"Mariella, or her lawyer, musta hired the same outfit. What a coincidence, I know." Dan shook his head in amazement. "So here's Louie, serving papers on me. I open them up and they're my own divorce papers! So, obviously, I think it's a joke. One of Bale's pranks, you follow?"
"Oh, God." Vicki's mouth fell open.
"Wait, this is when it gets good. So I go back to the meeting, I tell Bale, you dumbass, I wasn't born yesterday, to fall for this one. He tells me it's no joke and he's lookin' at me like ‘you poor slob.' " Dan kept shaking his head. "And I mean, he's not kidding, and it's no joke."
"Oh no." Vicki cringed, humiliated for Dan. No wonder he'd been calling her all afternoon. His world had exploded today. Her heart went out to him.
"After I get the papers, I call Mariella on her cell, and she doesn't answer. I go to the hospital because she told me she's on call, but it turns out that my bride hasn't been on call for two days." Dan paused, significantly. "Then I go home to see if she's there, and the house is cleaned out! Cleaned out!"
"What?"
"The whole house is empty." Dan's eyes widened, and he smiled, incredulous. "Everything is gone, every stick of furniture, everything but my clothes. The old lady next door told me Mariella had the moving van there an hour after I left for work. She even took Zoe."
"The cat?" Vicki couldn't believe it. "You love that cat!"
"I know, and she doesn't even like the cat! She didn't even take her meds."
"Whose meds?" Vicki was confused.
"Zoe's. She needs atenolol for a heart murmur, but Mariella didn't take the medicine with her. She doesn't even know the cat needs medicine, half a tab, every morning." Dan shook his head. "I must sound so friggin' stupid. God, I mean, it's a cat, suck it up!"
"You don't sound stupid."
"Or gay. So gay." Dan raked fingers through his hair, already out of place.
"No, you don't. Then what happened? How did you find out?"
"Okay, so, at home, taped to the living room mirror, is a note that says call her at this number I never heard of, in the 609 area code. I do. She answers the phone and tells me that it's over, the marriage is over." Dan waved at the papers on the table. "That I better sign the property agreement. That she's in love with this other doc, who's Brazilian. He's forty-five or something. He's leaving his wife and two kids, and she's leaving me."
Vicki winced.
"Oh yeah, and then she says, ‘Have your lawyer call my lawyer. Good-bye.' "
Vick felt stunned. She couldn't imagine it.
"That's when I realized, that's why she accused me of cheating on her!" Dan's eyes flashed with sudden anger. "You know, that fight the other day, the big one I told you about?"
"Yes."
"That's why she accused me, to hide the fact that she's been cheating, all along. To throw me off. The best defense is a good offense." Dan smiled ruefully. "How cold is she?"
"Wow." I always knew that.
"So I spent all this past year, since you and I have known each other and done nothing wrong, being so careful about her feelings, when, the whole time, she was cheating on me! And accusing me of cheating! Ha!" Dan smiled. "Diabolical, isn't she? She's an evil genius!"
Vicki couldn't smile. "On the other hand, maybe she really thought it, since she was doing it. People do project themselves onto others, the way liars always think people are lying."
"No, it was a scam and it worked." Dan curled his upper lip, where reddish stubble sprouted. "I never suspected her of having an affair. I thought she was working hard, to become a surgeon. I knew what that job took, and I figured she's paying her dues, like you are. A woman in a man's world. I just got suckered."
Aw. "That's awful!"
"I tell you, what's awful is being lied to, all that time. I don't like thinking that all those calls she got, emergency calls, weren't really from work. That, I don't like. I was stupid. Blind."
"No, you trusted her." Vicki remembered one of those emergency calls herself. They were in a restaurant and Mariella took a cell phone call, then left the dinner. "You can't question somebody when she leaves to save a life."
"Exactly." Dan exhaled and leaned back in his chair, his manner surprisingly accepting. "So, my marriage is over, but it's weird, I'm not even that upset. I don't even feel sad, not about the marriage ending. I didn't even cry."
Vicki eyed him with doubt, and Dan read her mind.
"Really, Vick, believe me, I know it's okay to cry. I know I'm supposed to cry. But I don't feel like crying."
"Are you in denial?"
"No, I'm in reality."
"But you loved her, didn't you?" Say no.
"I don't think I did, really. It wasn't a very good marriage." Dan shrugged. "Funny. After she told me, I went to the gym, but there was no game that late, so I took foul shots until they closed. Then I went home to my completely empty house and took a good, long shower. I think I sweated that woman out." Dan smiled. "And I dried myself off with toilet paper, because she took all the towels."
Vicki laughed. "Did that work?"
"Yes, if you like white balls stuck in your leg hair."
"That's so hot."
Dan smiled. "Bale said there's like starter marriages, practice marriages. He thinks that's what this was."
"Bale's been married three times."
"He's still practicing," Dan shot back, and they both laughed. Then he grew serious. "So that's that. She can have the stupid furniture. I'll sign the agreement, which gives her half our money, and it will be over and done with."
Vicki frowned, sipping her wine. "But didn't you earn most of it? I mean, what does she make, as an intern?"
"What's the difference?" Dan paused, as if waiting for an answer, but Vicki didn't have one. "She can have it. I don't want to fight, I want to move on. We'll sell the house and split the proceeds."
"Don't you want to talk to a lawyer first?"
"No, I am a lawyer. But I want Zoe back. A man needs his kitty cat." Dan got up with his full glass and took it to the sink, and Vicki rose.
"You don't like the wine?"
"It's fine, I've had enough. I'm going to be a good boy and wash my glass."
"Let me." Vicki came up behind him. "You shouldn't have to do dishes on a night like this."
"Why not? I always do." Dan flipped on the hot water and regulated it with care. "I always stand at this sink, just like this, with you hovering at my right shoulder, yakking away while I wash dishes."
Vicki smiled. "I wash, sometimes."
"Sometimes you do, but mostly, it's me. Cooking. Making coffee. I am completely gay."
Vicki laughed. "You're just a good friend."
"I'm your best friend, am I not?"
"Actually, you are." Vicki smiled, feeling a rush of warmth. It was the wine, partly. And partly not.
Dan turned from the sink, his blue eyes frank and direct. "And you are mine."
Vicki nodded, and a silence fell between them.
Dan turned off the water, set the wineglass upside down in the sink, and then looked at her again. "And that, my dear, is why I'm not going to fight over the china. Because Mariella was right about one thing."
"What?"
"I was in love with somebody else, all along."
Gulp. "Really?"
"Really. I share everything with this woman. Chicken dinners and jury closings and funny e-mails on the BlackBerry. And the amazing thing is, I feel like she's with me all the time, even when she isn't. Wherever she is, and wherever I am, I am connected, profoundly connected, to her."