door closes, Nate’s smile is gone. He unbuttons his flannel as he walks away.

  “You didn’t have to go over there,” I say. My tone is unintentionally accusatory.

  He disappears into the bedroom.

  My blouse sticks under my armpits. I’m hot one minute and cold the next—it’s starting to annoy me, and winter hasn’t even technically begun. I remain where I am. Finn claimed honesty was his reason for telling me he wanted to kiss me, but not mentioning a family was a lie. I don’t know why I care. It’s not my business. I don’t like being blindsided, though.

  I remove Ginger’s leash. Belated embarrassment over my behavior sets in. I’d thought Finn was flirting with me. And it was as if everyone in that hallway just now was in on the joke, waiting for my reaction to finding out Finn was married. Even Nathan.

  What do I care anyway? I hang up my coat. I’ve got something pretty good right here in my own apartment. Our hot sex from a couple nights ago hasn’t been far from my mind. I find Nathan in our bathroom, steam curling over the top of the shower rod. I pull the curtain open.

  His eyes are squeezed shut as he scrubs shampoo into his hair. “What are you doing?” he asks.

  “Joining you,” I say, unbuttoning my collar.

  He doesn’t respond right away, doesn’t look at me. “Didn’t you already shower?” he asks.

  “I don’t care.”

  “You were leaving for work.”

  “I, don’t, care,” I intone. I pull my blouse out of the waistband of my skirt. “You know how I get when I’m in the mood.”

  His cock twitches. My insides clench. Yes. This is what I want. Seeing his desire with my own eyes will always get me warm between the legs.

  Nathan runs his hands over his face and rinses. “I’m already late.”

  “So what?” I slide my hand down his bicep, elbow, forearm. I reach for him. “I want you.”

  He catches my wrist. “I said no.”

  I withdraw. Shower water drips from my hand to the toe of my boot. “What?”

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “I told you. I’m late.”

  “That’s never stopped you before.”

  “And I don’t want to.”

  My heart cracks, and it must be audible. Nathan drops his eyes from my face to my chest. He can switch off his attraction to me, just like that? Or have I been blind, in denial? Maybe he’s felt this way for some time. “You mean me. You don’t want me.”

  He looks away, and after a brief hesitation, picks up a loofah. He squirts body wash onto it but doesn’t move, as if he’s forgotten its purpose. “No. Not right now.”

  It dawns on me that maybe he didn’t want me the other night, either. Maybe he wanted a slut, not a wife, and that’s what I gave him. But it’s a lot harder to pretend you’re fucking someone else when it’s daytime. “Then when?” I ask.

  “I don’t know. I’m not having this conversation in the shower.”

  “Are you kidding me? You can’t just drop this on me and end the conversation.”

  He turns his back to me and puts his palms against the wall. “Maybe not. But right now, I think it’s best if you leave me alone.”

  My jaw tingles. My blouse hangs open. It didn’t really occur to me, over the past couple months, that he might not want me. If he’s angry, if he’s sad, if he’s screwing someone else—that, I can find a way to deal with. But if he feels nothing for me? That’s as deadly to our relationship as a bullet in the heart. My hand hovers over his back. “Why?”

  He slaps the tile with one hand. “For fuck’s sake, Sadie. I said I don’t want to talk about it.”

  I step back, almost tripping over the bathmat. My urges jump from ripping the shower curtain off its rings to begging him to stop this. I don’t know which of the two will make things worse and which will make things better. Is it even that black and white? Stumped, I leave the bathroom, leave the apartment, leave his bullshit. In the elevator, my hands shake as I close my blouse, tuck it back into my skirt, and get my coat on.

  Before all this, Nathan had never denied me so much as a kiss. I’m the one who pulls my hand out of his first, who has to be called back to the doorway for a goodbye peck when I’m running off to work. I love his affection. Sometimes I forget to show mine, but he doesn’t.

  He takes care of me—not because he has to, but because he wants to. That’s the fundamental difference between him and other husbands I know. A few years back, my girlfriends and I went to Atlantic City for a weekend. I drank one or six too many dirty martinis, got sick, and according to my friends, wouldn’t calm down without talking to Nathan. He picked me up that night, a three-hour drive to the casino and another three back home. I fell asleep with my head in his lap as he stroked my hair with one hand and steered with the other. In the morning, anyone else would’ve lectured me. But he made me bacon and eggs while we laughed.

  Outside, the sun shines, but it’s blustery. The wind freezes my ears, nose, fingers. Somehow, it gets inside me and ices over my heart. The heart that’s unprotected and defenseless because Nathan broke down the walls around it.

  Because Nathan once loved me hard enough to make me feel safe in his care.

  “Space. That’s something I’ll never give you too much of. Promise me the same?”

  EIGHT

  Amelia Van Ecken gives me a dirty look across the conference table. I don’t know how long I’ve been on the receiving end of my boss’s stink eye—black-framed glasses tipped to the end of her nose and everything—but I know why. We’ve been in this meeting forty-five minutes, and I haven’t contributed a word.

  When she dismisses everyone from the conference room, she tells me to wait. “Let’s go to my office.”

  I shut my laptop and follow her out. Amelia Van Ecken Communications, or avec, takes up the seventh floor of an office building near Bryant Park. The ope
n, partition-less space is bright with sunlight from the floor-to-ceiling windows. There’s a chandelier in the center and plush, blue velvet club chairs near the elevator. She never reveals her real age, but for her early-thirties, she’s done more than almost anyone I know personally.

  “Howie,” Amelia calls. Her long, blond bob moves as a unit, like it belongs on a Lego instead of a human. “We’ll take two lattes from that place I like. You know the one.”

  Howie slowly rises from between the rows of desks where my colleagues tap and click furiously. His mouth is thinned into a line. “Do I look like your assistant, Amelia?”

  “All you boys under thirty look the same to me. I don’t know where Jack is. He must be cleaning up the meeting.” She stares him down. “It’s on Sixth Ave.”

  Howie scowls at me. I shrug. He knew what he was getting in to when he was hired.

  “Bring them straight here,” she adds. “A cold latte will put me in a bad mood.”

  “What do you call this?” he mutters.

  She hears him, but to her, it’s likely a compliment. Amelia employs male underlings so she can get back at her ex-husband by ordering them around. Nobody says it, but we’re all thinking it.

  “Shut the door and sit.” She flops into her white leather chair and checks a gold-rimmed, Kate Spade desk calendar while speaking to me. “What was that today?”

  “Which part?” I take a seat across from her and cross my legs.

  “Don’t bullshit me. I expect more. That’s why I promoted you instead of Howie.” She points a black and white polka dot pen at me like a command. “You were distracted.”

  I was. If only it’d been the other way around, and work had been enough to distract me from my life. Too much has happened in just a few days. Before Nathan turned down my advances, I’d suspected this was just a phase. Now I have information I can’t ignore. Somewhere along the way, Nathan and I have gone from a team to opposite sides.

  “I’m sorry,” I say. “I have a lot on my mind.”

  She nods, and her leather seat creaks. “Divorce the asshole. Believe me, you’ll be better off.”

  My cheeks crack when I smile, as if they’ve been out of use for a while. “You loved Nathan when you met him at last year’s holiday party.”

  Her eyebrows gather, but magically, no wrinkles appear. “Did I? Oh, yes. I forgot. It’s coming back to me.” She waves a manicured hand. “Honey, he’s too handsome to be a good husband. You can’t have both.”

  I can’t help but laugh. “As logical as that sounds, it couldn’t be further from the truth. Nathan is . . .” Again, I’m having trouble describing his character. I could tell her how he puts others before himself, and that he loves and trusts blindly—too blindly sometimes. But words don’t seem like enough.

  Amelia sighs. Her veneer clears a little, like wiping steam from a mirror. “I remember, Sadie. I kept thinking how obvious it was that he just adores you. He always made sure you were enjoying yourself.”

  I straighten my back a little as warmth seeps through me. Even she sees how perfect we are, and considering her views on marriage nowadays, that’s a feat.

  “I remember that we were deep in conversation with some clients,” she continues, “and your husband brought over a round of drinks without prompting. The clients loved it.”

  “That’s Nathan,” I say. My smile wavers. Or, that was Nathan. This year’s party is in a month. I don’t think he’ll want to come. If he does, though—how long can we fake it? Will Amelia and my colleagues see right through us? “This isn’t about me, though,” I tell her. “Nathan and I are great. I’m worried about a friend, actually.”

  She pops her lips open. “Sure.”

  “Honestly.” Amelia talks about her personal shit all the time, so I know what she’s been through. I’m not comfortable bringing my problems into the office, but I need to talk to someone who might understand. “A very close friend. She’s not doing well.”

  There’s a knock on the door. “Come in,” Amelia says.

  Howie enters with our coffee.

  “Now, was that so hard?” she asks.

  “Not at all.” He sets them on the desk. “Just don’t expect me to get the IncrediBlast Mascara launch proposal done tonight like originally planned.”

  “Oh, but I do expect it tonight,” she says casually. “Wait.” She puts a hand up to stop him from leaving and takes a tentative sip of the latte. “Good. You’re dismissed.”

  He leaves us alone again, and I pick up my drink.

  “So this friend,” Amelia says. “What’s wrong with her?”

  I try not to look affronted. “It’s not her, I don’t think. I mean, who’s really to blame in these situations?”

  Amelia waits me out, tapping the end of her pen on the word November.

  I scratch my wrist, then under my nose. Not even the intricate terrarium hanging by the window is enough to keep my attention today. “How long was Reggie having his affair before you found out?”

  Amelia stops drumming her pen. She talks about Reggie frequently enough that I’m not uncomfortable bringing him up. “About a year. And that’s only the affair I know about.”

  “What were the signs? Looking back—what was different during that time?”

  She purses her red lips. “The smallest thing would set him off,” she says. “He’d get angry with me for no reason at all.”

  “Really?” I cough, my throat dry. “Don’t most marriages kind of go through that?” Mine hasn’t really, not until recently. But I’ve seen whispered arguments between my friends and their husbands over things that just don’t bother Nathan or me—whose turn it is to pick a movie or who last used the bicycle and let the tire go flat.

  “I’m guessing by the look on your face that your friend’s husband displays this behavior.”

  I school my expression so I look just the right amount of concerned. “He seems to be, I don’t know, fed up with her? Annoyed.”

  “That’s typical. My psychologist will tell you he’s not really angry with you—sorry, her. He’s mad at himself, and he’s taking it out on you.”

  “Her,” I correct.

  “Right. Sorry.”

  I raise my eyebrows at her. “It’s not me.”

  She shows me a palm. “I know,” she says defensively.

  “Is there anything else you can think of?”

  “Oh, that’s only half of it,” she said. “Here’s an example. Once, I’d made a drink and dropped ice on the floor without realizing it. He slipped—just a little mind you, he didn’t even fall—and he exploded at me. I was so upset, I cried. Later, he came into the bedroom as sorry as could be. Said he’d take me anywhere I wanted for dinner to make it up to me. He felt terrible.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “Everything was extreme,” she says. “Extreme anger became extreme remorse. He’d withhold love for days and then drop an insane amount of money on a bottle of wine or Louboutins to make it up to me.”

  Ever since this began, Nathan hasn’t given me a genuine sorry that I can remember. He hasn’t made any attempts to smooth things over or comfort me. He withholds, then withholds more, to the point that I’m beginning to get desperate. “He felt guilty?” I deduce. “About the affair.”

  “Exactly,” she says. “You could be a therapist.”

  “It’s not a difficult conclusion to come to.”

  She makes a thoughtful sound. “So, does that sound like your friend’s husband?”

  “I haven’t seen him apologize . . .”

  “He’d do that in private. His temper happens in the heat of the moment. The apology has better timing.” She shakes her head “Sick, isn’t it? Reggie was a manipulative asshole.”

  “And if he doesn’t? Apologize?”

  She takes a sip of her latte, studying me over the rim. Her lipstick leaves a splotchy red mark on the white lid. “I don’t know, honey. Doesn’t mean he isn’t having an affair. Doesn’t mean he is. Guilt manifests in a l
ot of ways. A lot of women get a Jekyll and Hyde on their hands when he’s stepping out. Everyone is different, though.”

  I spin the cardboard holder around my cup. Amelia is open, but I’m not sure where the line is with her. But my question burns hot. I need to get it out before it sets my insides on fire. “A year is a long time to be sleeping with someone who isn’t your wife . . .”

  “Yes, it is.” She looks directly at me. “You want to know if Reggie and I were intimate during that time?”

  I lift the coffee to my face, as if the cup will hide my embarrassed nod. I sip, and liquid warmth travels down my throat.

  “We were for the first few months. Then it got to be less and less. He’d make up excuses. And then it just stopped. He showed no interest in me.”

  My stomach somersaults. It just stopped. I can’t imagine never feeling Nathan’s weight on top of me again. Never climaxing under his skilled fingers and firm thrusts. I love the face he makes a few seconds before he comes, like he’s trying to catch something I can’t see. This tune is too familiar to ignore, though. The lipstick stain, the telltale cigarette stench, his defensiveness and unwarranted anger—Nathan’s behavior is a textbook example of a cheating husband. But if what Amelia says is true, it’s fresh salt in my growing wound. Just because Nathan’s unusual behavior started two months ago doesn’t mean the affair did. How long has this been going on?

  Oh, God. Nathan’s as vital to me as my own heart, as the blood in my veins. If he’s planning to leave me for another woman, he might as well slice me open and leave me to bleed out. Amelia’s expression is sympathetic, but not surprised. In her world, this kind of thing happens. It happened to her. It happened to many of her friends. I wouldn’t be surprised if she’s had this same conversation with others.

  I return to my office. Throughout the day, I wonder what the right reaction is. Anger? Sadness? Confusion? The thought of bringing it up gives me cramps. I’d rather hide under my bed and ride out the storm. I don’t have real evidence. Not even a gut instinct. My heart says it can’t be. My head knows it can. People cheat. I’m not immune to it. The potential consequences of an affair turn my blood cold. Would I have to leave him? Would I want to? Would he leave me first?