Manbuns & Martinis (Drinking #1.5)

by R. L. Griffin

  Hip hop flows through my headphones getting me in the mood to lift shit. I lay back on the bench, clear my mind of everything other than this weight and start my workout. One of my favorite parts of working out is losing myself in it. I’m not Brad Ellis, Texas A&M quarterback that had a career ending injury his sophomore year, I’m not the kid from the trailer park, I’m not the kid who didn’t graduate from college. I’m the badass who will bench more than you. I will find another monster in the gym and lift more than him, just because I can. I’ll sit next to him and out lift him and smile while doing it. Most of the time Duncan and I lift together, but I’ve got to squeeze this one in today.

  I’m on my last set when I see Duncan’s blue eyes over me to spot this last set. I’m trying to max out, to lift as much as I can lift one time, but it’s hard to do that if you’re by yourself. I grunt as I push the massive amount of weight close to the top and Duncan helps guide the bar back into it’s place.

  “Fuck dude,” Duncan looks at the plates on either side. “Why you doing that today? You’re going to die painting for four hours later.”

  “I’m hoping to get a massage later,” I say and I wink at him.

  “Oh, Mad around tonight?”

  “I hope so. I didn’t want to bother her this morning it was so early.”

  “I’m watching the Rangers later. I’m broke, so I’m going to just stay home with Snape.”

  “I hear you. If I don’t go to Mad’s I’ll be at home.” The end of the month is always hard for us, we’re both scraping to make ends meet. We eat as cheaply as we can and we don’t go out. The thing is, eating healthy is way more expensive than eating shit, it’s one of the reasons why America has an obesity problem. When people are busting their ass to make ends meet and they don’t have time to prepare a healthy meal, but can feed your family a full meal from a fast food restaurant for twenty dollars and five minutes, which do you think they are going to do?

  Last night was an exception to our general rule.

  I wipe my face with the end of my tank top that reads “Sun’s Out Guns Out.” I know, it’s super cheesy, but I love it.

  “I didn’t tell you yesterday, but Megan is getting married.”

  “She’s marrying that douche with the wine place?”

  I nod, sweat dripping from my arms onto the mat.

  “Interesting, she didn’t seem like the snotty rich girl to me,” he says walking back to where his client was drinking water.

  I wave at him as I walk over to another bench for chest flyes. “Me either,” I mutter.

  Later that night, Snape is standing on my lap with his front paws on my chest as I rub his head. Once I got home from my painting job, I laid on the floor of my bedroom for an hour before Snape had woken me with sloppy kisses up my nose. I’m currently on the couch with the television on, but not really watching anything. Exhaustion permeates every cell of my being right now. I’m ruined for the day. I look at my phone and see no messages. It’s Saturday night and I wonder what Mad is doing and why she didn’t respond to my text.

  The front door opens interrupting me from going on her Instagram to see what she’s doing. She didn’t tell me she would be busy today.

  “Hey man,” I call as Duncan walks in with a bag of groceries. “You brought food?”

  “Yeah, I figured you’d be tired and starving. I also got vodka and olives.”

  Duncan is a book cover model as well. He’s actually the one that got me hooked up with Charlie, his manager. He sold a cover to an author for a science fiction sort of book for young adults and his fucking face and torso are all over social media. Duncan’s blond hair and blue eyes give him a very all-American look that people love. On his first cover they were photoshopped to look alien green.

  “Vodka and olives?”

  “Well, we can’t really eat carbs and I needed a drink, so martini it is.” He starts pulling out things from the bag. I’d get up and help, but I don’t want to and the effort it would take is too monumental at the moment.

  “You got tomorrow off?” I ask him. He works at a cell phone company as well as being a personal trainer.

  He nods. “You?”

  “I’ve got Nadine and Jasper tomorrow.” They are a couple who workout together, both extremely out of shape, but really ready to change their lifestyles. I enjoy training them. I hope I can help change their lives. That’s what it is you know, changing your life to include being healthy. It takes determination and drive, but it’s worth it. You have to break years of habits and be willing to make it be a priority, if it’s not a priority people will go right back to being unhealthy the second it’s inconvenient.

  “Well, that’ll be like a break, right?”

  “Yep, two hours of my time will be fine. You want to workout after? They’re coming in starting at 1:00.”

  “Sure, dude. What are you working?”

  “Legs,” I answer. “I can hardly move my arms, so tomorrow will be rough. What are you making me?”

  “Cabbage rolls.”

  I chuckle. He’s obsessed with cooking shows and tries different recipes all the time. He’s going to make a man a great wife. I kid, I kid. I don’t understand his obsession. Especially when we are cutting calories so we can look as cut as possible and he’s over there watching chefs cook mac & cheese and shit. I would want to die.

  “No carbs.”

  “Sounds great,” I say, meaning it. Anything I don’t have to cook sounds good to me. I was hoping that Mad would cook for me and then ride me so I didn’t have to do much.

  “I guess Mad was a no go?”

  I shrug. I’m not entitled to anything with her. I know that, I just don’t like it.

  “She upset about next week?”

  “Huh,” I grunt sitting up and looking at him.

  “You’re a huge dick, you know that right?” He doesn’t even look at me when he asks this question.

  “And you aren’t?”

  “No, I’m not a dick like this.” Duncan pulls out pots and lets them fall on the counter and slams cabinets.

  “Dude, you’re acting like a bitch right now slamming things in the kitchen.” He ignores me.

  As much as it pains me, I move Snape from my lap, stand up and walk over to the breakfast bar at the kitchen counter. “What’s your deal?”

  “I mean Ellis, you fuck people at signings.” He finally looks at me, exasperated. “You guys fight every time you get back and she always gets hurt. Then I have to hear about what a huge dick you are for hours.”

  “We aren’t exclusive.” The image of Mad crying last summer flashes through my mind.

  “That doesn’t mean someone you’ve been fucking for years wants to see it all over the Internet.” He fills up a pot with water and puts it on the stove. “Hours, dude. Hours.”

  I sit on the edge of the bar stool. “Do you think that’s what this is about?”

  “Fucking dense asshole,” he mutters as he begins cutting vegetables.

  “Don’t act like you would’ve known if she hadn’t have told you. So when did she tell you?” My eyes narrow at my best friend.

  “I’ve known her longer than you and we’re friends…”

  “When,” I growl at him.

  “We had breakfast.”

  “And…”

  “And nothing.” He stops what he’s doing and looks up at me. “We had breakfast and every time you go to one of these things it’s the same thing for her, you fuck different women and have pictures of women pawing you all over the place.” Duncan talks with his hands so onions fly off the knife as he tells me all this.

  “You do that too,” I counter.

  “I’m not putting my dick in her after other people,” he says slowly like I’m stupid.

  “Wait, what’re you saying? She doesn’t want to be with me anymore?”

  He shakes his head back and forth, puts down the knife and starts browning the meat with his back to me.

  “Duncan,” I press.

  �
��I’m not getting anywhere near that explosion.”

  I open Instagram and see she’s at a restaurant downtown, it’s captioned “Date Night.” A light bulb goes on with a bang.

  “She’s seeing someone else.”

  “She’s not seeing you.” The meat is sizzling, but I’m not hungry anymore.

  “But…”

  “You say it all the time, y’all aren’t exclusive. Don’t be a dick about it.”

  I open my mouth to say something, then close it. He’s right. She’s right. She hasn’t even told me and I’m not sure I have a problem with that because what would I say? What could I say? Date me? I don’t think I’m ready for that because she’s amazing and I’m trying, but I’m not there yet. You’re wondering what exactly I’m trying to do? All I can say is that I want to be better when we give it a real shot. You know, have my shit together. Be able to take her on a proper date without worrying about how I’m going to pay rent after paying a hundred dollars on a nice meal. Now it’s probably too late.

  “I’ve known you both for most of our lives, don’t do what you’re thinking about doing. Give it some time. She knows what y’all are. I think she just wishes it were different. Because it’s not, she’s seeing other people.”

  I nod. Duncan doesn’t even know that eventually I will try to be with her, I just don’t see her wanting me yet. She likes expensive things, nice dinners and wine. I saw her buy a bottle of wine that was sixty dollars and all I kept thinking was she is going to drink sixty dollars.

  “I think Megan was the worst really because y’all are still friends.”

  I nod again.

  “It’s usually just the pictures with you and all the women from the signings she has to deal with, but Vegas was different. You know it and she knows it. I think it changed things. I mean y’all didn’t talk for weeks. I’m just saying.”

  “That was a year ago.”

  “You still talk to Megan.”

  “She’s getting married.”

  “Does Mad know that?”

  I walk over to the couch and slump back against the cushions and remember how upset Mad was when I got home from Vegas.

  Duncan and I wait at the curb of the airport for thirty minutes past our arrival time when I finally get in touch with Mad.

  “Hey, are you on the way?” I ask when she picks up.

  “No.”

  “No?” I look over at Duncan. He flags down a cab sighing heavily.

  “No.”

  “Mad, I thought you said you’d come get us today?” I’m confused because I swear we talked about this.

  “Fuck you,” she spits and hangs up.

  My head snaps back like I’ve actually been slapped. I stare at the screen in disbelief.

  “What’s happening?” Duncan asks as we throw our bags in the trunk of a cab.

  We move to the backseat and I slide in. My phone buzzes and Megan’s picture where she’s humping my leg pops up. I decline the call.

  “I don’t know,” I say honestly. “She told me to fuck off.”

  Duncan closes his eyes. “You guys are fucking exhausting, either be with each other or don’t.”

  “We aren’t exclusive.”

  “I know, dude. I know.”

  I give the cabdriver Mad’s address, hoping she’s there.

  “I see things hitting your face in your future,” Duncan quips without opening his eyes. We had to leave Vegas super early for our flight, it was the cheapest we could get. Duncan’s trip was paid for by an author, but I was there on my own dime. Charlie said it’d be good marketing to meet authors.

  I go through my phone looking at pictures of Megan and me this past week. We had a blast. She took me to the show Zumanity and we were so hot for each other afterward we were almost naked by the time we got back to the hotel room. That show is like elegant porn. I’d go see it again. I took pictures last night of her with ice cream all over her, not obscene, but you could tell she was nude.

  I close my eyes until we reach Mad’s house. Her garage is open and her car is there so I wave the cab off with Duncan in the backseat shaking his head.

  When I open the door to Mad’s kitchen she’s at her laptop, her blonde hair piled on her head and her glasses are on. She glances up at me, sheer disgust is evident on her face.

  “Get the fuck out of my house,” she says calmly.

  “But…”

  “Ellis. We’re done. I…”

  I walk over to her and drop to my knees. “What’s going on Mad? Talk to me.”

  “Talk to you?”

  I nod glancing at her computer screen. She’s on my Instagram account and reading through all the comments on pictures I’ve been tagged in. I blink as I notice that Megan is in a ton of candid shots taken by people I don’t know.

  “Talk to you?” she repeats.

  “Yeah, I mean what’s going on? Why’re you so pissed?” I put my left hand on hers and she throws it off, gets out the chair and walks into the den.

  “Mad, please just talk to me. Is it Megan?”I follow her.

  “Megan,” she spits as she turns and faces me. “Is it Megan?” she mocks.

  This is one of those times where I just don’t get women. Obviously I’ve done something, but I honestly don’t know why she’s so mad. I stare at her. Her chest is heaving in anger and a crimson color is spreading up her neck, which happens to her when she gets really mad. Before I realize what she’s doing she throws a picture at me. I barely duck quick enough when it crashes into the wall then shatters on the floor. I hold up my hands in surrender.

  “Okay, okay. You’re mad, I just need to know how to fix it.”

  “I don’t think you can fix what an idiot I’ve been.” Her eyes fill with tears and this makes her even madder if that’s possible at this point.

  “Mad…” I take a step closer to her.

  “Don’t,” she warns. “I literally hate you right now and I’m pretty pissed at myself. Every time I think it’ll be different. That I can handle it and then I see you and this whore. I can tell you like her. People think she’s your girlfriend. Are you dating her? Do you like her?”

  “I do…” I admit wondering what I’m walking into with my words.

  “Well, you can just go fuck her!” she yells across the room. “Take your dick and leave me alone Ellis. For real this time. I can’t even look at you.”

  “But…”

  “GET OUT!” The force of her words almost knocks me over. We never fight like this. I’ve never seen her so upset and I want to soothe her, to fix it somehow, but I know I’m the last one who could help.

  I take a step back. “I’m leaving.” I take steps back carefully away from her like she’s a wild animal. I glance at the broken frame on the floor, the glass scattered all over our faces. The picture was from homecoming my freshman year of college. It’s one of my favorite memories. Her face is close to mine and I can almost still feel her breath on my ear. I look up to see her gaze, full of fire and resolve. “Don’t...” I start.

  “Get the fuck out of my life Ellis.” Her words are quiet this time, like it’s breaking her heart to say them.

  I was going to tell her don’t do this. Don’t throw me away. I can be better. I will be better, but the resolute way she stands shows me she is actually done with me and it’s a fear I’ve had since I was seventeen.

  After dinner, I go to bed early, I’m exhausted and just want to sleep for twelve hours. Snape follows me and jumps onto my bed, making himself comfortable on the pillow next to mine. I understand this isn’t okay with some people. You won’t be in my bed. I secretly think this is why Mad always wants me to come to her place, that and the fact she owns her house and doesn’t have a roommate. Snape snuggles into her pillow when she stays over, drools all over her and it makes me...well, whatever. It doesn’t matter what it makes me anymore, she wants to see other people and I don’t really blame her.

  I take a selfie of Snape on my pillow, me with no shirt on, but flexing a bit an
d looking exhausted. I post it to Instagram with the caption, “Long Saturday, I’m exhausted. Keep up the hustle.”

  Comments pop up quickly:

  “I’ll come keep you warm.” @sheila49

  “If you look like that when you’re tired I can be there in 30 minutes.” @readingmomma

  “I love your dog Snape. The dog and the name. Look me up when you’re in Dallas.” @longhorn245

  “Can I pay you to take me to prom?” @harriotg

  “Marry me.” @ellisland69

  Oh Ellisland69, what would I do without you asking me to marry you, I think. My smile is genuine. It’s fun to see comments, but also sort of creepy. I try not to get all caught up in it, you know?

  By the way, you read that right, Mad is twenty-four, works at her dad’s real estate company and owns her own house. She also has a Mercedes that makes me hard whenever I’m in it. I message her.

  Hey Mad. I hope you had a good time tonight. We should talk before I leave Thursday.

  I see those three little dots that mean she’s typing something.

  I stare at the message for a good five minutes before I give up and fall asleep.

  Hours later, Snape shifting on the pillow causes me to crack open my eyes. It is still dark outside and I sigh. Before I close my eyes again, I check my phone to see if Mad messaged me back. She hasn’t, but Megan has sent me four messages.

  I’m just going to pretend you aren’t ignoring me today.

  You know I love it when you ignore me

  Meat!!! Tell me congratu-fucking-lations

  I’m flying there to beat your taut ass

  I laugh out loud and roll away from my dog’s ass, which is currently in my face. As I close my eyes, I hear my phone vibrate.

  We should talk. We’re usually not too good at that.

  Mad’s words aren’t the reassurance I wanted about us, but I guess I had tricked myself into thinking she was happy with our arrangement. Isn’t that what we do? Live in our little world of denial when everything seems fine. I should’ve done something different after last year. She got over Megan, but whenever her name comes up I see fire in Mad’s eyes. I blow out a breath and text her back.