My Father's Wives (25 page)
Authors: Mike Greenberg
Claire ruffled my soaking hair. “Oh my, you are
dripping
.”
“I’m going up to change,” I said as the kids extricated themselves from my arms.
“Want to watch TV?” Drew asked.
“I would love to.”
“How about a game of Trouble?” Phoebe asked.
“Sounds excellent.”
Her smile melted my heart. “It’s just like a Sunday!” she said.
Claire had procured a towel from somewhere and wrapped it around my shoulders. “You’re dripping all over the place.” Her voice sounded irritated but her face didn’t look it.
“I’m going up to change,” I said. “Out for dinner tonight? All of us?”
“Let’s stay here,” she said. “It’s too wet outside.”
I kissed her lightly on the lips. “Sounds good to me,” I said. “I’ve been outside a lot lately.”
I walked up the stairs and turned right one final time. In the guest bedroom I examined the bed, the expensive sheets. There was nothing out of the ordinary. That was the last time I was going check. I’m not going to spend the rest of my life looking for something I don’t expect to find.
I’m also not going to spend it looking for something I already have. Life isn’t supposed to be perfect. Mine is everything I want it to be and that’s more than good enough. I had been leaning this way all along; now the decision was made and I would stand by it forever. In the end, that’s what life is about. It really is the sum total of the decisions we make. My father was right. I guess that shouldn’t come as a surprise.
We had baked chicken for dinner, with green beans and rice. I opened a bottle of Estancia Pinot Noir and let it breathe while we ate, then I poured Claire and myself each a glass while we played the board game with the kids. When we were finished it was still only seven o’clock. The kids wanted to watch a movie. They settled onto the couch with popcorn and Claire and I went out to the screened-in porch. I brought the bottle of wine, filled our glasses, set the bottle on the floor.
“Pretty night,” she said.
It was, despite the rain. The sun hadn’t quite set; it lit the sky just enough that the clouds were especially vivid and dramatic. The trees were swaying. A candy wrapper fluttered across the lawn. In the distance I heard a rumble of thunder.
“This is really good,” Claire said, holding up her glass. “And I love you very much.”
“I love you, too,” I said. We clinked our glasses together. “It feels really good to be home.”
Claire leaned back in her chair and I in mine, and we delighted in the wine and the wind and all the things our lives had been and everything they might still be. Then she reached out her hand and I took it in mine, and together we stared out into the rain as a flash of lightning brightened the evening sky.
Great thanks, for varying reasons and in no particular order, to Elizabeth Dugan, Dina Siegel, Robert Perlmutter, Robert Boolbol, Diane Johnston, and Betsy Martindale. Also, Andrea Sullivan at Greens Farms Academy, Peter Benedek and Howard Sanders at UTA, Lou Oppenheim and Mark Zimmerman at Headline Media, Richard Koenigsberg at Spielman Koenigsberg & Parker, Katie Steinberg and Tavia Kowalchuk at HarperCollins, and Mark and Jason Bradburn at Morgan Stanley Smith Barney. Special thanks to Kara Edwards, who helped me more than she knows, and Erika Echavarria, for thousands of cosas buenas. And most of all, my literary agent, Jacques de Spoelberch, who has always believed in my writing more than I have, and Kate Nintzel at William Morrow, who continues to understand my writing better than I do.
Photo by Pamela Einarsen
MIKE GREENBERG
is the cohost of ESPN’s
Mike and Mike,
the highest-rated sports talk program in the United States, and the author of the
New York Times
bestselling books
All You Could Ask For, Why My Wife Thinks I’m an Idiot,
and
Mike and Mike’s Rules for Sports and Life
. He is a graduate of the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University and a native of New York City. He currently lives in Connecticut with his wife and two children.
Discover great authors, exclusive offers, and more at
hc.com
.
Fiction
Nonfiction
Why My Wife Thinks I’m an Idiot:
The Life and Times of a Sportscaster Dad
Mike and Mike’s Rules for Sports and Life
Cover design by Amanda Kain
Cover photograph © Melanie Acevedo/Getty Images
This book is a work of fiction. References to real people, events, establishments, organizations, or locales are intended only to provide a sense of authenticity, and are used fictitiously. All other characters, and all incidents and dialogue, are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real.
MY FATHER
’
S WIVES
. Copyright © 2015 by Mike Greenberg. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
FIRST EDITION
ISBN 978-0-06-232586-0
EPub Edition December 2014 ISBN 9780062325884
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