But now Reggie laughed. It was a side-splitting, tear-inducing, snot- and spit-blowing laugh. He careened off the landing’s railings like a pinball, at one point even tripping on the stairs and nearly tumbling down disastrously to the yard.
Thomas was irritated at first, but the longer Reggie laughed, the faker it seemed. It occurred to Thomas that his friend was trying to dispel the depressive fog Thomas had socked in by employing an over-abundance of mockery and hilarity.
“Man, oh man, if that don’t beat all…” Reggie finally managed, heaving as if he were in labor.
“Reggie, it’s not that funny,” Thomas said, smiling. “You’re overreacting.”
“It is that funny, Tommy. I knew you liked to twist yourself up into knots sometimes — heh heh heh — but I didn’t know it was this bad. What you need is some Reggie Willis Wisdom.”
“I’m all ears.”
“Good!” Reggie’s mostly-fake fit was finally subsiding. He wiped his eyes and massaged his laugh-stretched mouth. “You’ve talked enough, now it’s my turn.”
“That’s fine. Go ahead.”
“Well, first off, this Orianna chick. You thought she was The One, didn’t you? Don’t give me that sheepish look! You know ol’ Reggie speaks the truth. She was so cute, so pure, so — what’d you say about her? ‘Like moonlight on the ocean.’ Ha! When a man starts getting all poetic like that, you know he’s fucked!”
“Reggie…”
“Don’t Reggie me! This drama queen played you like a fiddle. Got you all wrapped up in her — what’s the word? — wanderlust, that’s it. And now she’s gone, and she’s laughing at you, the guy she left behind in that little grocery store. You were the Nice Guy, and she poured her little heart out to you, because you were so kind and willing to listen — that is, until you told her to fuck off. I give you props for that. But you should’ve told her to fuck off as soon as she started rambling about her Life Goals, and how tiny old Oxendine’s couldn’t handle her greatness, and you should’ve forgotten about her as soon as you walked away. I mean, you’re still hung up on her, and ya’ll never even fucked! What the hell, man?”
“Sounds like no woman has ever gotten inside the almighty Reggie Willis’s head…”
“Hell no they haven’t! I hit it, then I quit it. Oh, don’t get me wrong, plenty of women have tried to tame me. ‘But Reggie, don’t you care about’… fuck no, bitch, I don’t care about your complicated female bullshit, how this one guy at work said this one thing to you and it cut you so deeply you might never recover, or how life is just so cold, and it just freezes your insides, or how your mom criticized you because you did something stupid but she’s the one who’s the fascist because she just doesn’t understand. They want to talk about Feelings, they can go to a shrink. They want their pussy pounded, they can come to me. If they don’t like it, there’s the door.”
“Well, we’re different people…”
“Obviously! And what’re you doing mooning over a twenty-three old? Even I know not to mess around with those young’uns anymore — most of the time.”
“I don’t know, Reggie. She just struck me, I guess.”
“Well, un-struck yourself. You didn’t act like this with what’s-her-face, that single mom.”
“No, the situation with Kara is, uh, different. She’s…”
“Trash?”
“Yeah, sure, might as well call it like it is. Orianna isn’t Kara, that’s for damn sure.”
“You think so, because you ain’t thinking. They’re the same, pretty much. They both messed with you, but Orianna got to you more because she’s cute and has a super-duper smile and she says something that isn’t bumfuck stupid every once in a while. You’re just like those morons who put up with the worst shit imaginable from their woman just because she’s hot. Treat ’em all equal, I say. Ain’t that what they’ve been yelling for all these years? Equality?”
“Yes, they have. Alright, Reggie, thanks for the advice. Glad to get all this off my chest.”
“Glad to hear it. Wait, you ain’t leaving yet! Reggie ain’t done laying down his Wisdom!”
Thomas closed the door, shaking his head. “Reggie isn’t done? What else does Reggie want to say?”
“I have a few words to say about that wild sister of yours.”
“Ah.”
“Now, I know family’s family, and blood’s thicker than water, but you know what happens when those arteries get clogged? Heart attack. Death. Kaput.”
“Reggie, that’s one mixed metaphor I’ll always remember.”
“Thank you, Professor Von Brungenstein the Fourth. This sister of yours is hellbent on blowing herself up. Anyone who’s around her when the bomb goes off is gonna lose a few limbs. I’ve seen it happen. When they get those crazy eyes, run, and don’t look back.”
“That’s a little dramatic, don’t you think? And she’s the one who ran away all crazily. We still don’t know where she is.”
“She’ll be back, trust me. And there’s a lover-boy involved in all this, has to be.”
“I don’t know…” In truth, Thomas did believe Emily was philandering, but for some reason he felt incumbent to uphold his sister’s faithfulness.
“I do. I can see what’s gonna happen. She’s gonna announce her undying love to this other guy, divorce this lawyer husband of hers, take half his stuff, and be sitting pretty. She’ll probably take the kid, too, because the courts always let these bitches have their way. It’ll be ugly, Tommy. You don’t wanna be around when all this goes down.”
Of course, Thomas had considered this scenario, but having it presented in Reggie’s straightforward, profane style made it seem much more terrible. How should he act if such a thing happened? How should his parents act? Emily was his sister, and their daughter, but should they support such a selfish woman? Wives divorced husbands all the time, true, but not too long ago people whipped slaves all the time, too.
Or maybe Thomas was just being self-righteously indignant, like pretty much everyone in 21st-century America. He had never been married, he had never had a kid, so he didn’t know what it was like to grind through day after day with a family pressed in close around you. It was very likely he’d have done the same thing Emily did — but this was why he’d never gotten married or had a kid in the first place.
“I hope that doesn’t happen, Reggie,” Thomas said. “If it does…”
“If it does, then the Earth keeps spinning on its 22.43 degree axis, or whatever the fuck it is, and we get on with it. It ain’t your problem, Tommy. This lawyer guy married her, it’s his problem.”
“I feel like I should say something about family responsibilities…”
“Responsibility?” Reggie spat. “Fuck that. What did I just say about blood and arteries? A ball and chain, that’s what responsibility means, family or no family. People lock themselves up and throw away the key because they’re scare’t. If they didn’t have these responsibilities, well, then they’d have to live, and nobody wants to do that. Well, I say again: fuck that. I’m gonna live, and ain’t nobody gonna stop me. Not some bitch, not family, not someone at work — and not you, either.”
Thomas didn’t know how to respond to that last sentence; he couldn’t tell how serious Reggie was being. He said nothing, and waited.
“Ah, I’m just busting your chops,” Reggie finally said, smiling. “You’re alright, Tommy, don’t let anyone tell you otherwise. I ain’t dumb or cocky enough to think you’re gonna follow everything I just told you, but I hope at least some of it sunk in.”