I walk back to the bus stop slowly and start to worry about my fantasy fading. I have a pretty safe cure for times like these. I buy things for Evan. Then I look at them and I can feel him in my apartment again. I stop into CVS and buy him a green toothbrush. I stop into Littles Shoes and buy him an expensive pair of boots. I stop into Orr’s and buy him a new watch. By the time I stop home to drop his things off, I feel much better. I can’t wait to go to the Squirrel Cage later. I imagine I’m telling Evan I’m heading to a meeting and will be out late.
When I wake up, Mark is making breakfast. I quickly tie my hair back and throw on some lip gloss, then walk into the kitchen. I can hear the bacon frying before I can smell it.
“Smells good,” I say.
“I’m sorry,” he says, “I didn’t make enough. I figured you’d be leaving.”
“Oh,” I say. “I am.”
My stomach starts to hurt as I drag it away from the bacon smell. I think it’s mad at me for filling it with so much alcohol. Fucking tequila sunrises; they’re so pretty.
My clothes are thrown over a chair in the bedroom. There’s nothing to look around for and no reason I can think of to prolong my visit. Not that I really want to, I just hate that surreal feeling I get on the way home: Did that really happen? My imagination’s so good these days. Sometimes it’s hard to tell. Luckily, Mark’s apartment smells like kitty litter and my skirt probably does too.
Mark’s place is small, but charming. The border on the wallpaper is matched up perfectly, which makes me think he has a girlfriend, even though he swore he doesn’t. The furniture looks like college leftovers. There are desk chairs where there should be recliners, futons where there should be couches, beer cans where there should be vases. He called it his “bachelor pad” but it doesn’t have foosball, so I don’t think it counts.
The sex was unremarkable. Even when I thought he was making me breakfast, it didn’t seem that great. Every time I got close he would pull back and prompt me to beg for it. I did a half-assed job just to get things going, but I wasn’t into it. I also thought he got too sweaty. I was tempted to get up halfway through and switch on the ceiling fan, but I figured that would make it last longer, and at that point I just wanted to get to sleep.
By the time we finished, I was sober again and getting restless. He passed out right away and I stayed up for a little while. I wanted to know something about him. I didn’t need his life story, or even his telephone number. Just something to make him feel like a real person. I walked around searching for the foosball table. Nothing. I checked his fridge to see if maybe he was a vegetarian. Nope. I looked through his wallet for photos, but I didn’t find any. I learned his eye color from his driver’s license and went back to bed.
On the way home I slip into withdrawal again. I feel sweaty and laced with doubt. I smell my skirt for evidence of last night. Kitty litter. I stop thinking about how delusional I might be and puzzle over why I never saw a cat.
The tequila makes my stomach feel like it’s closing in on itself. I look through the cupboards to find something to prop it up with, but the only thing I have a taste for is bacon. I head to Pamela’s, best breakfast in the ’burgh.
Evan is there with some woman I don’t recognize. I watch them flirt back and forth for a bit, but I don’t worry until he leans over to kiss her. Then I walk past, letting my heels click loudly, which I never do.
He doesn’t look over. Neither of them follows me with their eyes. Their right hands are clasped across the table and the fingers on their left hands are looped through the handles of their coffee mugs. I can see their matching wedding bands. Hers looks more expensive than mine and she wears it under a diamond solitaire. They seem right together. I don’t realize I’ve stopped to stare until Evan, or whatever his name is, glances over. I fake a yawn to hide the tears in my eyes, but he doesn’t notice them anyway.
I storm out of the diner thinking some combination of Maybe I’ll buy him that expensive bathrobe and Now I’ve gone too far. I hover over a sewer grate outside the restaurant and pull my ring from my finger. The skin is a little lighter underneath it and the feel of skin brushing skin there is foreign and unpleasant. I know Evan and I are over. I can’t fix that. I struggle to tell myself: He didn’t treat me right. I’m filing for divorce. But I know I won’t feel like my dangerous, exciting self again until I’m remarried, for better or worse, for real or... not. I palm my wedding ring, and carefully tuck it into my purse on the ride home.
The next weekend I need an adventure, so I go to Silky’s. It’s mostly Pitt students watching the Penguins game, so wouldn’t usually be my pick, but it’s ladies’ night and my drinks are free. On the way in I get a plastic cup and a black stamp on the back of each hand. I say a silent prayer that they’ll fade by Monday. I take a look at my options. Too young, too short, too skinny, not in a million years, out of my league, maybe if I was drunk enough, and then I see him: perfect. He’s too old to be here, at least forty, and when I glance over, a sorority girl is giving him a dirty look and storming off. I know he’s not having any luck and think maybe he’s as desperate as I am to get laid. I make eye contact from across the bar and sit down next to him, our legs touching. He offers me a drink and I display my ladies’ night stamps. He smiles.
He asks if I’m married.
I tell him, “We’re working on a divorce.”
Pittsburgh scores on the television over his right shoulder. He is drinking Guinness, so I am too, but I have a hard time getting it down. I look around at the few college girls with their pastel drinks in plastic cups.
He tells me he was married once.
“Didn’t like it?”
He shakes his head.
The Guinness is starting to settle in my stomach and flutter to my brain.
He tells me his name is Rick.
“Pleasure to meet you,” I say, drawing out the L so he’ll think about my tongue.
The music from the juke box is so loud I can’t feel my heartbeat over the bass line.
He tells me I have beautiful eyes.
“Rick,” I ask, leaning in a little, “are you hitting on me?”
The barstools are too high and my feet are dangling a couple of inches above the floor. It makes me feel silly and I’m anxious to get out of here, but he orders us another round.
He asks what we should drink to.
I raise my plastic cup: “Marriage.”
And we drink.
Two hours, three pints of Guinness, sixteen jam band songs, a short uphill walk, and two flights of stairs later, he’s fumbling with the keys to his place and I’m squeezing his ass through his work pants. I hear the lock click and help him turn the doorknob. As soon as we get inside, he backs me up against the wall and slips his hand between my legs. The faded blue color of the room reminds me of the backgrounds on Saturday-morning cartoon shows. In my head, the Looney Tunes theme song is the soundtrack to the rest of the evening.
When I wake up, Rick is walking out the door. I dress quickly and follow him from a safe distance. I don’t know where we’re walking to, but on the way there I slip on my ring and start to think about our wedding. At first I can’t decide where we had it, or how many bridesmaids there were. But the more I think about it, the clearer it becomes in my mind: Rick’s spontaneous wide-eyed proposal, our rehearsal dinner on Mount Washington, how mad I was when he dropped his wedding ring in the drain and lost it, how he’d never suspect any infidelity on my part, how we’re so in love.