“Fine. OK. I’ll listen, as neutrally as I possibly can. Go on.”
Emily smiled and crossed her legs.
“You remember Brett Hickman?” she asked.
“Uh, yeah. Your first boyfriend? I mentioned him at Christmas?”
“Yes, that’s right. You did.”
“So he’s the one? The boy you ran away with?”
“Yes.”
“But… how does that work? He broke up with you decades ago.” Thomas could see a teenage Emily on her bed, seemingly done with life, despite Thomas’s encouragement and sympathy, however forced.
But his sister had surfaced from her fog, and it seemed like the chapter on Brett Hickman was closed for good. It was just an over-dramatic breakup with a first boyfriend, something that happened to every girl.
But now he was back, more than twenty years later…
“Yes, he did dump me,” Emily replied, “but that doesn’t matter anymore.”
“If you say so.”
“I do,” Emily said. “You know, I think you’d like him.”
“Why on earth would I like him? I don’t like him now, I didn’t like him back then. Ponytail, dressed like a punk, a bully…”
“No, he wasn’t a bully. He was just… hard.”
“In more ways than one, I guess.”
Emily laughed and squirmed in her seat. Thomas regretted his quip, and hoped to God she wasn’t going to go into too much detail about the sex they were obviously having, which was sure to be entrancing, wild, hot, and all the other words people threw out. If she did, he may already have to renege on his agreement to keep his anger in check.
“Yes, he was excellent,” Emily said sultrily, “and he still is.” Thomas waited, but thankfully this was all the detail she wished to give at the moment.
“So where is this Hickman guy at now?” Thomas asked.
“He’s around.”
“Oh sure,” Thomas said sarcastically. “He’s around.”
“Yes, well, I suppose you want to know how he came back into my life?” Emily said eagerly. Thomas tried to object, but she was off and running before he could form his words. “Well, I was in the gym one day, doing squats with Becka, my trainer, and I feel this presence behind me. Literally, I got goosebumps. I’m not lying. And it was him: Brett Hickman. Still had his ponytail, still as ripped as he was in high school — well, he wasn’t all that toned back then, but anyway — still with that grin that just gets inside your heart and twists it.”
“If you say so.”
“I do. He was in workout clothes, had a sleeveless t-shirt on, and I tell you, those biceps looked like they’d been carved out of marble…”
“How wonderful,” Thomas said acidly. He thought they’d bypassed Emily’s lustful thoughts.
“OK, OK. You don’t want to hear me gush over his physical attributes.” She paused, apparently wanting to gush over those attributes mentally for a few seconds before continuing. After a beat, she shook her head happily, chuckled, and resumed her narrative. “Anyway, we got to talking, or he talked and I stammered out some stuff. Said he had just moved to the area, and had been looking for a gym, since he was pretty hardcore into weightlifting and fitness and all that. Said it was his first time there, and lo and behold, I just happened to be there too. Not that I believed him. Sounded a bit melodramatic to me…”
“What’s he do for a living?”
“He’s sort of semi-retired. He did some stuff in Silicon Valley and made a lot of money. He helped develop some note-taking app for smartphones, for example. Now he mostly spends his money and has fun, though he’s sort of a venture capitalist, too.”
“Sort of. He’s sort of this, sort of that.”
“Yeah, is that a problem?” Emily asked haughtily. “What, you want me to print out a résumé for you?”
“That would actually be helpful. I mean, do you have proof of all this?”
“I can’t believe you’re asking that. You think he’s a con man, don’t you?”
“Well, do you have proof or not?”
“Yes, I do, actually. I’ve looked him up. There’s this thing called the Internet? And he’s shown me his investment portfolio. Very impressive.”
So he’d shown her his portfolio, too? Way to set the hook, Brett. Thomas sighed. He was tired of sighing, but it looked like he’d be doing it many more times tonight. “So this guy shows up, he’s a stud, has lots of money, and you go for it.”
“No, Thomas, I did not go for it, at least at first. We had coffee a few times, and he was clearly interested, but I kept him at bay. But then Dan…” She scrunched up her face at the memory of her husband’s slight, and clutched at her kneecaps as if she wanted to rip them off and throw them at something.
“What about Dan?” Thomas asked.
“He forgot our anniversary,” Emily said. The guillotine sliced downwards, and Dan’s head was lopped off. Blood spurted out of his neck-hole, and the body twitched once before giving up the ghost.
Thomas didn’t remember when their anniversary was either. He actually had it written down on a Master List of birthdays, anniversaries, and other important events that was posted on his refrigerator, but it would be silly to walk all the way to the kitchen to find out.
“When was it?” he asked.
“You don’t know either?” She blew up like a pufferfish, but before she could make use of her spines, Thomas squished her back down again.
“Oh, stop acting wounded,” he said. “I’m not married to you — thank God for that! I have it written down, but I can’t be expected to remember it off the top of my head. You know, not everything revolves around you.”
“Well… fine. It’s on September 21st, and this was our fifteenth anniversary. And he forgot.”
September? That recently? Yes, he remembered now: he’d sent them something, a cheap bauble of some sort. No, it had been a gift card to Outback Steakhouse. He knew Dan salivated over their Bloomin’ Onion.
“Well, that’s no good,” Thomas said lamely.
“I know. It was because of work. It’s always because of work. He’s so busy, I swear he forgets he has a family. You know, he’s forgotten our anniversary four times now. I put up with it the first three times—”
“You did, huh?”
“OK, I got angry, but I didn’t go nuclear.”
Thomas would disagree, and he was pretty sure Dan would too, but he decided not to contest the point — this time.
“So you decided to shack up with Brett because of that? Emily, come on now…”
“No, there are — were — other things. Haven’t you been listening? That was just the catalyst. I have needs, you know. Brett has time for me. Dan doesn’t.”
“So you just run away at Christmas? When the whole family is together?”
“Yes, I did exactly that. I couldn’t stand that harassing conversation, ‘Emily did this, Emily did that, let’s all talk about Emily’s past.’ I was stressed out from fixing all the food and preparing all the rooms, and then you actually mentioned Brett by name, like you knew, somehow. So I just said fuck it.”
“I guess it’s my fault, huh?” Thomas asked sardonically. “The straw that broke the camel’s back, right?”
“No, I don’t blame you. But I am disappointed that you didn’t really respond to the e-mail I sent you on your birthday.”
Thomas had to rack his brain again. He tapped his fingers on his chin, refusing to give up until he’d pulled out this particular memory. He didn’t want Emily to have a conniption because yet another person hadn’t memorized her every word and action. (Of course, this played right into her hand, but Thomas was too angry and tired to care.) Emily waited expectantly. Finally he remembered her vague e-mail and his flippant response.