Page 74 of Such a Good Wife

“We can see other people, but we’ll stay married for now. So, yes, Luke and I had a relationship and I don’t regret that. It was good.”

“I bet it was,” he says, lustfully. “And, I mean, I told you, I never thought you did anything, but I had to cross you off the list and with this affair stuff hanging out there...”

“I know. So I’m telling you now. Sorry I had to lie about it, but you get why. I have a family to protect.”

He’s too drunk to really process it right now, or maybe he doesn’t care all that much about his job at the moment, when potential sex is dangling in front of him, and just thinks that me having one affair means I’ll easily have another. With him.

“Anyway, I better get going. Thanks for the drink. And the talk,” I say, as sweetly as I can muster. He scrambles to his feet as I stand, trying desperately to hold on to his shot.

“You’re going? It’s still early.”

“Yeah, I should get home. This place is so loud.”

“Well, let’s get out of here. Take a drive with me. We can get a drink somewhere quieter.” He’s hammered, trying to fish clumsily in his pocket for his keys.

“Only if I drive,” I say, and he doesn’t have to think about it. I drive down the same rural road I took when I drove Lacy home that night. Moonlight flashes, dull and pale, through tree branches in the woods that stretch for miles along the road.

“We could stop at the Roadhouse Inn,” he says, trying to make it seem like he’s just interested in that drink in a quieter place, but of course, I know that it’s a motel with a dumpy karaoke bar attached. Technically quieter I guess, since nobody really goes there for the bar.

“Sure,” I say, making a right turn to head toward the Roadhouse Inn. We pull up to the one-story strip of building with a pale pink exterior and an empty, calcified swimming pool in front. The sign for Zippy’s Liquor store blinks neon red across the street, and the remoteness of the place is making me uneasy, but I came here for a purpose and I need to stay on course. If I make it too easy for him, will that be suspect? Should I play harder to get?

“If you want to have a quiet conversation, I could grab a bottle of wine across the street and we could relax in a room. I mean, if you want,” he says, still refraining from touching me, but leaning in seductively. I’m happy he suggested it. It may be a bit unrealistic coming from me.

“I don’t know,” I say, feigning shyness. “There’s a bar, you know.”

“Well, I mean that’s fine. I just know karaoke gets loud. And you said yourself you just need some fun sometimes. Not that I assume you... I mean, we’d just be hanging out as friends, of course.”

“Well, as long as it’s just as friends, I guess so.”

He tries to play it cool as he walks into the glass encasement where the check-in desk sits. I wait in the car and see him get impatient when nobody is minding the place. He rings a little bell and leans over the desk, stretching to see if there is anyone in the back. A small, tired-looking man trudges to assist him. When he gets the key, he gives it to me and says he’ll run across the street for that bottle.

Inside the room, I feel hot tears spring to my eyes. I wipe them away. I tell myself to focus, that this is the only way. I needed a few minutes alone before he came back, so I get myself ready. This is it. I have to follow through.

He forgot a bottle of wine needs a corkscrew, so he shows me his old college trick and pushes the cork down into the bottle with his car key. He pours two glasses into plastic motel cups and the wine bobs around the cork, leaking everywhere as he tries to fill the cups. When he finally succeeds, we toast to “old friends.”

“Just goes to show, you never really know people,” he says, sitting himself on the king bed. I sit in the desk chair near him.

“What do you mean?”

“Well, I mean, you. You and Luke.”

I look at the floor, and he quickly realizes that he brought up something painful. He’s so focused on the sex, he’s not thinking that I lost someone I actually cared for. He changes gears.

“Well, the arrangement you have with your husband, the fact that you’re here. It’s just...I would never expect that. From you.”

“Well, there’s a lot you don’t know about me.”

“So, tell me.” He holds his hand out for mine, so I sit next to him on the bed. I take it, and we sit so close our shoulders squeeze together.

“You want me to tell you my life since, what, when’s the last time we really talked, high school?” I laugh, playing into his hands.

“I would listen to the whole story. You look exactly the same, by the way.”

“Yeah, right.” I give him a dismissive gesture with my hand and take a sip of wine.

“Really, I wouldn’t say that if it weren’t one hundred percent true. You’re really...” He brushes his hand against my cheek. He is a gifted charmer. “Just so beautiful.”

Then he kisses me. I’m glad to get this started without too much more painful effort. I kiss him back. His five o’ clock shadow burns my cheeks as we kiss harder. He pulls at my tank, but it’s impossibly tight, so I help him get it over my head. He tosses it across the floor and pushes me down on the bed. I start to unbutton his shirt, but he pulls it off over his head instead. He kisses down my body and I shimmy out of my skirt. He kneels over me, my body straddled between his legs while he unbuckles his belt and smiles down at me, biting his lip, stopping to slip his hand into my panties a couple of times while he gets himself out of his pants and slides on a condom.

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