Page 13 of Sex. Love. Marriage.
Charlee’s eyes about bug out. “He keyed my car because I told him to stop parking in the street.”
“Well, you did call the police on Jayden.”
Charlee laughs nervously. “Because he keyed my car, Gretchen.”
Gretchen waves her off. “He paid for a new paint job.”
With an eye roll, Charlee keeps walking. “You meanyoudid.”
“Whatever.”
Believe it or not, Charlee and Gretchen are friends. Like good friends. I swear.
Beside me, Kate’s still staring at the mailer in her hand. And then she hands it back to Charlee. “Maybe if I start walking around naked, my husband might move out.”
“You have twin eleven-year-old boys at home and your dad lives with you. Pretty sure that’s not a good idea.”
“Why is Jason still living with you?” Charlee asks Kate, looking at her wine bottle with that same surp-gusted look Gretchen gave Ashlynn when she found out she sticks dicks in her for a living. “That’s weird.”
“Kelly told Noah she wants a divorce,” Kate blurts, trying to draw the conversation away from her and her drinking problem. “So, that’s new.”
They all look to me like I have a different head all of a sudden. “You seriously told him that?”
After smacking Kate upside the head, I sigh, a heavy weight of uneasiness settling over me. “No, I didn’t saydivorce,” I whisper, hoping Hazel can’t hear me. She’ll repeat it to Noah for sure.
“Speak up. I can’t hear you,” Gretchen notes like she’s that old she can’t hear me.
I call bullshit. She’s what, forty-five. No way your hearing goes that soon. “I don’t want Hazel to hear me.”
“It’s not like she knows what we’re talking about.” Kate looks up to see Hazel trying to ride Miley like a horse.
I feel bad for Miley and the worst part about my kid crawling all over her? The dog allows it. I’m telling you, these are the incidents when a child gets bitten by the dog, and they say to the local news, “I never saw it coming.” And in reality, that kid was invading that dog’s personal space like nobody’s business and the dog finally snapped. Not that I want Miley to make a meal out of my kid’s face, but I’d understand if she snapped and took a chunk out of her adorable cheeks.
“Yes, she does,” I point out, walking a little slower to create some distance. “She’s five. They’re way smarter than you think.”
I learned my lesson talking around her when she learned to speak. Don’t tell that kid anything. Oliver, he’s like a vault of information you’re never getting out of him. Hazel, don’t trust her. And here’s why. You know how when you’re in the bathroom, your kids just barge their way in like it’s a common meeting place? Hazel did this once while I was changing my tampon. After a very awkward conversation about how mommies bleed once a month and how all that works, I figured Hazel would drop it.
Nope. Children under ten are incapable of not asking a million questions. “Can I tell Daddy?” was her first question.
“Daddy knows. But let’s not tell everyone I’m on my period,” I told her, knowing my child and her talkativeness. She can pretty much strike up a conversation with anyone and does so by making eye contact with them. One look at her pretty blue eyes and they are sucked into talking to her. That’s when she spills her secrets. Including telling everyone that day I was ministering. Yes, she meant menstruating, but it totally came out as ministering.
Charlee leans in. “So you didn’t say divorce?”
“No, I said separation.”
Ashlynn’s brow furrows. And there are absolutely no wrinkles. I bet she gets Botox. “Isn’t that the same thing?”
“No, I don’t think so.” I look over at Kate. “Is it?”
She shrugs. “Don’t ask me. I got a divorce thinking my husband would move out and he still lives with me. Clearly, I don’t understand a goddamn thing.”
“So why did you say that then?” Charlee attempts to get me to clarify my jumbled mess of thoughts. “And what did he say?”
I could potentially say so many things here. I could tell them about Mara, and my mother… why we moved, our everyday struggles. Or the fact that I don’t know if our marriage can survive who we’ve become after the death of our daughter. I don’t say any of that and instead, I go with, “We haven’t had sex in a month,” I admit, ashamed and feeling like I’m neglecting my wife duties. Surely, they’d judge me over this, wouldn’t they? It’s not like I ever talked to my friends in Texas about this kind of thing. They’d make me pray if I did.
Charlee giggles, her cheeks red. “Maybe he’s watching porn?”
Ashlynn looks over at me, whispering, “Ninety-eight percent of men have or do watch porn on a regular basis. Sixty-five percent watch daily.”
