by Krista Wolf
I also made several more ‘payments’ for his hard work, and Tate accepted them all with his hands folded comfortably behind his head. For me, each one was yummier than the last.
Yes, life was good. Better than good, actually! I was living every woman’s hottest, craziest dream, and there were times I had to pinch myself to make sure I wouldn’t wake up from it. In the back of my mind however, I was always waiting for the other shoe to drop.
That shoe showed up on a Saturday afternoon, a few weeks later.
Forty-Three
TATE
The house was empty, and that was fine. I’d expected it to be empty. With everyone else at work, I’d stopped by to drop our surprise on Serena’s bed: a couple of bottles of wine, plus a sleek black dress she could wear later on, when we planned to take her out.
Cole and Jacob would be here soon enough, having picked Serena up from work as planned. We’d finagled a half-day from her boss, somehow without her knowing it. We were proud of our efforts, because it was hard to surprise Serena. She was one of those people who noticed everything.
But no, the house being empty didn’t bother me one bit. Except for one thing:
The door had been open.
That’s not right.
Unlocked I could maybe understand. An oversight by Cole or Jacob. But open… that just didn’t make any sense.
“Hello?”
I called out cautiously as I stepped inside, then realized silence might be a better approach. There wasn’t much in the way of weapons as I pushed through the foyer. An umbrella from the umbrella stand, maybe. Or one of the bottles of wine I was holding.
Relax. You’re probably just being paranoid.
My shoulders went a little less tense as I made my way through the living room and kitchen — both empty. Nothing looked missing. Nothing disturbed.
“Okay,” I sighed quietly. “Fine.”
I set the bottles down on the table and slung the dress over one of the chairs. I planned to hit the head and freshen up. Get ready for—
I stopped mid-thought as I heard a noise coming from Cole’s room. Something had definitely moved.
What the fuck?
I froze in the middle of the hallway, listening intently. I could hear a sigh, or a snort. The sound was low, but the source of it was unmistakable. It definitely came from a man.
Rather than peek around the corner, I balled my hands into fists and went charging into the bedroom. The guy I tackled didn’t even have a chance.
“OOFFFF!”
He was tall and broad, if not a little out of shape. I caught him just above the waist and sent him flying into the opposite wall, his body bending awkwardly as we crashed into it together. The sheetrock gave way instantly. Pieces of gypsum went flying, raining down all over us as we struggled together.
“Who the hell are you?” the man demanded. “What are you—”
I punched him in the ribs, and his face grimaced with pain. He responded by grabbing me by the hair and yanking my head back. The guy was looking into my face now. His expression was fear mixed with confusion, but there was fight in his eyes too. Before I could do anything he head-butted me square in the nose.
FUCK!
I felt the crack, followed by the warm stream of blood. I should’ve seen it coming. I should never have let him get that close to my—
“Stop!”
The word was loud, shrill, high-pitched. I didn’t recognize it at first. Probably because I was already throwing an elbow into the guy’s face.
CRACK!
The stranger spun away, clutching his own nose. It created distance between us. Before I could advance on him again, that distance was filled with a familiar figure: Serena.
“Guys, stop!” she shouted. “STOP FIGHTING!”
She extended her arms to keep us apart, but it wouldn’t have mattered. Cole already had the other guy in a headlock, and was dropping him to the bed. Jacob was standing there confused, between the stranger and Serena.
“Leave him alone,” she cried again, her eyes pleading. “It’s just my ex!”
It took a few moments for the realization to sink in. When it finally did, Cole relaxed his grip. The guy sank to the bed, his expression scornful as a silence settled over the room. A silence punctuated by our heavy breathing.
“It’s only Eric,” Serena spat, staring daggers at him.
Forty-Four
SERENA
My ex-husband’s whole head was as bright red as a tomato, probably because Cole was just about ready to remove it from his shoulders. After hearing the sounds of fighting, we’d flown down the hall together. I’d shown up just in time, lucky for him.
“Eric what the HOLY fuck?!”
He heaved a few more deep breaths from a sitting position on Cole’s bed. Eventually his mouth curled into a wry smile.
“Well hello to you, Serena.”
The guys stared back at me, searching for answers. The problem was I had none. I was just as confused as they were.
“What the hell are you doing here?!” I demanded.
“Looking for you,” Eric grunted.
“In my bedroom?” Cole spat.
Now it was Eric’s turn to look confused… as well as angry. “His bedroom?”
“Yeah,” I said, crossing my arms. “That’s right. His bedroom. He rents here.”
“He rents David’s bedroom?” Eric asked incredulously.
“It hasn’t been David’s bedroom for years,” I pointed out. “And yes, I had to take on renters. There was no way I could afford this place on my own.”
“Renters?” Eric went on. “As in more than one?”
“Why the hell do you care?” Jacob cut in. “You ditched out, leaving your wife high and dry. Instead of sending help, you sent her divorce papers. Is it so hard to believe she’s renting part of the house?
He put it better than I ever could’ve. In a way that even Eric might understand.
“Can we go to the kitchen or something?” asked Cole. “You guys are bleeding all over my stuff.”
I took Tate’s face in my hands, and for the first time I noticed that he was hurt. He was staring murderously at my ex-husband. I felt pretty murderous myself.
“Yeah,” Tate spat. “Let’s go.”
Down the hall we moved, with Eric lumbering along still holding his own nose. Once in the kitchen he pulled up his usual chair. There was a dress slung over it, and two bottles of wine in the spot where he used to eat dinner.
“What is all this?” my ex-husband demanded bitterly.
No one answered. Cole and I took care of Tate, while Jacob filled a Ziploc bag with ice, wrapped it in paper towels, and handed it begrudgingly to Eric.
“Now,” I said, sliding into the chair beside him. “Let’s hear it.”
“Hear what?”
My patience was at its breaking point. I actually screamed into his face.
“Why the HELL are you even here?” I demanded. “And what are you doing breaking into my house?”
“Our house,” he corrected me.
“Yeah, no,” I snarled. “You’re not on the deed anymore, remember? The judge took care of that. Not that there was any equity here when you left.”
“It’ll still always be our place though,” Eric grunted through the stack of bloody paper towels. “I still have a key.”
He slapped a brass key down onto the table with a muffled ‘clack’. Immediately I took it from him.
“Not anymore.”
Tate’s nose had stopped bleeding, though it was still swollen. I could see him restraining himself, biting back whatever he wanted to say. I appreciated him for letting me do it.
“Eric…” I sneered.
“What?”
“Answer the question,” I sighed in exasperation. “Why are you here?”
He looked down into his paper towels, which were significantly more bloody than Tate’s After half-spitting, half-blowing his nose into them, he stared up at me with two bloodshot eye
s.
“I’m here for David.”
David?
My brow furrowed. Even more begrudgingly, and probably only to save a cleanup on my kitchen floor, Jacob swapped out my ex-husband’s bloody paper towels for new ones.
“David’s not here,” I told him. “He’s been gone for two years. You know this.”
“Yeah well he’s coming back to town,” Eric went on. “Just for a day or two. Like me.”
“Why?”
“He’s getting married, Serena. To that girl he met in South America.”
I felt suddenly shitty. David and I hadn’t talked in a few months now, but the last few times had been him calling me. I could’ve at least picked up the phone and given him a call, but I hadn’t. Probably because I was so angry about the student loans.
“How do you know this?” I asked.
“I saw on one of his social media pages that he was stopping up here this weekend,” said Eric, “to pick up the last of his stuff and tie up some loose ends. Then he’s going back to Bolivia. They’re having the ceremony there.”
“And you’re going to the ceremony?” I asked, surprised.
“Heck no,” Eric shook his head. “I have to be back in Milan by tomorrow night.”
I laughed, but it wasn’t a good laugh. “Figures.”
“What?”
“Nothing,” I swore. “Nothing at all.”
Eric happened to look up at the wrong time, and found Cole staring at him intently. Wrinkling his lip in disgust, my ex-husband swung his gaze back to me.
“Anyway,” he sighed, “being in town for only one night I figured I could stay in David’s old room. That even if you still held a grudge, you’d at least grant me that.”
“You thought wrong,” I growled.
“So I grabbed an Uber here,” he went on without missing a beat, “and dropped my stuff in David’s room. By the time I realized something was off, this asshole attacked me from behind.”
He jerked a thumb at Tate, who only grunted.
“You’re lucky that’s all that happened.”
I couldn’t believe it, and yet somehow I could. Yes, Eric could be this stupid. Yes, he could be this oblivious, too. It was astounding to me that I’d once fallen in love and married this man, but I kept telling myself that people change. And not always for the better.
“So you live here with these three guys?” Eric asked, shifting gears. Suddenly he was looking at the guys a little differently than before.
“Doesn’t matter,” I said. “You need to go.”
“Wait a minute…” Eric said, squinting at Jacob. “Weren’t you the guy who cuts our lawn?”
“ERIC!”
I remembered this part about our relationship — having to yell just to get his attention. Finally I had it.
“I still don’t understand why you’d come here,” I said, “or why you’d ever think to let yourself in. But you have to go now. There are plenty of hotels you can stay at, and if David shows up—”
“Holy shit!”
He yelled the words so loudly it sent us all flinching backwards. He was staring out the kitchen window. Looking into the driveway…
“HOLY SHIT, MY CAR!”
Forty-Five
SERENA
We followed my ex-husband into the driveway, after bolting straight out the front door. The GTO was where Tate had parked it, right in front of the garage.
“You fixed my CAR?!”
Eric was swooning over the Pontiac, running his hands along the sleek, gorgeous lines. For a good half minute he forgot all about us. Instead, he focused on absorbing the fruits of Tate’s long, painstaking labor.
“I can’t believe it,” he swore. “You put her back together after all this time! And she’s beautiful, too. She’s fantastic! She’s—”
“She’s also not yours,” I stepped in, shattering the little bubble around his fantasy.
Eric scowled. He stormed over, moving so quickly in my direction that both Cole and Jacob stepped in front of me.
“Of course she’s mine,” he demanded, putting his hand out for the keys. “I bought her.”
“And you took her apart too,” said Tate. “After upgrading the engine you were going to… what? Paint her?”
“Yes,” Eric answered excitedly. “Electric blue with silver flake.”
Tate’s response would’ve been comical, if I hadn’t seen the look in his eyes.
“Were you gonna hang a disco ball from the rear-view mirror too?”
“Maybe.”
The mechanic’s hands were fists. He looked ready to murder my ex. “I’d take you apart if you tried painting her that color,” he spat acidly.
Frowning, Eric decided to ignore him. He looked at me instead.
“How’d you get her registered?” he demanded. “The title was in my name. You couldn’t just—”
“A motor vehicle that has been left unattended on the property of another person for more than 96 hours is considered abandoned and unclaimed,” I cut him off. “State law.”
As Eric stood there gaping, I took a deep breath and smiled. “You left that thing here for fifteen thousand hours. So I got a new title. A clean title, in my name.”
“But—”
“You never called,” I pointed at him. “You never asked for it. In all this time, you never sent a tow truck to get it out of my garage. Like everything else in your life, you just walked away from it. Everything except your work.”
Eric’s face contorted bitterly. He turned even more red.
“I was the one who taught her all that by the way,” said Tate, his voice dripping with smug satisfaction. “I’m also the one who put her back together.” He looked over at me and winked. “She paid me well.”
The tension between Eric and my three boyfriends was building steadily. Whatever was about to happen next, it would probably not be good.
“Look,” I told him. “You’re still bleeding. Maybe you should go to the hospital and get your nose looked at. Or at least check into a hotel and lay down for a while. If David—”
“If David what?” came a voice from behind us.
The five of us whirled, just in time to see another car pulling away from the curb. David stood there with a duffel bag dangling from one long arm. He had a full beard, and his hair was so much longer than it was the last time I’d seen him. It made him look very different. So much more mature.
“Dad?”
My stepson’s look of total confusion didn’t last long. His father ran to him, flinging his arms around his son. Hugging him like the father he should be, instead of the father he actually was.
I saw the duffel bag drop. His eyes shifted to me, perhaps looking for answers. I was all out of answers, though. I could only shrug.
Eric doted on his son for half a minute, kissing him on both cheeks in that weird Italian way. He told him how good he looked and congratulated him on his upcoming wedding. He also started spewing more bullshit about how he couldn’t wait to meet the bride-to-be — someday soon — when suddenly David noticed the guys.
“J—Jacob?” he asked, confused.
“Yeah man,” Jacob smiled. “What’s up?”
He extended his hand, and David shook it mechanically. They did that thing at the end of the handshake, where they were still clasping fingers before letting go. It was a team thing. Old habits die hard.
“And… Tate?” he shook his head as if to clear it.
“Yeah it’s me,” Tate acknowledged. He gave David a half-hug, the minute his father finally let go of him. “Welcome home I guess,” he chuckled.
David glanced at Cole, and there was vague recognition there. Then he looked at me, his expression going even more awkward.
“Hi.”
“Hey David,” I said, and gave him a hug. “How’s it going down there?”
“It’s going,” he said awkwardly. “I, uh… I’m getting married in a few months.”
“I heard.”
Overwhelmed b
y everything and everyone, he took a step back. His eyes scanned each of us again, one by one. Trying to make sense of it all.
“You guys knew I was coming?” David asked in bewilderment. “And you all came to see me?”
A few seconds of awkward silence followed. The guys glanced at each other.
“Not exactly,” said Jacob, scratching his head.
“They’re living in the house now for some reason,” Eric cut in quickly. His voice was loud and accusatory as he pointed to the door. “All of them. That one there who cuts our lawn. The other one there, who I remember from your team…”
“Not all of us,” Tate stepped in.
“They’re renting your room, David,” said Eric. “And look at this! They’re driving my car.”
He pointed again, and David’s gaze swung to the GTO. His eyes lit up in astonishment. I could only imagine what he was thinking.
“They’re all here,” Eric went on. “The three of them. Living with her...” My ex-husband scowled at me, curling his lip. “Sharing the house with her… and God knows what else.”
A truck rumbled past, out in the street. The noise was loud but it broke up the conversation. It gave everyone a few seconds of doing nothing, while it all sank in.
Shit.
I felt terrible for some reason. Probably because I wanted to deny what Eric was saying… but at the same time, I couldn’t.
“I came back for my birth certificate,” David murmured when it was quiet again. “I think it’s in a box in the attic.”
“It is,” I said quietly.
“There were some other things too,” he said awkwardly. “Stuff I needed for the wedding. I’m staying at Ryan’s tonight, but I wanted to tie up some loose ends here. I wanted to… well…”
He stopped, letting his sentence trail off into nothingness. With the five of us staring at him, it was all too much.
“I think I’ll just come back tomorrow,” he said abruptly.