possible? We’ve been married for two days!”
“Chance went through all the requirements for summary dissolution with me. We’re not eligible…something to do with the value of my house…” I trail off with a shrug. I still don’t understand why a property I’ve owned for years that Jesse’s never even set foot in should be the thing that stands in the way of us getting a quick resolution to this mess, but there you go.
“Okay, so what…we file for divorce?” Jesse asks. “Do we both need to be living here?”
I shake my head. “No. The papers are drawn up, we sign them, and then you can go back to New York and just wait for notification that it’s been finalized.”
“Huh. That sounds easy enough, I guess,” he says, his features arranged in a thoughtful frown. “Except we’ll still be married for the next six months.”
“Unless one of us intends to get married again during that time, it shouldn’t be a problem.”
To my surprise, Jesse flinches at those words.
“What is it?” I ask, my brows drawing tight with concern.
He shakes his head roughly. “Nothing. Don’t worry.”
“Jesse…” I trail off, not knowing what to say.
He lets out a sigh, his eyes falling briefly closed. “It’s so stupid. It’s just…if you’d asked me last week if I thought there was a chance I’d be getting married in six months I’d have said ‘yes, absolutely.’ I didn’t tell Zack this because it’s so completely mortifying, but on the night David dumped me I thought he was going to propose.”
My mouth falls open in surprise, although I’m not sure whether I’m more surprised about Jesse mistakenly thinking he was going to be proposed to, or the fact that his idiot ex didn’t propose. Or maybe it’s the fact Jesse has chosen to share this with me when he hasn’t even told Zack about it. “Seriously?”
Jesse nods, a hint of color flushing his cheeks. “He pulled a page right out of the Warner Huntington handbook. Nice restaurant, expensive wine…”
It takes me a moment to realize he’s referencing Matt Davis’s character from Legally Blonde. My mouth twitches at the edges as I recall the sheer amount of times Jesse and I watched that over and over when it first came out. I’m pretty sure I can still quote most of the movie.
“What a dick. You’re not planning on pulling off some hair-brained scheme to win him back, are you?”
Jesse lets out a soft breath of laughter. “No, definitely not. I can definitely see now why Zack never liked him. I have no idea why I never saw it before.”
If I were Slater, or George, or Chance, I’d probably make a remark about Jesse’s ex obviously being really great in bed or something like that. But shit like that always feels too awkward coming from me. Instead I just offer a commiserating shake of my head. “Sometimes it takes something drastic to see what’s right in front of you. Like Spike—he didn’t know he was in love with Bufffy until he had a sex dream about her.”
Jesse arches a dark brow at me, lips quirking in amusement. “Is that your way of telling me you want to get back to the DVD?”
“I don’t get it.”
“Get what?” I toss a fry into my mouth before taking a sip of my beer, waiting for Jesse to clarify his thoughts.
“How you could possibly prefer Spike to Angel,” he says with a scornful look, before picking up his burger in both hands and taking an enormous bite.
I let out a soft chuckle. “Okay, you know what your problem is? You’re judging the characters based off their appearance. If you stopped ogling David Boreanaz for two seconds you’d realize Angel is boring as fuck. Spike at least has a personality.”
“You don’t need personality when you look like that,” Jesse says with a grin.
It’s comments like these that always made me so uncomfortable in my early teen years just after Jesse came out. I didn’t understand how I could be attracted to him but not remotely interested in any of the celebrities he always went crazy over. I still don’t get it, if I’m being honest, but I’ve had years to adjust to being this way, so I manage to avoid getting all awkward and weird now, instead giving a wry shake of my head.
“Okay, did I just fall off a ladder and wake up in an alternate reality?” George asks as he enters the bar from the stairs that lead up to his apartment