‘Pills?’ I ask.
She taps her head and automatically I think she’s talking about anti-depressants. I know Dave was on them before, but these days who isn’t? Doctors are handing them out like candy.
‘For his hair,’ Laurie clarifies. ‘To make it grow back. We’re broke and he’s pouring money away on snake oil to make his hair grow back. He’s been bald, Ava, for half his life. There are billiard balls more hirsute than him.’
I stifle a smile as the waiter lays a fresh martini in front of Laurie.
‘What did you think when I said pills?’ Laurie asks, glancing at me over the rim of her glass. ‘That he was taking Viagra?’
I give a tiny, non-committal shrug.
‘I wish!’ Laurie spits. ‘I can’t even remember the last time we had sex. I think it was my birthday. So when was that? Six months ago? And believe me, I think I exerted more effort blowing out the candles on my cake. And the cake was way more satisfying. And it was a vegan cake. Take a minute to think about that.’
I take a sip of wine and try not to think about that. Instead I think about Robert. When was the last time we had sex? Last week? No, last month. That’s right. It was after June’s school play. And it was good, definitely better than cake, vegan or otherwise. It’s always been good, if a little sporadic recently. We’ve been together for twenty-two years though, since I was a young and naive nineteen-year-old, so I suppose it’s no surprise that our sex life is in decline. The fact we’re still together and still having sex (albeit occasionally) and don’t hate each other’s guts feels like success to me, given how many of our friends’ marriages are hitting the dust and then the divorce courts. Besides, everyone’s sex life takes a nosedive after forty, doesn’t it?
I switch my attention back to Laurie. ‘So, Dave’s getting in shape, how does that equate to him having an affair? Maybe he just wants to be on a par with you.’
Laurie is forty-one, like me, with jet-black hair and an angular face that most people would call striking, if not outright beautiful. She’s tall and slender and has never had to work out in her life to stay that way. Unlike me. I have to work harder than Beyoncé at the Super Bowl to keep the weight off, which could be why I’m never going to get back to the size I was before I had kids. I’ve had to let that ambition go, along with a million others.
Laurie swallows half her martini in one go and then sets it down. ‘I overheard him the other night in the bathroom. He thought I was asleep. I get up to pee and I hear him in there, whispering, on the phone to someone, telling them he’ll be there, promising them, he just has to make sure I don’t find out.’
‘Maybe he was arranging something for your anniversary.’
Laurie scowls. ‘At three in the morning?’
OK. She has a point . . . but still. ‘Why didn’t you just ask him what he was doing?’
‘I did.’
‘And?’
‘And he told me it was a missed call. At three in the morning. What? I’m some kind of idiot now? I checked his phone the next day.’
‘And?’
‘He’d cleared his call log. Who does that? A guilty man! That’s who.’
Laurie huddles closer and casts a furtive glance around the bar. We live in a small town and everyone knows everyone, but The Oak mid-week is half-empty so we’re safe. ‘I think it’s someone from work,’ she tells me. ‘He keeps coming home smelling of perfume. Something cheap and nasty too, like a Vegas stripper might wear.’
I pull back to study her. Is she serious? Dave’s the manager of a local wine-tasting room. I know there are a couple of girls in their late twenties who work there; LA hipster types who’ve migrated north to our idyllic little valley and who all dress like they’re extras in Little House on the Prairie, but I can’t imagine for a moment that Dave has seduced any of them. Not that Dave doesn’t have a certain appeal – he’s got a brilliantly droll sense of humor – but he’s not exactly Brad Pitt. More William H. Macy.
Laurie digs in her glass for the stray olive and starts stabbing it violently with the toothpick. ‘I thought about hiring a private investigator.’
I almost choke on my drink. ‘Are you serious?’ I ask, assuming she can’t possibly be, because it sounds far too Hollywood noir to be something people actually do in real life.
Laurie doesn’t smile back. ‘Absolutely.’ She stabs the olive again, this time so viciously its pimiento guts spill out. ‘But I can’t afford it,’ she sighs.
My face warms, and I take another sip of my drink. Money has always been a contentious issue and I try not to bring it up when I’m around Laurie. I know she and Dave have been struggling financially but I’ve learned my lesson about offering to help. Not that I would ever offer to pay for a private investigator, because I can’t for the life of me believe Dave is doing the dirty. The evidence Laurie has laid out isn’t exactly a slam-dunk for the prosecution.
Laurie slips off her stool and heads to the bathroom, swaying a little as she goes. I ask the waiter to bring two glasses of water, and while I wait for Laurie to come back I think about what she said about never really knowing anyone completely. Is it true? No. I would know without a shadow of a doubt if Robert were having an affair, though I also know I’m probably echoing the words of every woman who’s ever been cheated on in the history of the world.
But there’s barely room in
