Slip of the Tongue

by Jessica Hawkins

  “Thanks. Never had this kind. Is it good?”

  “I wouldn’t know. I don’t drink a lot of beer.” I line up the vegetables and start chopping.

  It’s quiet for a few seconds, except for his gulp-gulping as he drinks and the tap-tap of my knife on the cutting board.

  “How is it?” I ask.

  “Just what I need. My apartment is depressingly alcohol-free at the moment.” He pulls out a chair, but seems to change his mind and stays standing. “I need to make a trip to the grocery store.”

  “It’s from Brooklyn Brewery. The beer.” I slide mushrooms from the board into a wok. “What brings you to Gramercy Park anyway?”

  He coughs. “Work.”

  I don’t ask what he does. I still don’t even know his name. “Are you new to the city?”

  “Actually, I went to NYU, just like you.”

  I look up from the bell pepper I’m about to julienne. “You did? When?”

  He shakes his head. “Don’t make me answer that,” he says, but he does anyway. “I graduated ten years ago.”

  “I’m almost there too.” For some reason, his green eyes sparkle, and I have to return to the vegetables to keep from getting flustered. “Then what?”

  “Then I did some things. Moved to the ’burbs. Now I’m back.”

  “Most people go to the suburbs and stay.”

  “I’m aware.” I sense a hint of bitterness, and then it’s gone. “I’m one of those rare birds who’s happy to be back in the chaos.”

  “Well, you picked a good neighborhood. I never want to live anywhere else.” I put the vegetables in the wok and get the chicken ready. It might not be enough food for him. One of the only things I really know about this man is that he has a large enough appetite to work his way through an entire meal group. You might guess it by his height and muscular physique, but there doesn’t seem to be an ounce of fat on him.

  “So, how do you even order everything on a menu?” I ask, pushing things around the pan with a spatula. I think I would’ve laughed my ass off to see it with my own eyes. “Do you start at the top and have the waitress write each thing down? Or does she just hand the cook a menu?”

  When he doesn’t respond, I turn around. He’s wandered over to the desk in the corner. There’s nothing special about it—it holds the typical office items. Neon Post-It notes, a mug of pens, a pile of mail. He isn’t looking at any of that, though.

  He picks up a framed photo of my husband and me on our wedding day. Nathan, tall and broad in his tuxedo, gazes down at me while I smile at the camera. Our dark hair and eyes complement each other and contrast my wedding gown.

  “Let me guess—your twin sister?” he asks.

  I glance at him. His green eyes, sweet and warm up until now, are narrowed on me. I’ve known him less than a day, but I can read the shift in his mood. Because I’m married? He shouldn’t be disappointed, but judging by his closed expression, I think he might be. If so, I’m not wrong that there’s been some strange electric charge between us today. And I wonder if I should’ve invited him in.

  My laugh is forced, uncomfortable. “No. That’s me.”

  “You didn’t mention—” He looks back at the frame. “Divorced?”

  “No.” I hold up my left hand and wiggle my fingers. “I’m wearing a ring.”

  He looks. “You weren’t earlier.”

  “This morning? I had gloves on. Or you mean after my shower?”

  He clears his throat and gently returns the photo to its spot. “Where is he?”

  I focus back on our dinner. “Not sure.”

  I haven’t checked my phone since before my shower. I forgot. Most likely, there’s a text waiting. I don’t know why Nathan continues to let me know where he is when he goes out, though. That small communication will probably shut down soon.

  “Either out with his friends or at a homeless shelter,” I guess. Realizing how that sounds, I quickly add, “Serving food, I mean.”

  “Of course he is,” he mutters. He comes back to my side of the kitchen. “Is it court mandated?”

  I smile, even though I’m not sure if he’s joking. “No. He volunteers once or twice a month.” It’s an automatic response, but come to think of it, it’s no longer accurate. Lately, he’s been there every week.

  Nate does good work as a grant writer for the Family-kind Association, a youth-oriented nonprofit with homeless shelters and soup kitchens around the city. Earlier this year, he turned down a promotion to Communications Director a few days after we found out about his dad’s lung cancer. Me, I sold out the first chance I got. I was offered a promotion months ago, and I accepted on the spot. I never had money growing up, and I want to help myself. Nathan never had money, and he wants to help others.

  My neighbor takes a swig of his beer—Nathan’s beer, actually. My husband brought it home from Brooklyn after a tour of the brewery this weekend. It occurs to me Nathan might not want this man in his kitchen drinking his beer. I brush the thought away. Unlike me, Nathan enjoys being social. If I let him, we’d have company over more often.

  “Does he normally go out on Monday nights?”

  “Mondays and Wednesdays he goes bowling with friends—sometimes he’ll go by the shelter first.”

  “And you stay here by yourself?”

  “Why not? I enjoy the alone time. I’ll read a book or whatever.” I don’t mention that whatever normally means watching Project Runway or binging on Netflix shows. For some reason, I don’t want him to think I’m a couch potato.

  “This happens two nights every week?” he asks.

  “Yes. And sometimes weekends.”

  “Weekends?” A pause. “What do you mean?”

  I shrug. “Like, some Sundays, he plays pick-up basketball.”

  His silence is telling. It encroaches on my good mood like fog. We never really agreed to weekends, Nathan and I. A year or so ago, I read somewhere separate hobbies are good for a relationship, and Nathan and I were always glued at the hip. Nathan didn’t like the idea of spending even one evening apart. Which is why I catch myself wondering when his absence spread into the weekend and became a regular thing.

  “And that works?” he interrupts my thoughts. “For your marriage?”

  I pull two plates from a cupboard. “Yes, I suppose it does.”

  “Really?” He sounds unconvinced. “You prefer to spend time away from each other . . .?”

  I set the dishes on the counter and pause. “When you put it that way, no.”

  “How else would you put it?”

  “We have our own lives.” And those separate lives are bleeding into places they shouldn’t. Like the bedroom. My husband hasn’t touched me in two months, and he hasn’t given me a reason why. When I ask, he shuts down, and I’m afraid pushing him will make it worse. But how can he stop wanting me all of a sudden, practically overnight? At first, I’d convinced myself it was stress. Unlike me or most people I know, Nathan gets emotionally attached to his work. I never thought it would last this long. It’s hard not to take it personally, two months without fucking.

  “What did you do this weekend?”

  “Yesterday, Nathan went beer tasting with friends. I went to a movie with my brother and his daughter. Nathan—that’s my husband. He hates matinees. He’d rather be outside.”

  “And you hate breweries?”

  “No.”

  “You hate his friends?”

  “No.” I dump stir-fry from the pan onto the plates. Ginger hears the scrape of the spatula and comes in to lie under the kitchen table. “Couples don’t need to spend every minute together. We can have our own lives.”

  He holds out his hands, and I pass him our meals. He sets the dishes down, opens the takeout menu drawer, and closes it. He finds the silverware in the next one.

  “You don’t need to—”

  “Will he mind that I’m here?” he asks.

  I open my mouth to respond. When it comes to other men, Nate usually just teases me. I give
it right back to him. Plenty of women have shown interest in him, some even in front of my face. I’ve never had to worry, though. “He’s not really the jealous type. I don’t think.”

  “You don’t think?” he asks. “Don’t you know?”

  “Not really. I don’t give him reason to be.” We look at each other a moment. My face warms. I don’t want anyone other than my husband. Nathan knows that. And I know he only wants me, even if he hasn’t shown it lately.

  “All right,” he says. “If he doesn’t mind, then I’ll stay.”

  I’m being silly. It means nothing that he’s here. Nathan would love to come home and meet a new neighbor our age. He’d probably invite him out. I wave him off. “Yes, of course you will. I insist.”

  Somehow, he’s already set the table with placemats, silverware, and napkins. I’m not used to having the table set for me. I’m not sure I even like it. Nathan loves to come in and start eating right away. He can never get enough of anything I make him.

  I refill my wine. My shoulders are loose. “Would you like another beer?”

  “Please.”

  I pass him a bottle, then top off each dish with cilantro and lemon juice.

  Once he’s opened his second beer, he takes a seat. My seat.

  I laugh, and he pinches his eyebrows together. “What?”

  “That’s where I sit,” I tease. “You claim to know me so well.”

  His mood visibly lightens. He smiles and stands, looking sheepish. “I knew that. I was just trying to shake things up.” He gestures behind me. “Aren’t you tired of looking into kitchen night after night? Why not give the living room a try?”

  The Pinot makes me giggly. “I don’t know . . .”

  “Come on.” He sits back down in my seat, newly confident in his decision. “You need a change of scenery.”

  “Do I?” I take Nathan’s chair. It’s strange to be in a different spot, looking at someone else. “It’s like Opposite World.”

  “I like it,” he says, peering at me. “Personally, I could get used to the view.”

  I look down at my food. Is he flirting? I can’t tell. I don’t trust my judgment. It’s been a long time since I flirted with anyone other than Nathan, and I know him so well, it’s easy to get him worked up. Or, it was. Until recently, I barely had to try.

  “I’m talking about the kitchen, of course,” he adds, his mouth quirking into a smile. “It’s a lovely room.”

  I half roll my eyes. Now, I hear it in his tone. He’s definitely being playful. “Are we going to eat sometime tonight?”

  “After you,” he invites. He waits for me to take the first bite. Judging by the way he digs in, I don’t have to ask if he likes it. “Oh,” he says, “and breakfast.”

  I stop. “Sorry?”

  “That’s how I ordered this morning. I pointed to the word on the menu and said, ‘I’ll take breakfast.’”

  “Just . . . breakfast? And she knew what you meant?”

  “I must’ve looked hungry.” He eats another forkful. “She knew.”

  I laugh with my mouth closed. For some reason, that’s funny to me. “So, if I’d come along, then what? ‘We’ll take two breakfasts?’”

  He shrugs. “Come with me next time, and we’ll see.”

  “All right,” I agree. I don’t mean it, but it’s fun to think about.

  He glances around the kitchen, chewing. “You do keep it cold in here. Not that I’m complaining.”

  “We don’t turn on the heater until November twenty-first.”

  He arches an eyebrow. “That’s specific. Why not the twentieth? Or the twenty-second?”

  “It’s kind of a tradition.”

  “Strange tradition.”

  “Our friends think so too.” I take a bite. The chicken is dry. I wonder if he notices, but I try not to look disappointed. “It’s something only Nate and I can appreciate. We spent our first three weeks here without heat.”

  “Are you kidding?”

  I smile down at my plate, shaking my head. “We slept on a mattress on the floor until our bed arrived.”

  Our first night in the apartment, we’d made love on the wood floor, then gone downstairs for food. On the same corner I stood on this morning, Nate had freed some curls from my knit cap and touched his lips all over my face. We’d walked across the street and eaten sunny-side-up eggs at one in the morning, bundled into one side of a booth at the diner.

  I swallow my food, chicken sticking in my throat. That seems like a lifetime ago now. Nathan’s been cold lately. Not toward others—just me. I’m still trying to figure it out. I don’t come from an affectionate family. Everything I know about love and true intimacy, I learned from Nate. It’s jarring to watch him take that away a little more each day. He’s told me never to give him space. He always said that was what came between his parents. I think he wants his space now.

  “What took so long?”

  I look up again, wondering if it’s pity I see in his eyes as he watches me. I sit up straighter. “You mean why did we sleep on the ground? The furniture store—”

  “No, I mean what took so long to get the heat fixed? I won’t last until next month with the heater blasting like it is. I have to stop what I’m doing every twenty minutes to stand by an open window.”

  I welcome the shift in subject, however small. I’d rather get wrapped up in his problems than my own. “What do you think’s wrong with it?”

  “I don’t know. I’d give it a look, but I don’t have my tools.”

  “Where are they?”

  “Greenwich.”

  “Oh.” I wait for him to explain. Instead, he takes a massive bite. Recalling our earlier conversation about the suburbs, I ask, “Connecticut?”

  He nods. After he swallows, he says, “I left the tools behind in case I have to fix anything up before the deal closes.”

  “You’re selling your house there?”

  “It’s in escrow.”

  He isn’t exactly volunteering information, but I’m curious. It is unusual to move to the suburbs on your own for your twenties and return out of the blue. “Why are you moving back?”

  “I miss it. Let me tell you, it’s a tough life here in the city, but at least it’s alive, not like Connecticut. Four years I went back and forth between Wall Street and Greenwich. It’s a grind.”

  “You work on Wall Street?” I set my fork down. Men in finance don’t spend their Monday mornings in t-shirts and shorts, and they don’t spend them in diners. I’m fairly certain they have more important things to do. “So you moved to be closer to work?”

  “No. I quit my job.”

  I tilt my head. If I was intrigued before, now I’m rapt. “You quit? Just like that?”

  He sits back in the chair and wipes his mouth with a napkin. “Pretty much.”

  “I thought you said you moved back to the city for work.”

  “I did, but not for that job,” he says quickly, confidently. “I’m here to make some career changes. Did you know commuting the way I was costs weeks of your life each year?”

  I raise my eyebrows at him. His expression is bright. “No. I didn’t.”

  He nods. “Four hundred and eighty hours a year. That’s almost three weeks. Time is our most precious resource, don’t you think? What can you do in three weeks?”

  I take a sip of my wine. I understand time best in segments. Eighteen years under my parents’ roof in New Jersey. Four years undergrad at NYU. Eight years bullshitting in marketing and PR. Seven years with Nate, five of them legally bound to him. Two months since he’s begun to pull away. Two months I’ve been utterly confused. Twelve hours I’ve known this man sitting across from me.

  “But you can relax on the subway and read the paper while you commute,” I point out. “Or if you’re driving, listen to NPR. Maybe an audiobook.”

  “It wasn’t a rhetorical question,” he says. “What have you done these last three weeks?”

  It’s embarrassing how hard I have to thi
nk. I can feel the lines deepening in my forehead, leaving their mark. Another way to measure time: wrinkles. “I secured one of my clients a significant feature in New York Magazine. I finished one of the books in the Game of Thrones series.” Or watched a season on HBO. Whatever. “I took my niece trick or treating.”

  “What else?”

  “That’s all I can think of.”

  “There must be more. They don’t have to be big things.”

  I roll a carrot over on the plate. I haven’t done anything worth mentioning the last three weeks. Spending Halloween with Andrew and Bell made me happy. Except that usually when I’m around Bell, Nathan is there. He adores and spoils her. He wants to see Bell more than we already do. Without him, what became painfully clear was his absence. And how I’ve failed Nathan because of what I haven’t given him. May never be able to give him.

  “What’s on your mind?” he asks. “You look sad.”

  I glance up at him. His voice is soft, but he doesn’t sweeten his words. Do I look sad, or does he sense it in me? Even if I tried, I couldn’t explain the tornado of emotions working its way through me. I don’t even really know what they are. Inadequacy? Hopelessness? This is what happens when I go where I shouldn’t. For a second, I wish Nathan were across the table. He knows our story. Except that he doesn’t—not everything. And the moment passes, because if he were here, I still wouldn’t tell him there’s a piece of the puzzle he doesn’t know about.

  Again, I try to think of something worth mentioning, and again, I come up short. “It is sad,” I say, “how much time we waste.”

  “I didn’t ask how you wasted time. What made you happy these last few weeks?”

  “Hanging out with my brother and his daughter. He’s single, so he doesn’t get a lot of help.” Ginger rolls onto her side at my feet. “Ginge and I have had more quality time together lately. Sometimes, it’s like she’s the only one who gets me.”

  “Why does anyone own a dog?” he asks. “For that reason, I think.”

  “Maybe.” His plate is empty. “There’s a little more in the wok,” I say. “Why don’t you take the leftovers?”

  “What about your husband?”