Things We Didn't Say - By Kristina Riggle Page 0,71
it’s her own damn fault. But this would seem cruel to say now.
She pulls her knees up to her chest and rests her face on her knees, looking out to the middle of the room.
I want to break the mood, so I turn the question around on her.
“How did you meet Michael?”
She snaps her attention back to me. “Really? You want to know?”
I nod. Frankly, I’m curious to hear her version of the story.
This has livened her up. She goes back to cross-legged sitting and nabs a fistful of popcorn.
“Well. I was at a party at MSU. I was a social work major, he ever tell you that? Ha. I was going to solve all the world’s problems. I was going to make sure what happened to me never happened to any other girl.” She says this as if mocking herself, with exaggerated earnestness. She laughs, shakes her head, and eats some more before resuming. “Anyway, so my guy of the moment was giving me a hard time. He’d been so hot, all tattooed and sexy, but a mean drunk, so I ditched him. Then I was all bored and wandering by myself when I saw this nerd . . . Remember that show Murphy Brown? Remember the boss, what was his name?”
I’ve seen it on reruns. I try to think . . . “Miles?”
“Yeah! He looked like Miles! Only taller. And not Jewish. But anyhow, he was the polar opposite of Tattoo Guy—you know, I fucked that guy for two weeks and I don’t even remember his name?—and I thought maybe I should try something different. He was so cute, and at first he was all standoffish and sad. Some girl had just dumped him for another guy. But his resistance lasted like, what, a minute? I kissed him right behind his earlobe, and just licked a little bit there, he really loves that . . . Wait, you probably know that!”
She carries on some more about the seduction, but all I can think of is how Michael told me not to kiss his neck at all. He said he found it distracting.
I look up in surprise as Mallory continues her story, reaching over and slapping my knee to emphasize something funny. I tune back in to hear her describing their first night of sex in great, gory detail.
Why did I start this conversation?
She sits back, almost glowing like she just really had sex. “Yeah, he was done for. And I thought, hey, who knew that nerds could be so great in bed? And he was so nice. God, so nice. No one had ever been that nice to me. Especially no man. So it started as a lark, but I kept seeing him. I worshipped him back then. I think that’s why he stuck around so long, I mean, who can resist being worshipped? I was like a starving person who’d been eating gruel finally given a fresh apple. All I ever wanted then was fresh apples, one after another. And then, Angel.”
At this I maintain a diplomatic silence.
“Oh, I know. You think I got pregnant on purpose. Everyone on Michael’s side thinks that. My own family thought it, too. No one thought I could actually keep a decent man on my own.” She begins to pick at her cuticles, crack her knuckles. “Guess they were right, in the end. But I’d like to think he stayed with me for some other reason than the baby. I mean, these days, having a baby out of wedlock is nothing, right? People do it all the time. Who even uses that word, wedlock? Lock, yeah, right. It was meant to be, I guess, however awful it was. Because it wasn’t always awful. You know that, right, that it wasn’t always?”
“Sure,” I say, because it must not have been. Not every minute.
“It won’t always be perfect, either,” she says, pointing to me. “Don’t get your hopes up for that.”
“Oh, I know that. Believe me.”
“Oh?” Mallory smirks. “Really.”
I shouldn’t say anything. But maybe this is just the kind of girlfriend bonding to heal the rift. After all, it’s something we have in common. I opt for a small complaint, something most wives have, as I’ve gathered.
“Well, I sometimes feel like he takes me for granted.”
She sits up straight. “Oh, honey. We have a lot to talk about.”
Chapter 32
Dylan
Hey, Romeo,” says the female cop again, this time coming in with a bottled water.
I’ve been dozing on a chair, my feet up on another