Sail (Wake #2)

by M. Mabie

  One of my fears was that she didn’t feel like she could talk to me. That had always been when our relationship—or whatever you call it—ran off the tracks and crashed.

  We’d somehow get back on, and then wreck ourselves all over again. Okay. I could see where maybe some professional help might be good for her—and hopefully us, and therefore, me.

  I continued, “You know you can talk to me about stuff, right? I want to be the one you come to when you’ve got a problem. Does that make sense?”

  “What types of problems are you qualified to handle, Dr. Moore?” She turned on her seductive phone-speak at just the right time. Or the wrong time, because my fucking point was that we could really talk, but if this made her feel better—so be it. I’d have to come back to the serious part of where our conversation was going, because she masterfully knew how to distract me

  And, Dr. Moore? I liked that.

  “Oh, lots of things. Dry nipples. I’m especially good at fixing that. What else?” My back met the bed and I finally started to relax about the psychiatrist subject. In the back of my mind, I heard a voice say I was a failure in the relationship department once again. But loud and clear, right up front, was a voice that said I wanted to chill out and talk some dirty things over with my honeybee. “I have a doctorate in masturbation. I’m pretty much the world’s leading mind on the subject. Do any of these things appeal to your needs?”

  “I’m sure you’re overqualified for my issues.” Her laugh was sincere.

  We chatted a little about masturbation, which led into a rather lengthy discussion about monkeys at the zoo and then we were right back where we started. Her seeing the doctor. But like usual, after we talked for a while and found our footing, it was easier the second time around.

  “I know I was joking before, but I was a little serious too. I want you to talk to me when things are on your mind. I might be okay at it.”

  “Thank you,” she graciously said. “Same for you, if you ever need to talk about stuff. I know I’ve done a lot and you probably want some answers. I guess I need some too. About myself. Why did I do all that? Why didn’t I just do what felt right? That’s the part that scares me. I don’t want to mess this up again. Not after everything I put you through. Us. Hell, everybody through. I have to do better. I’m going to do better.”

  Her soft, sleepy voice showed me she was nervous, but okay. And if she continued to tell me things as they were happening, I thought we’d be all right. If she was looking for answers to why she’d made some of the decisions she had in the past, then talking to someone, outside of the situation, just might add some perspective.

  “Well, if it’s your decision and you’re doing it for you—no one else—then I think it’s good. Great actually.” And I meant it. I hoped it wasn’t something she was doing for anyone else. Just her.

  “She’s seeing me tomorrow. And I am. I’ll let you know how it goes. When do you fly out in the morning?”

  I was headed to Boston—more of a stop in and say hello type of trip—and my flight was early.

  “My plane leaves at 7:30.” It killed me I wasn’t flying to her. “I miss you. When do we get to see each other again?” I pulled my phone away from my ear and looked at the date. It was already the end of January. February was close and Valentine’s Day would be a good time to meet up.

  It was a few weeks away still, but I’d be on the road most of the time. And since Las Vegas had gone so well for Blake, the franchise owner gave Couture Dining another project in Miami. That’s where she was headed the following week.

  It would almost have to be Valentine’s Day.

  “You just saw me. But I miss you, too. Do you have time to come to Seattle soon?”

  I wanted to go that very second.

  “Valentine’s Day?” I asked.

  “It’s a date. You can see my new place.”

  I hoped I could wait that long.

  Tuesday, January 26, 2010

  “Yeah, I’ll have another,” I said to the bartender, then swallowed back the last of my third draught. It wasn’t my beer, but I’ll be damned if it wasn’t doing the trick. I had a lot of things floating around my head that night. I was in Boston, knowing that Blake was going to see Dr. Rex. And not knowing what the doctor’s take on us would be, I felt anxious.

  Recently, I had many things to be thankful for. But there were many things, in the past few weeks, I’d realized were my shortcomings. I’d spent so much time blaming and pointing my finger, and not nearly enough time thinking about how my actions played into all of it.

  There was a ball of guilt the size of Rhode Island in my gut. Yeah, I know Rhode Island isn’t really the biggest state, but it’s the one that probably gets overlooked the most. That seemed fitting. And regardless of how big it was by comparison, put that fucker in your gut, it felt pretty massive.

  Point was: Blake was seeing a counselor and I didn’t know how I felt about it.

  Yes, I did.

  I was scared. I was terrified the doctor would find the pesky spot in her mind that had been doubting us all along. The place where trying for a shot with me was a terrible idea, reminding her of the kind of deal she was making. I was the man she cheated with. Who on the planet would side with me? With us? What the hell was I going to do if I lost her?

  I could still lose her.

  She had a house. A husband. A planned life.

  What did I have to offer other than my love? And that wasn’t even something I alone offered her. He loved her too—I assumed, in his weird robotic way.

  “Better get me a shot of Jameson, too,” I added when I was handed a fresh ale.

  The guy, two stools down, asked, “So what are you drinking to?” He wore a sports jacket and the dress shirt underneath was unbuttoned. His tie hung loosely in front of him, as he held all of his weight with his forearms pressed against the countertop. He slouched into the bar.

  I tried to come up with a Casey the Sales Guy answer, but all I had was Casey the Fuck-up answers.

  “I guess I’m just trying to get my shit together,” I answered.

  He shook his head understanding.

  Standard bar buddy etiquette requires a man to engage in conversation at this point. Speak when spoken to.

  “You?” I asked him in turn.

  “Bitches.”

  I glanced at the bartender and he gave a chuckle, before turning to do some bartender-y things.

  “I’ll drink to bitches. Any particular one or just them bitches in general?” I inquired. At least the guy was funny. I’d expected him to be beer bent about work or maybe the economy, which I’d found to be a popular reason to belly up at the watering hole. But bitches was a new one. Not the idea really, just the way he’d said it. He had my attention.

  “All the bitches,” he confirmed. “Lying, cheating, heartless bitches—the whole lot of ’em.”

  Oh God.

  The Universe was taunting me. Worse than taunting. The Universe was playing let’s give Casey early onset heart failure. And just for good measure let’s take away his bowel control. Because, I swear, I almost shit my pants sitting in the hotel bar with the bitch hater.

  “Okay. Better make it two shots.” Bartender showed mercy and poured both of his patrons, me and the bitches-guy, doubles.

  “On the house,” he said. Then he produced another shot glass, from somewhere under the counter, poured a third and held it high. “To the bitches,” he toasted and tossed back the whiskey. So it seemed, I was with two men who had smashing good luck with the ladies.

  Maybe we were the three amigos. The bartender. The bitches-guy. And me.

  “Yeah, they love to make you into their dream man and then...then when they’ve got you by the balls, they fuck you over. Because now you’re not exciting anymore or some shit.”

  I had a hard time believing he’d been someone’s dream man. But in solidarity, I had to side with the poor guy. I didn’t know his story. I didn’t want to know his story. Thick sensation hu
ng in the air that indicated he and I were on opposite aisles of the scenario.

  He continued, “Some fucking bitches don’t know when they’ve got a good thing. Am I right?”

  “Amen, pal,” said the bartender as he rinsed a glass. “Never trust a pretty woman.”

  “Yeah, the prettier they are the blacker their heart.”

  Clearly, the two men had some bad luck. I let them rant about how they’d been wronged by the women of their lives. As familiar as some of it was, it didn’t sound like my story.

  “Who leaves a lawyer for a tire salesman? A fucking tire salesman,” he swore. “We had a life. Kids. And she threw it all away for a fucking tire salesman.”

  I had to sympathize, but then again, I also identified with the tire salesman. I was the fucking tire salesman in my scenario.

  “But at least I’m getting the house and she’s not fighting me on anything,” he said, more to his beer than to us. “That makes for a pretty quick divorce.” He slugged back half the pint and huffed, “I’m getting a divorce. Fifteen years of marriage and I’m getting a divorce so she can be the Queen of Discount Tires.”

  Bitches-guy fished out his wallet and threw some money toward our faithful bartender. He swiveled on his stool. All humor had left the building.

  Then he said, “You know what the worst part is? I know the guy. I thought he was an all right dude, you know? Why couldn’t he just be a man about it? Face to face. Own up to it. Be a fucking man. You want to take away my wife, the woman who loved me through tough times and good times and two daughters? Fine. If she wants you more, then take her. But look me in the face. Not him though. He cowered like a dog, like he was ashamed. The least he could do was be a man for her.” Then he stumbled away. I silently prayed he got a cab.

  After I finished my beer and settled up with Kevin, the bartender as it turned out, I walked up to my room, showered, and clicked through the TV. Nothing registered, only the poor bastard’s words.

  Is this what Grant is thinking?

  They hadn’t built a fifteen-year life together, but was that what I was to him? Just a dick who stole his wife?

  Over and over in my head, I replayed the conversation. More specifically, the part about being a man. Blake deserved that. And even though I really didn’t like the jackass she shared a last name with, I had to admit I’d wronged him.

  I was the tire salesman. I’d stolen his wife. I hadn’t been a man about it.

  Things needed to change.

  Tuesday, February 2, 2010

  THINGS WERE CHANGING FAST. I was changing with them.

  The best part about seeing Dr. Rex was that I didn’t fit into her office hours. No uncomfortable waiting rooms. No Scholastic coffee table reads. It didn’t smell like a doctor’s office, which made sense because that wasn’t where we met.

  Since I worked long hours, and my office was close to the school, when she had evening classes on Tuesdays and Thursdays, she suggested we meet at her office on campus. That worked great for me, because I could park in my dad’s spot since the Psych and the English departments shared a lot.

  It was new, but I liked her a lot already. I’d only met her once, and most of that was her telling me about herself. I’m not sure if that was a technique thing or if she could tell I was nervous, and was trying to warm me up.

  It hadn’t been the best day to start seeing a shrink. Then again, the day you go to a lawyer’s office to get a divorce might be a pretty damn good day to go see someone who just lets you sit there, while she goes on and on about herself. I let myself believe she did that for my benefit and not hers.

  Dr. Rex was a single mom to a son. He was away at school in Atlanta, a musical engineering student. She told me, with him away, she lived with just her cat. She let me know she only had a cat, because as a psychologist it was good practice—living in a constant state of paranoia. When her son was fifteen he got a cat and named him Dre. The feline hated her very existence. She joked living with such a creature, and fearing for her life on a nightly basis, was good for her professional perspective as a counselor.

  She claimed her son, Nathan, loved that cat, but couldn’t take him to school. So she made concessions, because she loved him. And that people do that kind of thing all the time. Everything she talked about ended with things like that. Either she was very insightful, or the woman was just damn good at her job.

  So walking up to the building’s entrance on my second date with the good doctor, I had the impulse to kind of spill my guts. Like, all of the sudden, I was going to burst if I didn’t have a chance to tell someone everything. Someone who didn’t have a single thing to win or lose in the situation. I felt liberated, and out of somewhere I’d never visited within myself, I felt braver than ever.

  The divorce papers, which I’d filed for last week were ready to be picked up the next day and I was seeing Casey in ten days.

  I’d had moments of panic—feelings of sheer what the fuck am I doing-ness?—but since the New Year, I’d felt like I had a goal. A focus. A purpose.

  Walking down the marble hall, I passed the ladies’ room as she walked out, startling both of us.

  “Oh shit, Blake. You scared me,” she gasped and leaned against the door frame. Her crazy half-gray, half-black hair ran wild on her head and down her shoulders. Like a pile of quilt stuffing, it was light and fluffy. She tried to compose herself and straightened her purple bifocals over her light blue eyes.

  “I’m sorry. That scared me too,” I said, also feeling the startle in my chest, even though I saw her first.

  “How’s it going?” I panted, bending a little in the hips to catch my breath.

  “It’s going good. How about you?” she replied, as she stepped away from the lavatory. Together we began walking down the long hall to her office.

  Ever want to have a nightmare? Take a walk down the hall in the psychology building in your nearest university, after everyone has left for the day. It made me shiver. I guess brains freak me out.

  I spoke as I walked, “I think I’m doing okay.” But really, how in the hell was I supposed to know? That’s what I was there to see her about.

  That’s another new thing, or change, that I’d observed about seeing a therapist. Knowing I had a therapist made my mind self-diagnose every decision I made all day. Oh, a bran muffin? What’s that say about you, Blake? Are you feeling like you need bran, some stability? Some normalcy—bowel or otherwise? Then, I threw it in the trash. I’d been bested by my breakfast on more than one occasion that week. I won’t even go into the theories I came up with concerning my egg choices.

  “Well, that’s convincing,” she countered as we got closer to her office. “Tell you what, Blake. This will go a whole lot better if you just say what you feel, in any way you choose to. I’m not here to tell you what I think or tell you what my opinion on your life is. I’m here to help you realize how you feel about all of those things. To find the things you think you did well—things that make you proud to be you—and maybe, help you implement those behaviors to make you happier in other areas.

  “It’s not about spilling your guts, then me rummaging through it to see what stuff you messed up. It’s more about why you made the choices you did, so you understand yourself. You don’t need my validation, you need yours.” She made a lot of sense.

  Her office was cozy, inviting. She had books stacked everywhere and instead of using the overhead fluorescent light, she had lamps in every corner. Two comfy chairs sat on the far side of the room by a window, and that’s where she led us. It was different from the first time I’d been there, when she sat behind her desk telling me about herself.

  “Have you ever talked to a therapist before?” she asked, as she sat and waved a hand for me to do the same.

  “No.”

  “Good. Then I don’t have to undo any of their bullshit.” She chuckled at the poke she’d made at her profession and, in turn, my sanity.

  I was sane. Right?

  She continued, “S
o you know a little bit about me from last week, why don’t we get to know you a little. Please, tell me about you.”

  Where were the numerous anecdotes I’d been dying to talk about on the way in there? On the spot, it felt mildly awkward.

  She coaxed, “What do you do for a living? Blake, you’re not being graded here. No pass/fail. Just talk to me.” She leaned back into her chair and tucked a leg under her butt.

  “I’m a trained chef and I work for a company that rejuvenates, or creates themes and menus for restaurants. We work mostly in the hospitality industry.”

  “That’s cool,” she said and it didn’t sound like fodder. “Do you do only here in the Pacific North West or do you travel?”

  “I travel a lot, but I kind of have free reign over that now. I like that part of the job. Most of the time.” My finger crept its way to my mouth. I had the urge to bite at the skin I’d been obsessing over for the past minute with my thumb.

  “I hope you don’t mind me saying this but you look really uncomfortable. Let’s go for a walk?”

  A walk?

  She read the skepticism on my face and added, “Trust me, when you’re walking, or doing something trivial, your brain sort of goes onto autopilot. Those easy, routine-like tasks let our minds open up a little. Like singing in the shower.”

  Just as fast as she walked us over to the chairs, she was up and pulling my hand to follow.

  “Come on,” she instructed, “your work is fun, but I want to know the good stuff.”

  She was right. As soon as we started walking, I started talking and it came out almost effortlessly. On and on, I went.

  “And then she called me,” I recalled, telling her about the day Aly hijacked Casey’s phone and I got engaged.

  “No. She didn’t. Did she?” she asked incredulously, while stopping to sit on a half wall that was home to a makeshift garden in the main entrance of the lecture hall. “What did you do?”