by Gray, Ace
“Okay, okay.” She reaches for me and the covers then pulls us both down to her. “Yes,” she whispers in my ear then nips at it. “Yes, I came, okay? Does that make it better?”
“No, that makes me hard all over again,” I say just before I bury myself in her for the best Tuesday morning of my life.
“What do you want to do today?” Mina asks as she traces my hand splayed on her chest.
“I don’t know, what do you want to do?” I use my grip to pull her into my side. “I already called in.”
“You didn’t have to do that.” She tries to pull back.
“I know. But I wanted to.”
The corners of her smile pull up against my chest. “So then what do you want to do?”
“Is this really what the rest of my life looks like? Endlessly asking each other what we should do?” I wince dramatically.
“Well, we could try and take over the world.”
I start laughing. Big and loud, shaking Mina where she lays on my chest. I remember when I told her that Animaniacs was one of my favorite cartoons when I was little. She and a coworker were taking bets on me. Bets. On me. On my answers. It was ridiculous but it was Mina too. A charming, quirky way to shove herself into my life. I never complained because it kept Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups appearing in the brewhouse.
“Are you Pinky or The Brain,” I ask before I kiss her forehead.
“Depends on the day.”
I smile. “I’m going to make you breakfast then I’m going to teach you to disc golf.”
“I know how to play frisbee, James.”
The wicked arch of her eyebrow says she knows exactly what she just said to me. That she’s counting on my reaction. “Frisbee?” I ask.
“So easy a dog can do it.” She shrugs.
“A dog?” I let my outrage build in my voice, a small part of it real, but only a very small part of it.
“Woof, woof, James.”
“Oh, that’s it.” I turn on her and use the grip I have to start tickling her.
“Do it. I dare you.” She doesn’t fight or wail against me. Instead she just giggles, but not in the tortured way. Mina is laughing at me.
“You aren’t ticklish?” I stop.
“I have two spots. That’s it.” She smiles before she attacks. “How many do you have?” she asks as she reaches for my ribs.
“No.” I swat her away. “Don’t do it, Mina.”
Her touch is excruciating for the first time ever. She’s relentless as she moves on my ribs, up my arms, toward my armpits. I try to shove at her the whole time.
“You’re a jerk!” I yell as I finally shove her away.
She sits back, eyes wide and mouth a little aghast, as if I slapped her.
“Ouch,” she says softly as her arms cross her chest in the shy way she has.
“Did I hurt you?” I scramble after her. I play back the last thirty seconds to double check.
“Why’d you call me a jerk?” She flinches against my grasp. “What did I do?”
I sigh. We’re back here. We’re engaged, we spent the whole night and this morning together but we’re back here. Back where she doubts herself as much as she doubts me, and I put my big fucking foot in my mouth every other sentence.
“You didn’t do anything. I just said it.” I look at her and see the question mark in her face. “I thought we were teasing. It didn’t mean anything, but I’m sorry,” I say, and I mean it. I want to get past this. Marriage is the good and the bad, so I have to power through this part for the next.
“Okay,” she says, relaxing a little bit but not enough.
“Still down for frisbee?” Saying it kills me.
Her answering smile revives me.
She’s a little shaky as she walks past me to the shower but she’s wearing that smile and my engagement ring, so I let it go. Sort of. I look after her and see all the stuff that gets spun up in our wake. It’s floating to the surface again. Even when it shouldn’t. We’re engaged.
I fixed it. Didn’t I?
When the hot water turns on, I decide that’s how I have to operate. Like I did fix it. Like we’re good and always will be. I’ll keep fighting for her, of course, but she’ll see how good it is when neither of us are fighting for space, or to breathe, or for each other, and she’ll want it. She’ll have to.
To Mina,
I refuse to write beloved or dearest wife or something else like that—my vows are to you. Who you are at the very core of it all. You and I have stumbled enough times for us to be cut and scraped down to the bone and with that much exposed, I can honestly say I’ve seen all of you and I love it.
The way you love me is just the same. So simple and so inexplicable at the same time. You love ME. You love the battered and bruised bones. You love me hard enough for me to find redemption when I don’t deserve it. You love me enough for the both of us.
“What are you doing?” Mina asks when she finally emerges.
“Waiting on you,” I say as I slide the wedding vows I started rambling through into my brewing notebook and throw it into my bag.
“No, in the book.” She crosses her arms and eyes me.
“Brewing recipes.” I shrug as if that’s a sufficient answer. As if I’m not lying.
“Okay.” She doesn’t move and every little bit of her being says she doesn’t believe me.
“Would you like to look?” I challenge, knowing some things are okay to keep secret.
She shakes her head then smiles half-heartedly as she pushes away from the doorframe. “Shall we?” she asks as she heads for the door.
“Yes.” A thousand times, yes.
I stretch my arm the length of hers and splay my other one across her stomach. I correct her fingers on the edge of the disc before leaning in and kissing the small space beneath her ear.
“I’ve thrown a frisbee before,” she snarks.
“Not a frisbee,” I growl.
“Okay, okay.”
I don’t know whether she means to or not but she wiggles against my crotch when she relents. It takes everything in me not to groan. Or bend to kiss her neck some more. We’re playing disc golf if it kills me. Today it’s important. Not just because I have strong feelings about the sport but because we need to find our new normal. Neither of us will survive in the state of flux we’re in, let alone the relationship.
“You’re bad,” I scold her then try to move on.
“You think I’m bad at disc golf?”
“Naughty bad, not crap at sports bad. Don’t put words into my mouth.” I make sure my words are playful, as playful as I can manage anyway, but she still yanks the disc out of my hand and stomps away. “Mina!” I call after her. “Come on. I just want to play with you.”
She says something like you’re not playing with me again for a very long time but she mumbles, and is far enough away, that I don’t exactly catch it. I shove my hands in my pockets and feel my teeth clench together, but I follow her to the tee all the same. I guess she wasn’t purposefully wiggling against my crotch.
I’m about to ask her why she takes everything I say so personal, why it all ends up as heartburn when she manages a beautiful fairway shot. One that’s a hell of a lot further and a bit more on target than mine was a moment ago.
“Am I about to get hustled?” I still have my hands in my pockets and the tension is a little more real in my shoulders when I ask.
“I’ve never played disc golf before. Up until July I avoided everything that reminded me of you.” She shoots me a look and for the first time in a very long time, it’s new. I’ve seen turned on, happy, content, intrigued, timid, even sarcastic. Of course sorrowful, and more often than I care to count, but I’ve never seen her get competitive. Because that’s what I’m seeing now. She’s saying bring it.
A new fire fans in the pit of my stomach. Another challenge when it comes to Mina. A challenge that I like, a lot, and a challenge that I’m going to win.
We walk in silence to my disc laying
about twenty feet from hers. I’m mapping out the course. I’ve only played this one a few times—most of my time has been spent pursuing Mina since I moved—but I did use a tournament to decide if I was going to move to Pyramid Peak. Oh, and a job interview.
Mina made my mind up.
And now I’m going to crush her. I’ll make it up to her with beer, dinner, and in bed later.
I pick up my disc and place my feet on its soft indent on the grass. I take a deep breath, letting my ribs expand until they press against the fabric of my shirt. For a brief moment, the woman beside me is gone, sent the way of the wild world around us, and it’s just me, the disc in my hand, and the curvature of the course. I throw well. Very well.
Then so does she.
I narrow my gaze at her, I can’t help it. “Were you lying to me?”
“What?” She arches her eyebrow as she grabs her disc from the chains of the basket.
“About disc golf?”
“Yes, James, I’ve tricked you into playing with me by creating an elaborate ruse in which I’m actually a semi-pro disc golfer, but I carefully constructed an alternate identity over the past three years.” She rolls her eyes then throws toward the next target like that is exactly the truth.
I throw without taking a moment to center myself and end up arcing right because I throw too hard. My snarl resonates in my throat and Mina shoots me a look.
“I’m not throwing real well today,” I mutter my excuse as I walk past her, and faster than her, toward my wayward disc. My putt gets caught on the wind and I watch neon pink float away. I swear under my breath just before I pinch the bridge of my nose and turn my head skyward.
Mina yells a question about putting over to me, something super basic that shouldn’t even be a question, and it feels like salt in a fresh wound. I answer her and hope that she doesn’t realize I’m talking through teeth grit so tightly they might shatter.
She misses and my mood improves marginally. Then she bends over and the red clouding my vision clears enough for me to appreciate the view. My mood improves again. I smile as I walk over to her, this time a bit more genuinely than I did on the first two holes.
“This is fun,” I say as I grab her putter and switch back for a distance disc.
“Yeah, it’s great.” Both her eyebrows rise as she takes the disc from me and stomps off. I can’t help but find it kind of cute.
“You’re cute when you’re mad.”
“Funny, you’re a dick when you’re losing.” She flips me the bird then walks away to throw.
It’s a decent throw but not amazing. I throw beside her and we end up nose to nose. She walks away without acknowledging me, and I jog a few steps to shove my hand in her back pocket. She shifts away from me but it’s halfhearted.
We throw again, fairly even once more. This is it. I’m going to go ahead; I can feel it. I’m going to take the lead then teach my girlfriend—no, fiancée—the nuances of disc golf. But then she putts and lands right in the basket.
I do not.
And before I even realize it, a string of profanities vomit out of my mouth. I stomp over and kick the shit out of the tall grass by the edge of the course. Then a rock into the lake on the other side. And I yell again.
“And I’m out.” I hear Mina behind me in between the pettier parts of my tirade.
“Mina,” I yell as I turn and bolt after her. “Mina, stop. Wait.”
She doesn’t. And with a heavy sigh, I realize I don’t blame her. How many times have I let my temper get the better of me when it comes to competing? How many times has a game with my family been pulled up short? Usually I prepare myself for it, take deep breaths, and talk myself off the ledge before I get there but not today. I figured Mina would suck at disc golf so there wasn’t a need.
“Mina!” I sprint after her. “I’m sorry,” I say as I catch her by the forearms and stop her from stomping off. “I’m sorry,” I say a little slower and with all my sincerity.
“It’s just beginner’s luck.” She tries to wiggle out of my hands.
“In disc golf? I don’t think so,” I scoff without checking myself.
“So you’re calling me a liar. Again.”
“No, uh, that’s not…”
She sighs. “James, I know you’re competitive and I get it, I do, I can be insane too, but you were a jerk.” She shoves her hands on her hips. “Calling me a liar? After all our shit?”
“I know.” My voice falters. “Or I should have known.” My hands fall from her arms.
I expect her to walk away, after all, that’s what she does best, but she just quirks her brow. “Would you like to try again?”
“You’d let me?”
“Have a second chance? I think that’s a yes.” She holds up her left hand and wiggles her fingers. I try to hold in the smile but I can’t. Not with my ring on her finger. Not with those words on her lips. “Excuse me, do you think this is funny?”
“No.” I hold up my hands and wave her off. And laugh. “But it makes me love you more.”
“I love you, too.” She reaches up on tip toes and kisses the tip of my nose. “But how ‘bout we just alternate throws.”
To Mina,
I refuse to write beloved or dearest wife or something else like that—my vows are to you. To Mina McLennan, soon to be Larrabee. My vows are to Wwho you are at the very core of it all. You and I have stumbled enough times for us to be cut and scraped down to the bone and with that much exposed, I can honestly say I’ve seen all of you and I love it. Every piece. (???)
And Tthe way you love me is just the same. So so simple and so inexplicable at the same time. You love ME. You love the battered and bruised bones. You love me hard enough for me to find redemption when I don’t deserve it. You love me enough for the both of us.
Even when I’m insufferable while losing at disc golf. Or laughing at your angry face. (It really is cute, what can I say?) Or when I’m realizing that I broke your heart. I needed you then, maybe more than ever. I deserved you then, maybe less than ever.
But you loved me. You kept on loving me.
The plink, plink, plink of Mina’s keyboard is drifting in from her living room as I finish cooking for her. It’s a reassuring sound, specially since I know sometimes she writes about me. I pat my wallet where the letter I took from her is still folded neatly inside. I stole it when I was doing laundry, and I reopen it every day.
I have no idea how my vows will compare to hers but I keep reworking them to try. Practice makes perfect.
“Hey…” Mina drags out her word, suddenly in the kitchen.
“Hey yourself,” I say as I brush my knuckles down the back of her hand. She sits down at the kitchen table and sets her laptop in front of her. The screen in front of her is definitely not a letter. It’s blue and white and a constant flicker of bogus excuses for life. Fucking Facebook. “What are you up to?”
“I know you hate it.” She follows my train of thought regarding social media exactly. “But I don’t have the luxury of being able to unplug.”
I go to interrupt her.
“Uh, uh, uh.” She holds up her finger to silence me. “I have a small business. One of the only free marketing tools available to me is social media. To have business accounts, you have to have personal accounts so that someone can be the administrator.” She air quotes around the word and I give her a look. “So when I get on there to post new beers, new food specials, events, whatever, I can’t help but scroll. And I know you’re going to tell me what a deep, dark, awful, black hole of disgusting it is and that it really just feeds that monster of self-loathing I have to slay from time to time but…”
“There’s a but.” I settle in to lean against the countertop, my beer in hand, and wait.
“…but I can’t break the habit. Not completely anyway.”
I nod. “Have you tried?”
“Does it matter?” She looks away from me, her eyes falling to the floor.
“No. I’m just curious.”
> “When we…ya know…with the texts and stuff, I stayed away for a while. I couldn’t climb out of the pit of despair when social media was pushing me back in.”
Whomp. I feel the sucker punch to my stomach when she says it that way. I try not to let it show on my face but I know it crinkles.
“Sorry.” Her eyes search mine.
“Don’t.” I manage a smile and reach to run my knuckle along the back of her hand. “I’ve figured out what an ass I was.”
“You’re my ass.” She smiles and I groan. Painfully. When she breaks out into a giggle, it’s worth it.
“I believe there was a question in here somewhere?” I try to change the subject away from assholes.
“Oh, yeah.” She keeps her smile but it’s hesitant. “Can I post that I’m engaged on Facebook? Maybe a picture of the ring on Instagram? I’ll leave you out of it, I just kind of want to celebrate it.”
For the very first time, something about social media doesn’t seem so terrible and soul sucking. While I loathe the premise of only being dragged into it to brag, I like the idea that she’s bragging. About me.
“Sure.” I shrug then bend to kiss the back of her hand. “What harm can it do?”
“So, you made it Facebook official, eh?” Jonas asks as he helps me move kegs in the cold room.
“What?” I ask as he shakes me from my idle thoughts.
“You and Mina are official. I saw her change her status to engaged the other day.”
“Oh. Yeah.” I try and shake the haze from my head. “Is Facebook what makes things official these days? I thought it was her wearing my ring…” I trail off, making sure it sounds like a joke, and I guess it sort of is, but also, it’s bullshit. It’s like my life, like we don’t matter unless we’re posted somewhere.
After what we’ve been through, the tears and blood and utter shit we’ve slogged through, should matter more than Mina posting something stupid. What an asinine social ritual. Can’t Jonas see the way I look at her?