know “I’m sleeping with your woman now.” I was being marked, like territory. I was being peed on. Wonderful.
“If you don’t mind, my wife and I are having a private discussion.”
Mike’s prissy tone was enough to break the tension. I had to bite my lip again to keep from laughing. Monroe and I shared a look that made Monroe smirk. Mike saw this and scowled. “How well do you know my wife, Monroe?”
“Why the hell would you care?” I asked him.
“Oh, come on, Lacey, what’s the point of hiding it?” Monroe asked, slipping his arm around my waist. “Very well. You know, it’s not every day that a woman so spontaneous and open minded and well, flexible, moves in right next door. Am I the luckiest guy you’ve ever seen or what?”
Monroe leaned in and gave me a long, loud, smacking kiss. As Mike’s face drained to paper white, Monroe gave him a cheeky grin and slapped me on the butt before walking away. “Nice to meet you, Mark,” he called over his shoulder as he ambled to his front door and walked into his house without so much as another look.
“Right.” Mike began to roll his sleeve up, stomping toward Monroe’s door.
I rolled my eyes. “Oh, what are you doing?”
“You think I’m going to just let him put his hands on my wife in front of me?” Mike demanded.
“I’m not your wife anymore.”
“So this is why you won’t come home?” Mike snarled. “We hit a rough patch and you shack up with the first ex-con you meet?”
I spluttered, “Wha - what -? Yeah, Mike, this is why I’m not coming home. My reluctance has nothing to do with the fact that your mistress is living in my house now. It would have to be because of another stud in the corral, right?”
“I told you I made a mistake! Why do you keep harping on me when I’ve said I’m sorry?”
“Actually, you haven’t said you are sorry. You said you made a mistake. It’s not the same thing,” I told him.
“I tried to give you another chance,” Mike said rather snottily. “If you’re not willing to take it -”
“Just leave, Mike.”
“You’re not going to get another chance,” he warned me.
“I don’t need one. Tell Beebee I said hello.”
Mike stormed off to his car and peeled out, flinging no small amount of gravel my way. Monroe stepped outside and waved at Mike’s departing car. He grinned at me.
“What on earth has gotten into you?” I demanded as I marched up his front steps. “I thought you had this whole ‘divorce drama’ phobia.”
“You wanted him to stay?” Monroe asked.
“No, definitely not. But I didn’t need for you to step in. And there was no reason for you to manhandle me in front of him. I did not like that.”
Monroe snorted. “Right, why make him think that you’re unavailable?”
“Don’t do that,” I ground out. “Don’t make this into a you – versus - him thing. There’s no contest. Why would I care what Mike thinks? I do not want Mike back. I am not still in love with him.”
“And you’re saying you didn’t enjoy that just a little bit, making Mike think you might spare him a lifetime of alimony?” Monroe asked.
“I’m not taking alimony from Mike. I don’t want anything from him. Hell, if Maya keeps throwing money at me, I’m not going to need it anyway.”
Oh, double damn it. From the look on Monroe’s face, I immediately wanted to change the subject back to my ambiguous feelings toward my soon-to-be ex-husband.
“What are you talking about?” he demanded. “I thought we agreed you were going to drop the newsletter thing? You said you were going to rethink writing the letters.”
“Well, I did rethink it,” I said. “And I decided, for myself, that it might not be such a bad idea. I could make a lot of money writing the newsletters. And I could help people. Mostly it would be about making money, but I would have a lot of satisfaction in my job. I’ve never had that before. Even your mom said that writing that e-mail was what I needed to move on. I could do that for someone else.”
“My mom said it made sense for you to do that. She wasn’t writing a blanket prescription for everybody,” he insisted. “And you’ve been making so much progress on your book. Why stop now?”
“I don’t have the dedication that you do when it comes to writing,” I told him. “I don’t know if I’m going to finish that book. And let’s face it, even if I finish it, I have a better chance of getting hit by lightning while scratching off a million-dollar lottery ticket than getting that thing published.”
He followed me as I turned to walk away. “You want to know why your life hasn’t turned out? Why you’re not going to finish what you’ve started? Because you take the easy way out. Whenever something’s hard or doesn’t just fall into your lap, you give up or you let someone else do the heavy lifting for you. You’re just waiting for someone else to hand you the answers, to make the decisions for you. Mike, your parents, Maya.”
“Well, if I’m so lazy and immature, why did you even bother with me?”
“Because you have the potential to be this amazing person. You’re smart and you’re funny and you can be so brave. You’ve grown so much since you’ve come up here and you’re just going to give it all up.”
“Who the hell do you think you are?” I yelled. “Who appointed you the great determiner of personal growth? And stop trying to pretend that you’re mad about the newsletter thing.
When you’re really mad about Mike being here. I can’t help that he managed to remember the way.”
“This is about you, Lacey,” he said, taking my arms in his hands with just enough force to hold me in one place. “This is about you being unable to just move on and let Mike go. Stop letting it fester. It would really suck, forty years down the road, to look back on a lifetime of being petty and resentful, and think, ‘Well, at least I took him down with me.”
I jerked away from his grip. “I don’t have to stand here and listen to this.”
“Right, because I don’t get a say. I mean, it’s not like we’re in a relationship or anything. You’ve made it loud and clear we’re just two people having friendly sex, right? Fuck buddies?”
“Don’t,” I growled stalking toward my door. And damned if he didn’t follow me, his voice growing louder and angrier with every step.
‘I mean, I guess I should be grateful that some divorcee just wants to jump me and then walk away like I’m some anatomicaly correct prop. But somehow it hurts my feelings a little bit. I’m not stupid, Lacey. I see you pull back at every chance you get I know how much this freaks you out. You made it pretty clear when you turned into Howard freaking Hughes after you met my parents. I just don’t understand why. We’re good together. I’ve made it clear how much I care about you. You know I wouldn’t hurt you. Why are you working so hard to keep from calling this what it is?”
“And what is it, exactly?” I asked, fighting the tears flooding the corners of my eyes. “Are we going steady? Are you going to give me an ID bracelet and a box of conversation hearts? Do you want to get married? Because I’ve been there, done that, and I don’t know if I’m ever going to be ready to do it again. So what’s the point, Monroe?”
“The point is that I love you. And it really pisses me off that you don’t want to hear that.”
“Because it’s got to be on your terms!” I yelled. “It’s got to be on your timetable, your way. You know, maybe it’s not that I don’t want to be in a relationship, maybe it’s that I don’t want to be in a relationship with you. You’re always pushing and judging and trying to make me change into the person that - I don’t know - is worthy of you? I mean, you wouldn’t even talk to we until I proved that I was low-maintenance enough for you. I don’t want to be your pet project. I’ve already tried living with a man whose standards I couldn’t meet and I’m not going to do it again.”
“Stop making this about Mike. I am not your husband.”
“You’re right, you’re not.”
“Grow up, Lacey.”
“Fuck you, Monroe.”
