gotta be hard for you.”
His kindness made me sob harder. “I can’t believe she’d go to Hawaii,” I said, hyperventilating. “What kind of person does that? I hate her! I want her to die!”
“You don’t mean that,” Marcus said.
“Fine. Maybe not death. But I want her to get a bad case of cystic acne that Accutane won’t cure,” I said, thinking that incurable acne would actually be worse than death.
Marcus put his arm around me as we jaywalked across Sixtieth Street, narrowly escaping a delivery guy on a bike. “Just forget about them, Darce. What does it matter what they do?”
“It matters!” I sobbed, thinking that there was no way around it: Dex and Rachel were a couple. I couldn’t pretend otherwise. A wave of buyer’s remorse washed over me. For the first time, I started to wonder if I should have stayed with Dex—if only to keep this from happening with Rachel. When my affair with Marcus began, the grass seemed so much greener with him. But after watching my former fiance furniture-shop, Dexter’s pastures seemed blissfully bucolic.
Marcus hailed a cab, and then helped me inside. I cried the whole way down Park Avenue, picturing Rachel and Dex in all of the scenes that I had studied from our honeymoon brochures: the two of them in a Jacuzzi sipping champagne… at a luau grinning over a roasted pig amid native dancers twirling flames… frolicking in turquoise water… having sex under a coconut tree.
I remembered saying to Dex that we were a better-looking couple than any of the featured honeymooners in those brochures. Dex had laughed and asked me how I got to be so modest.
“Can we go to Hawaii on our honeymoon?” I asked Marcus when we arrived back at his apartment.
“Whatever you want,” he said, sprawling on his bed. He motioned for me to join him.
“We should go somewhere even more exotic,” I said. “Dex picked Hawaii, and if you ask me, Hawaii is a trite choice.”
“Yeah,” he said, wearing his “I want sex” expression. “Everyone goes to Hawaii. Now c’mere.”
“Where will we go, then?” I asked Marcus as I reluctantly lay down next to him.
“Turkey. Greece. Bali. Fiji. Wherever you want.” You promise?
“Yeah,” he said, pulling me on top of him.
“And can we get a new, big apartment?” I asked, looking around at his stark white walls, his overflowing closet, and his hulking stereo equipment belching wires all over the scratched parquet floors, “Sure.”
I smiled a sad but hopeful smile.
“But in the meantime,” he said, “I know how to make you feel better.”
“Just one sec,” I said, as I picked up the cordless phone next to his bed.
Marcus sighed and gave me an exasperated look. “Who are you calling? Don’t you call them!”
“I’m not calling them. I’m over them,” I lied. “I’m calling Crate and Barrel. I want that table.”
Rachel may have stolen Dex and my trip to Hawaii, but I was sure as hell going to have a nicer table.
But even the table (which was in stock) and sex with Marcus (which was incredible) did nothing to repair my mood. I just couldn’t believe that Rachel and Dex were actually together—that their relationship was real. Real enough to go shopping for couches together. Real enough to go to Hawaii.
And from that day forward, I was totally obsessed with Rachel and Dex. They were two people cut entirely from my life, yet from my perspective, the three of us had never been so inextricably and permanently bound together.
----
twelve
Things only got worse when I turned thirty. I woke up on the morning of my birthday to my first dose of morning sickness. I was in bed with Marcus, on the side farthest from the bathroom, and barely made it over him to the toilet before I puked up the fajitas I had eaten for dinner the night before at Rosa Mexicano. I flushed, rinsed my mouth with Listerine, and brushed my teeth. Another wave overcame me and more red and yellow bits of pepper descended. I flushed, rinsed,
His kindness made me sob harder. “I can’t believe she’d go to Hawaii,” I said, hyperventilating. “What kind of person does that? I hate her! I want her to die!”
“You don’t mean that,” Marcus said.
“Fine. Maybe not death. But I want her to get a bad case of cystic acne that Accutane won’t cure,” I said, thinking that incurable acne would actually be worse than death.
Marcus put his arm around me as we jaywalked across Sixtieth Street, narrowly escaping a delivery guy on a bike. “Just forget about them, Darce. What does it matter what they do?”
“It matters!” I sobbed, thinking that there was no way around it: Dex and Rachel were a couple. I couldn’t pretend otherwise. A wave of buyer’s remorse washed over me. For the first time, I started to wonder if I should have stayed with Dex—if only to keep this from happening with Rachel. When my affair with Marcus began, the grass seemed so much greener with him. But after watching my former fiance furniture-shop, Dexter’s pastures seemed blissfully bucolic.
Marcus hailed a cab, and then helped me inside. I cried the whole way down Park Avenue, picturing Rachel and Dex in all of the scenes that I had studied from our honeymoon brochures: the two of them in a Jacuzzi sipping champagne… at a luau grinning over a roasted pig amid native dancers twirling flames… frolicking in turquoise water… having sex under a coconut tree.
I remembered saying to Dex that we were a better-looking couple than any of the featured honeymooners in those brochures. Dex had laughed and asked me how I got to be so modest.
“Can we go to Hawaii on our honeymoon?” I asked Marcus when we arrived back at his apartment.
“Whatever you want,” he said, sprawling on his bed. He motioned for me to join him.
“We should go somewhere even more exotic,” I said. “Dex picked Hawaii, and if you ask me, Hawaii is a trite choice.”
“Yeah,” he said, wearing his “I want sex” expression. “Everyone goes to Hawaii. Now c’mere.”
“Where will we go, then?” I asked Marcus as I reluctantly lay down next to him.
“Turkey. Greece. Bali. Fiji. Wherever you want.” You promise?
“Yeah,” he said, pulling me on top of him.
“And can we get a new, big apartment?” I asked, looking around at his stark white walls, his overflowing closet, and his hulking stereo equipment belching wires all over the scratched parquet floors, “Sure.”
I smiled a sad but hopeful smile.
“But in the meantime,” he said, “I know how to make you feel better.”
“Just one sec,” I said, as I picked up the cordless phone next to his bed.
Marcus sighed and gave me an exasperated look. “Who are you calling? Don’t you call them!”
“I’m not calling them. I’m over them,” I lied. “I’m calling Crate and Barrel. I want that table.”
Rachel may have stolen Dex and my trip to Hawaii, but I was sure as hell going to have a nicer table.
But even the table (which was in stock) and sex with Marcus (which was incredible) did nothing to repair my mood. I just couldn’t believe that Rachel and Dex were actually together—that their relationship was real. Real enough to go shopping for couches together. Real enough to go to Hawaii.
And from that day forward, I was totally obsessed with Rachel and Dex. They were two people cut entirely from my life, yet from my perspective, the three of us had never been so inextricably and permanently bound together.
----
twelve
Things only got worse when I turned thirty. I woke up on the morning of my birthday to my first dose of morning sickness. I was in bed with Marcus, on the side farthest from the bathroom, and barely made it over him to the toilet before I puked up the fajitas I had eaten for dinner the night before at Rosa Mexicano. I flushed, rinsed my mouth with Listerine, and brushed my teeth. Another wave overcame me and more red and yellow bits of pepper descended. I flushed, rinsed,
Similar Books
