“And after each one, I was inclined
to fall deeply in love with the next guy I dated.”
“You still do that?”
“No,” Rita said. “But it
doesn’t mean I won’t.”
“After my divorce,” Jesse said,
“I wanted to fall in love with
someone else and couldn’t.”
“You’ve only been divorced once?”
“Yes.”
“The more it happens, I think,” Rita said,
“the more desperate
you get, and the more likely you are to grab at the first loser that strolls by, which makes it more likely that this marriage will fail, too.”
“And you’ve learned not to do
that.”
“Until now,” Rita said.
Jesse drank. The cranberry and soda seemed particularly insufficient for this moment. They were silent.
Finally, Jesse said, “Me?”
“It feels like it,” Rita said.
“Another loser?”
“No,” Rita said. “You are not a
loser.”
“Thank you, but I’m not so sure.”
“Because?”
“Because Jenn,” Jesse said.
Rita put her glass down and stood, and began to unbutton her blouse. When it was unbuttoned she slid out of it. She stepped out of her shoes and unzipped her pants, and slid them down over her legs and stepped out of them. Her lingerie was ivory. So it won’t show through, Jesse thought. She unsnapped her bra, slid
out of her underpants, and stood naked in front of him. Jesse smiled.
“A real redhead,” he said.
“Or a very thorough colorist,” Rita said.
She came to the couch and sat beside Jesse and tucked her feet under her.
“So?” Rita said. “Tell me about
Jenn.”
“It’s a little hard to
concentrate,” Jesse said.
“My point exactly,” Rita said.
She shifted somehow and was in his lap, and then they were both
naked, and then, after a while they lay together on the couch with their arms around each other, waiting for their breathing to slow.
Finally, with her face next to his, Rita said, “So, tell me
about Jenn.”
“You are as good-looking a woman as I have ever met,” Jesse said
carefully. “And I’ve never had sex that I liked better.”
“Not even Jenn,” Rita said.
“She’s not better-looking than you
are,” Jesse said, “and she
doesn’t make love any better.”
“So, why her, not me?”
Jesse eased himself up a little so that his head rested on the arm of the couch. Rita adjusted so that she lay inside his right arm.
“Why her?” Rita said again.
Jesse laughed briefly and without amusement.
