Checking Him Out by Debbie McGowan

Author:Debbie McGowan
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2014-11-21T05:00:00+00:00

Chapter Fifteen

I don’t recall getting back to the apartment, or how long I’d been sitting waiting, but it was dark by the time Adam got home. I had my back to the door, and I heard him stop. If he was watching me, all he’d have been able to see was my outline in the twilight of the evening spilling through the window.

“Sol?”

“Hm?”

“You OK?”

I closed my eyes and stayed completely still. I could have fed him the lie we feed strangers—hey, yeah, I’m fine, thanks—because that’s what he felt like to me at that moment. A stranger. I could have got angry, but what good would it do? He’d said he was thinking of leaving me and I’d still gone to L.A. I had no right to feel betrayed. In his mind I’d already made the decision, and this was his place. It would be me leaving, not him, to go where? Back to the Best Western with my life in a suitcase?

“I’m going to switch the light on,” he said. The warning registered a second after the event and I instinctively screwed up my eyes. When I found I could open them without my eyeballs turning to dust, Adam was kneeling in front of me, his head bowed, long dark lashes fluttering against his cheeks.

“I went to find you,” I admitted.

“Yeah. I saw you.”

“Who is he?”

He closed his eyes, his head shaking from side to side, a slight, rapid motion of denial. Or was it guilt?

“I could tell you knew each other. Were you screwing him while I was in L.A.?”

Back in the days of arguing with Elise, we’d reach that stage of the fight where I’d stop trying to defend myself. If we’d been dueling to the death, she’d have had me face down in the dirt before I’d even reached for my pistol. And she’d yell, “The right to remain silent has no jurisdiction here.” And I’d think, “Fuck you, Elise,” but I knew better than to say it out loud. Now it was me on the receiving end of the silent treatment, I could appreciate just how disempowering it was. If I’d had the energy to scream and shout I would have done, but I was too tired and couldn’t see the point. Not if he’d cheated on me. I sat forward, all set to go and pack my bags and leave.

“Doctor Michael Finnegan,” Adam said.

I stayed where I was. He glanced up at me. I was sure I knew that name from somewhere.

“My ex.”

Ah, maybe that was it, though I couldn’t recall Adam mentioning him by name before.

“He was out for a stroll. He’s a bit weird like that. He got dumped and was feeling miserable. After you walked off, we went for a coffee, and I told him all about you.”

A smile broke across Adam’s face, lifting it with joy. My heart skipped a beat at the realization it was for me.

“Michael said I was to pass on his condolences to you, for having to put up with me, and to look him up if you ever need a sympathetic ear.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.