Stay (27 page)

A
fter bringing the decorations into the condo and taking Joe out to pee, I was down to six hours and fifteen minutes. I wasted at least fifteen minutes staring at myself in the mirror, transfixed by the clogged pores on my nose.

Six hours even.

I started collecting dishes so I could run the dishwasher. There was a small army of coffee mugs in my office, and not one, but five, water glasses on my nightstand, with varied levels of water in them. I hoped Alex hadn’t noticed. The water had dust and dog hair scum floating on top in all but the most recent glass. I dumped all the water into one, and stacked them up. Then I realized that the dishwasher was already full. I started it, and made a plan to hide some in the recycling bin in the garage if I couldn’t get them all done in time.

My next round was garbage. Joe followed me while I made the rounds, getting underfoot and trying to sniff everything I picked up. I wished I could train him to clean up for me. When I emptied the bathroom trash can, which was overflowing with used tissues and cotton balls, the tissues kept the shape of the can from being jammed in so tightly. There were seven crumpled tissues under my pillow and several more on the floor next to the bed. And throughout my tour of garbage, I picked up dog hair by the handful. I had a full bag by the time I got back to the kitchen. Alex had left so early in the morning that it was still dark out. I told myself he couldn’t have noticed any of it.

Joe ran into the living room and jumped on the couch. He stuck his head in between the slats of the blinds. His tail stopped wagging and he growled, long and low.

I jumped up on the couch next to him and looked out. Peter was sitting in his Beamer in the driveway. I hadn’t even heard the car pull up. I pulled the elastic out of my hair and worked on twisting my hair up in a bun, trying to smooth it down. I ran my index fingers under my eyes to try to wipe away the oily puddles of melted eyeliner that had probably collected. I knew it was useless.

I grabbed my jacket.

“Back,” I said to Joe. He backed away from the door and sat down. “Zustan.” I held my hand out to tell him to stay and closed the door quickly behind me.

Peter was sitting in the driver’s seat. I could see him clearly in the spotlight from over the garage. He looked down when he saw me coming, and didn’t look up even when I opened the door and climbed in.

“Is that a dog in there?” he asked, before I could say anything.

“You spying on me?”

“You really need to close your blinds,” he said. His voice was tired and snotty, like when I used to make jokes while he was trying to study.

“So perverts like you can’t sit out here and get a peep show?”

“You didn’t take your clothes off,” he said. “I wouldn’t have watched that.”

“Thank you, Pete. Thank you so much.” I spit the words out like sour lemon pits.

“That’s not what I meant. I-”

“Shove it,” I said. I knew he hadn’t meant it that way, but it felt good to be mad at him and let him know it.

He lowered his head and looked up at me, trying to make eye contact. I didn’t let him.

He looked down at his hands, still on the steering wheel. “Invite me in,” he said. “It’s cold out here.”

“I don’t care.” I pulled a piece of Juicy Fruit out of its usual resting place in his console, unwrapped it, and shoved it in my mouth. It was stale and brittle, and it took a few rounds of chewing to come together.

“Come on. You’re cold too,” he said, rolling his hands up into fists and flexing his fingers out again.

“I can go in anytime I want to.”

“Fine,” he said, turning the key in the ignition.

“Where are you taking me?” I asked. There was a part of me that still wanted him to just whisk me away. We could drive to the airport and take the first plane out-who cared where it was going. I wanted that part of me to shrivel up and die, but it didn’t seem like it ever would. I was so disappointed in myself.

“Nowhere. I just don’t want to freeze.” He turned the dials on the air vents to blow hot air in his direction. Then he reached over and turned the center one to blow on me.

“It’s a waste of gas,” I said.

“I don’t care,” he said, banging the sides of his hands on the steering wheel. His voice was even snottier than before.

“What the fuck is wrong with you?” I asked, and then cringed at how harsh it sounded.

“What?”

“What are you doing here, Pete?”

His cell phone rang. It was the
Mission Impossible
theme song.

“Cute,” I said.

He stared at me in a dead panic.

“You’d better pick up,” I said, crossing my arms and raising my eyebrows.

He didn’t make a move. The phone stopped ringing, but just as he put it back in his cup holder, it started again.

“I won’t say anything,” I said, holding my left hand up like I was taking an oath. “The more time you take to pick up, the more freaked out she’s going to be.”

He flipped the phone open and held it up to his ear.

“Hi, Baby Jane,” he said, plastering on a smile that was as fake as his sweet voice.

I sat there silently wishing that cars came equipped with vomit bags.

“No, our Wegmans didn’t have any.”

“Right. Well, they only had the other brand, and I know you don’t like the other-”

“Exactly. I’m at the University Ave. Wegmans.”

He stared at me while he talked, like he was expecting me to scream out,
Janie! He’s in my driveway!

“Yes,” he said. “If it’s not here, I’ll try the Marketplace Wegmans and then I’m coming home.”

He stopped looking at me.

“That’s what I meant. If they don’t have it there, I’ll look for a CVS or a Walmart or something. That’s what I meant.”

He turned away from me. “I love you, too,” he said into the phone.

Just as he flipped it closed, I yelled, “Hi, Janie!”

He jumped and turned back to me.

“Why did you do that?”

“Your phone was already off.”

“But why did you do that?”

“Why are you here?” I said, not sure I really wanted to hear the answer.

“I don’t like how we left things,” he said, softening.

“Do you even remember how we left things?” I asked, rubbing my hands together in front of the heater. “You were trashed.”

“I remember.”

“Well, what am I supposed to say here?” I asked. “What do you want from me?”

He just stared at me in silence. Then he leaned over and kissed me. I let myself be kissed for a split second. I let myself feel what it was like to be kissed by him after all this time. It was almost like I thought it would be. His lips were soft, his breath was sweet, and my heart did a drumroll.

I tried to pull away, but Peter was holding the back of my head with his hand. I pursed my lips together. He kissed me harder.

“Come on, Van,” he whispered. “This is what you want, isn’t it? This is why you called me, right?”

He went in to kiss me again.

“No,” I said. I tried to push him off of me, but he kept pulling me in to him. My hand slipped and I hit him hard in the stomach.

He recoiled into his own seat, holding himself and resting his head on the steering wheel.

I didn’t apologize. I hadn’t meant to do it, but I wasn’t sorry.

“What the fuck?” he said.

“You know what the fuck!”

“I didn’t think it was going to be like this,” he said.

“Like what?”

“Like running around like crazy to buy Preparation H for her puffy ‘airplane eyes.’” He turned his head toward me, still resting on the steering wheel.

His eyes were wet.

“You’re not running around like crazy, Pete. You’re sitting in my driveway.”

He didn’t say anything. He turned his head and rested his cheek on the wheel so he could look at me.

And then it dawned on me.

“This isn’t about you having feelings for me, is it?” I looked down at my knees, trying not to explode. “This is about married life not being as perfect as you thought.” I felt around for the handle of the door so I could be assured of an easy escape. The metal was smooth and cold. “This isn’t about me. It’s about you.”

“Van- ”

“No!” I yelled. “No. I’m not everyone’s pawn. I am not your pawn.” I couldn’t look at him. I stared at the garage door, holding on to the door handle so tightly that the tips of my fingers started to go numb.

“I don’t know what you’re-”

“I’m not your pawn. Not yours or Diane’s or Janie’s.”

“Van, calm down.” He put his hand on my shoulder, but I slapped it away.

“You forget that I am a person,” I said. “Well . . . well, when you leave the room, surprise! When you leave the room, my life keeps going.”

“Come on!” He reached for me again, but stopped before he got close enough to touch me.

“No, you come on! You drive away, and I’ll be stuck here with the fact that my best friend’s husband just kissed me.” I found the spot on the garage door where I hit it with my bumper last June. “And who am I going to call to talk it through? No one. No one. Because Janie is my goddamned best friend, and you’re a close second. My mom is dead,” I said, feeling my bottom lip start to shake, “and it’s not like I’m going to call Diane about this.”

“Aw, Van.” He started to put his arms out to hug me, but pulled them back in when I looked at him.

“The thing is, Pete. The thing is that it’s always been like that.”

Joe was still watching us from the window, his big black snout poking through the blinds. I wanted to be done with this. I wanted to go back inside and sit on the couch with Joe and pretend Peter didn’t even exist.

“Van,” he said, pawing at my shoulder like he was grasping at straws. “I love you.”

I had dreamed of him saying
I love you
for years, and now, it just made me mad.

“Well, goddamnit, Pete, I loved you, too, but I never used it as an excuse to stop being your friend.”

I pulled the door handle and freed myself from the car.

“Wait,” Peter said, before I could slam the door behind me.

I looked back at him. “Why?” I asked, but I didn’t give him time to answer. I pushed the door closed until it clicked shut. I watched my shadow on the garage door as I walked past Peter’s headlights so I wouldn’t have to watch him watching me.

Joe ran out into the front yard when I opened the door. He ran around in a circle and then followed me into the house.

“We’re not going to wallow,” I said to Joe. He ran back to the window. I followed and peeked out. Peter was still sitting in his car in the driveway. Maybe he was still trying to figure out why. Maybe he was trying to think of the perfect thing to say to make me want to run away with him. Maybe he was just steeling himself for the next leg of his hunt for hemorrhoid cream. Whatever it was, I didn’t care. I wanted it all to be over. I wanted to call Alex and drink cider and wear flannel and wake up with him.

This is it, I told myself. I will throw this party and then I’m done. Then I’ll move on and have my own life. I stepped away from the window and dusted the coffee table with my sleeve.

Finally, we heard Peter’s car back down the driveway. Joe jumped up on the couch to watch, letting out a long, low growl. The headlights lit up his face and he barked sharply, with authority, as if he were saying, “Yeah, you better go.”

I
was down to four hours and forty-five minutes. I took out the vacuum to clean the crumbs and dog hair off the carpet, but as soon as I turned it on, Joe started to make a whiny sound in the back of his throat that grew into a sharp, high bark. He pushed himself between me and the vacuum cleaner and started biting at the wheels.

I yelled “phooey” at him a million times over, but he kept going. He growled and barked and bared his teeth at the vacuum in between bites. If he’d freaked like that when I first got him, I probably would have left the condo and never come back.

While I felt safe knowing that Joe was driven to be my personal protector, it wasn’t helping me clean. I closed Joe in the bedroom. He yelped and whined, and I felt awful about it, but I had no choice. I was running out of time. I had to go back to vacuuming.

A few minutes later, the doorbell rang. Joe barked from up in the bathroom. I peeked out through the view hole to see Gail’s husband, Mitch, standing there, hair crazy, in a green-and- maroon-striped bathrobe. I took a deep breath and opened the door.

“It’s six thirty in the morning, Savannah,” Mitch said through his teeth. His robe was too short, and I couldn’t stop staring at his knobby white knees. “On a Sunday.”

“Oh,” I said. “I hadn’t thought about it.” I wasn’t trying to be snotty; I really hadn’t thought about it. Waiting for a decent hour to vacuum didn’t fit into my preparation plan for zero hour. “I’m sorry, I have these people coming and I- ”

Mitch’s face was very red. “You can’t do this. You cannot do this!” His fists were tightly clenched. His breath was steaming from his mouth. “We’re trying to sleep, and that beast you have is keeping me awake.”

“Oh, like that rat of yours doesn’t yip all day long while I’m working.”

“Make him stop!” He waved his hands at me like a conductor trying to make an orchestra stop playing. “And stop vacuuming. Normal people do not make this kind of noise at six AM.”

“Well, the next time you and Gail are going at it, I’ll stop by to remind you what kind of noises normal people make, Mitch.”

“Get rid of him!” He was screaming. “Mr. Wright told you to get rid of him.”

“I have three weeks left. We’ll be gone before that,” I said, hoping it was true.

“Thank God!” he yelled.

I slammed the door and watched him out the peephole. His robe blew open when he got to the end of the stoop. He had the flattest ass I had ever seen, and it was so white the streetlight almost made it glow.