Single, Carefree, Mellow by Katherine Heiny

Author:Katherine Heiny
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
Published: 2015-02-02T16:00:00+00:00

Josie agrees to meet Billy at the coffee shop midway between their houses, about an hour’s drive away, and hurries out to the car wearing jeans and a flannel shirt, pausing only long enough for mascara. One year ago, she set off to meet him at the same coffee shop wearing a white blouse, red skirt, black boots, and a tiny lace bra that could barely contain her breasts. One year ago, her hands were so cold that she had trouble grasping the steering wheel. One year ago—you know, Josie’s a writer but even she is getting tired of this one-year-ago device. Let’s just agree that one year ago, things were different. Then, Josie was going to meet Billy for the first time. She had fallen in love with him online, this stranger who lived two hours away and who she never would have known existed without Facebook. He was in her life only because she “liked” a comment he wrote on someone else’s page and he “liked” her “like” and—oh, please, don’t get Josie started on the evils of Facebook.

—

When Josie pushes open the door to the coffee shop and sees Billy sitting in the corner booth, she has the same feeling she has every summer when she sees her nieces and nephews after a yearlong break: shock and fascination and a sort of disbelief. They do exist! And so does Billy.

He is a compact muscular man with very short, prematurely silver hair and startling blue eyes and teeth as white and square as Chiclets. He looks like an actor playing a building contractor, or maybe just the kind of building contractor you would be really happy to have, but he is actually the sales rep for a software company.

He always wears blue or purple dress shirts with white collars (Josie is certain he is aware of what those colors do for his eyes and hair). Today’s shirt is cobalt blue, so vivid that it seems to bleed into the air around him. Actually, all of Billy seems to bleed into the air around him, as though he is truly larger than life.

—

Josie has a husband, of course she does. His name is Nathaniel and he’s uncommonly tall and broad-shouldered, with a long, handsome, seamed face. A sort of good-looking Herman Munster.

Last night, Nathaniel was standing in the kitchen, reading the mail, when Josie came out of her office and she wrapped her arms around his waist and leaned against him, as though he were a redwood tree. He kissed the top of her head and read to her from the letter in his hand, which was from their son Mickey’s school. “ ‘Your child has been selected as our Student of the Month for demonstrating respect, integrity, dedication, and excellence.’ Do you think we got someone else’s letter?”

Josie laughed, and together they checked the name on the envelope and yes, it really and truly was meant for them. They were so lucky—Josie was so lucky, and she knew it, too.

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