Sweet Serendipity (3 page)

“Let me ask you something. Are you happy, Becca? When you are with Jack, does your stomach do flips? When he touches you, does your heart race? When you look at him, are you filled with such longing that you cannot breathe without him?” Tasha snapped.

“Tasha…I’ve been with him since I was eighteen. I think over time you fall into a comfortable place,” Rebecca answered.

“Not what I asked you, girl. I guess what that means is your answer is
no
. So, before you criticize me for helping one of my closest friends, I want you to just relax tonight, and don’t think about tomorrow,” Tasha said.

“Well, don’t look at me. I’m like a beached whale. I’m not jumping anyone,” Emily added as she rubbed her baby bump. They all laughed again.

Tasha grabbed her glass and strutted her way over to the bar. She immediately took charge and introduced herself to the guys. Rebecca and Emily lingered behind, watching her in action.

“I don’t think she is necessarily wrong, Becca. You haven’t been happy in years. I’m not saying go to bed with someone, I am saying keep your eyes open. Perhaps Mr. Right could be nearby.” Emily told her friend.

“Would you cheat on James?” Rebecca asked.

“I don’t need to. He keeps me pregnant, but seriously, we can’t seem to keep our hands off of one another. When he does touch me, I can’t get enough. When we talk, I just want to take in every word,” Emily said.

Rebecca nearly spit her wine out. She had to cover her mouth to keep it closed. “He’s over in Iraq in the Army for Christ’s sake. It’s a little different than what Jack and I have built.”

“I’m not saying it is or isn’t. I have been your friend since the very beginning of your marriage. There were never sparks or fireworks. I think you just settled for the sake of settling. Ask yourself, if you didn’t have kids with him, would you be with him?”

“I…I don’t know,” Rebecca answered.

“That’s the point. I think you need to make some changes in your life. You have me and you have Tasha. You won’t be alone if that’s what you are afraid of.”

“I don’t know what to say. I wasn’t expecting my girl’s night out to be an ambush of my best friends trashing my marriage.”

Tasha floated back over to the table and helped Emily to her feet. She then grabbed Rebecca’s arm and dragged her up out of the chair.

“You have to come and at least say thank you for your wine.” She flung her hair over her shoulders and straightened her skirt. “It’s the lady thing to do.”

She dragged her friends over to the two guys waiting at the bar. Rebecca didn’t want to go, but Tasha wasn’t going to take no for an answer. She knew she was going to have to be Tasha’s wing man tonight. She reluctantly walked to the bar to say thank you for the wine, but when one of the guys turned around to face her she was left speechless. One look at his bright blue eyes, and she forgot what she was going to say. Blue eyes stood up and extended his hand to her.

“Hello. I’m Ethan,” He said to her.

“Ethan here is into art. He’s the one who sent the wine to the table, for you,” Tasha explained.

“Hi Ethan,” Emily said. “Thank you for the Shirley Temple. I haven’t had one in a long time. I forgot just how yummy they are,” Emily said.

Ethan smiled at Emily and his smile took Rebecca’s breath away. He turned his attention back to Rebecca and asked, “And you are?”

“Married…I’m married.” She stumbled on her own words.

Tasha put her arm around Rebecca and shook her.

“Ah, it’s just a legality.”

She smiled at Ethan and then whispered to her friend, “What the hell is wrong with you? Did you not see how hot he is?”

“Tasha, I can’t do this. I have to go.” Rebecca turned around and hurried out of the restaurant to the sidewalk.

Tasha turned back to the group.

“Ha-ha, she’s just in denial. Excuse me for just a minute.” She grabbed Emily’s arm and the two girls hurried out onto the sidewalk to find Rebecca.

Rebecca took one look at them and shook her head.

“No! Don’t say anything. It doesn’t matter how unhappy I am. I am married. I take my vows seriously.”

Emily’s mouth fell open as she pointed across the street, and stuttered as she spoke, “Um, apparently
he
doesn’t.” She pointed across the street to a little restaurant called The Crow’s Nest Lounge, where she spotted Jack cozily sharing a plate of food with a young, perky blonde. Rebecca felt her heart drop. She now had her irrefutable proof that he was in fact seeing someone else.

Ethan and his friend walked out on the sidewalk so that his friend could smoke a cigarette. He noticed the girls talking animatedly and pointing across the street. He tried to keep his distance; he pretty much figured that he could put the pieces together about what was going on, and although he felt bad for her situation, he was glad that it meant the door wasn’t slammed shut for him.

“What do I do? Do I go over there? Do I wait?” Rebecca asked.

“You need to march your ass over there and confront his sorry ass. Give me a dollar,” Tasha said.

“What?” She looked at her friend strangely.

“Give me a dollar so you can retain me. As of this moment, I am your divorce lawyer,” Tasha told her.

Rebecca stormed across the street. She told herself she wouldn’t cry. She told herself that she deserved better than a husband who would sneak around behind her back. She entered the lounge and walked right past the host who tried to stop her. Tasha put her hand up and swung her neck around.

“Oh no you don’t, you can just keep your scrawny ass right there. This is personal.”

The host looked at her with complete humiliation written across his face, and decided to turn back to the menus that he had been organizing.

Rebecca walked through the bar and out onto the patio. She approached her husband’s table. He didn’t see her coming until it was too late. She couldn’t help but notice the sexy smile that he was giving the blonde, it was a smile she hadn’t seen in years, and here he was smiling at some other woman the way he used to with her.

He looked over and saw his wife standing beside him. Rebecca thumped her pocket book on her thigh.

“So…this is you working late, you bastard.”

“Rebecca…wow, you look…I um,” He couldn’t answer her. “I’m sorry.”

“You’re sorry? Eighteen years, Jack, eighteen years I have been faithful to you. We have a family. How could you do this to me?”

The blonde sat there shocked to be in the middle of all of it. Jack stood up and placed his napkin on the table.

“Rebecca, here is not the place, there are people staring at us.”

“I don’t give a shit, Jack. I’m your wife.”

“You don’t want to do this here.”

“I’m not doing it at all. I want you out. I’ll be at Tasha’s tonight. I want all your stuff out of my house this weekend. The kids are away, so they won’t see any of this.”

“You don’t mean this. It’s my house, too.”

“You should have thought it through before you did this.” She brought Tasha forward and continued, “You remember my oldest friend Tasha, right? Well she’s my lawyer and first thing Monday she’ll be filing for divorce. I suggest that you don’t contest any agreement she comes up with considering she is witnessing all of this.”

“Rebecca,, no!” Jack said as she walked away.

They walked back across the street. Rebecca was shaking, but a part of her felt relieved that it was out in the open. No more wondering or worrying. No more second-guessing.

“Holy shit, Becca, that was so awesome. You stood up to him like a champ,” Emily told her.

“I have to admit that I feel pretty liberated,” Rebecca said.

“Well, babe, you should. Let’s go get you shit-faced. I think you deserve it,” Tasha said.

They walked over to Stingray’s Lounge, where Tasha slammed a fifty on the counter.

“Two shots of tequila, por favor, and keep them coming,” She called out to the bartender.

The bartender smiled at Tasha as he poured two shot glasses. Tasha handed one to Rebecca. They clinked the glassed together and downed the golden liquid. Tasha slammed the shot glass on the bar, and the bartender filled them back up and left the bottle on the bar.

He looked over at Emily and said, “You are driving, right?”

She rubbed her belly and said, “Yeah, obviously.” He walked off to help the next customer and Tasha and Rebecca downed two more shots of Tequila.

“I have to admit to you, Becca, that I never liked Jack. Is it OK to say that now? I always thought you were way too good for him,” Tasha told her.

“You couldn’t have told me eighteen years ago? You wait until I’m practically middle-aged and washed up?” Rebecca said.

“You are hardly middle-aged, or washed up.” She grabbed Rebecca’s arms and held them up. “Look at you, you are totally hot.” She looked over Rebecca’s shoulder and beamed a huge smile with her pearly whites. “I’m obviously not the only one who thinks so, either.”

“Huh?” Rebecca began to say as Tasha turned her around to look. Walking over to them was Ethan from The East Bay Grille. Again, Rebecca took a deep breath. She had never seen someone with such beautiful eyes. The contrast to his raven-colored hair only made them that much brighter. He smiled as he approached her.

“It seems I never did get your name before,” he said to her.

She shook her head ever so slightly and grinned.

“Rebecca, but my friends call me Becca.”

He took her hand in his and kissed it.

“Hello, Becca, it’s nice to finally meet you. Can I buy you a drink?”

Tasha pushed her toward him.

“Yeah, go ahead. I’m just going to hang out over here with Emily and flirt with the bartender. Go, go for God’s sake,” Tasha demanded.

Rebecca and Ethan sat in a corner seat by the end of the bar. Her head was feeling a little tipsy from the tequila, but she had never felt so light and free. She clung to his every word as he spoke. He was four years younger than her. He had moved around a lot, ‘painting the world’ as he called it. He had been to Plymouth many times while growing up and always seemed to find his way back.

“It’s America’s hometown. This is where it all started. The history alone is fascinating. I’m looking into opening a shop here. Maybe settle down,” Ethan said.

“Oh, have you ever been married? Do you have kids?” Rebecca asked him.

“No to both, not that I am against either of them, it just hasn’t been in the cards for me
yet.”

It was the way he emphasized ‘yet,’ that sent chills through her body. She was thirty-seven, she didn’t see any kids in her future, and she’d been there and done that. She had her children.

She loved looking at the beautiful man sitting in front of her. She wondered why he was wasting his time talking to her; he could have any of the young little things running around in the bar half naked. She talked herself out of the floating high that she was feeling. She felt like she just snapped back into reality, and her reality was that she should just go.

“What just happened, Becca?” Ethan asked her.

“I think I should go, Ethan. It’s been really nice talking to you. Maybe I’ll see you around.” She got up and hurried out the door.

Tasha and Emily stood up and gathered their things. Ethan looked at them and shrugged his shoulders. Tasha walked up to him and handed him a piece of paper with Becca’s phone number on it.

“Did I do something wrong?” he asked her.

“No. She’s just been off the scene for a long time. She just got spooked. I’d take that as a good sign,” Tasha told him. “Give her some time and then call her.”

“I plan to. I really like her,” he said to Tasha.

“Good.” Tasha turned and winked at the bartender as she walked out the door to meet her friends. She caught up to Emily and Becca who were sitting on a bench the next block over.

“What the hell was that, Becca?” Tasha shot out at her. “You had a perfectly good, wicked hot guy totally into you and you walked away.”

“It’s wrong. I just caught my husband with someone. It’s just not right. Besides, he’s younger than me. He could have anyone in there. He doesn’t need a washed up old lady.”

“Yeah well, he apparently wanted you, so what is the problem?” Tasha snapped.

“The timing is wrong. I’m not even separated. I haven’t even told my kids. I can’t even think about another man.”

“No offense, but I wasn’t thinking that you needed another man, but I was thinking you do need to get laid. I wasn’t trying to marry you off, just loosen you up a little.”

“I kinda have to agree with Tasha on this one, Becca. You are a great mother, and you were a great wife, regardless of him being a louse. When is the last time you felt like a woman? Go do something that is meaningless and crazy for just you,” Emily told her.

“No! I just want to go. Can we please just go?” She pleaded with her friends.

They agreed that Rebecca wasn’t ready. They didn’t want to push her. They walked down the street to where they parked. They got into Emily’s car and drove back to Tasha’s house. Rebecca crashed on the guest room bed and grumbled.

“Oh God, I have to tell the kids.”

“Just get some rest, Becca. Your kids aren’t going to be as surprised as you think they will be. They are pretty smart, and it doesn’t take a genius to know how unhappy you are. Good night, babe. Tomorrow is another day.”

Rebecca stayed at Tasha’s until Sunday afternoon. She didn’t want to take any chances of running into Jack, she didn’t want a confrontation, and she didn’t want to confuse the situation any more than it already was. She knew the kids would be home by five, so she planned on arriving at four thirty.

Tasha pulled into Rebecca’s driveway and put the car in park. They sat, staring at the house.

“Do you want me to hang out while you tell the kids?” Tasha asked her.

“No, I think it is better if I do this alone. Thank you, though. You know I love you,” Rebecca told her.

“I know. I love you too. Now go, call me if you need me.”

Rebecca waved goodbye and ran into her house. At first glance, it looked as though everything was still the same. Upon further investigation she noticed little things missing. The household tools that he kept in a box under the sink were gone. The jacket that he kept drooped over the office chair was gone.
Strange
, she thought,
how something so minuscule can have such a big impact
. A simple sweatshirt was missing and her heart sank.