With Vanessa, he had to bite his tongue to keep from saying a lot of things.
It wasn’t healthy. A lot of marriages aren’t. Some survive anyway, but most end in some kind of heartache, Rick thinks glumly as he throws his jacket on the hook beside the booth and slides onto the bench.
“You’re looking good,” he tells Bob.
“So are you.”
“Yeah, right.” Rick is well aware that the return compliment is perfunctory. He looks about as great as he feels today.
“I like your shirt.”
“Now you’re really laying on the bull.”
“What? I like your shirt. Why is that bull?”
“Because men don’t say they like each other’s shirts.”
“They do when they’ve rooted for the same team together all their lives. I thought you wore that just for me.”
Looking down, Rick sees the familiar Green Bay Packers logo, grins, and nods. Might as well let Bob think he’s wearing this T--shirt in honor of their shared hometown, which is only a half--hour drive from Lambeau Field, as opposed to it being the only clean item of clothing in his drawer.
He asks Bob about his trip and finds himself envious again as his old friend describes his adventures in En-gland and Scotland, plus a journey last winter to Antarctica, which is where he was when Vanessa died and why he was unreachable for several days afterward.
“The farthest from New York I’ve been is Appleton,” Rick tells him, “and I haven’t even been back there in years.”
“Why don’t you come down, spend some time on the beach and the golf course . . . If you haven’t been traveling, you must have some vacation time coming.”
Rick sidesteps that, saying, “I haven’t even touched my clubs in over a year.”
“Then let’s plan something.”
Rick pretends that’s a possibility. He’s good at that—-letting -people treat him as though he’s not flat broke, or lugging around this burden of guilt like a boulder on a chain.
The waitress arrives at the table with a pot of hot water and a selection of tea bags. “I didn’t know if you wanted caf or decaf.”
“Thanks for remembering, Bernice, but I’m actually having coffee today. Black and strong.” He makes a point of looking her in the eye when he speaks with her. -People in the ser-vice industry appreciate that, and when you use their names, Vanessa told him years ago. It establishes respect and trust.
She was right about that—-about a lot of other things she taught him back when they first met, often saying that he was “a little rough around the edges.” She was right, of course—-and he didn’t resent her for it in the beginning.
“Uh--oh. Tough night?” Bernice asks sympathetically, but he chooses not to answer that.
She fills his coffee cup, refills Rick’s, and takes their orders: sesame bagel with butter for Rick, a Western omelet with a side of sausage for Bob.
“Hey, he has a better appetite than your friend yesterday did,” she tells Rick with a wink.
“You’re dating?” Bob asks after she’s bustled away.
“What makes you think that?”
“Bernice said you were here yesterday with someone.”
“She said friend, not date.”
“I’m pretty good at deductive reasoning.”
“Sorry, Sherlock, you’re wrong about this.”
“I don’t think so.” Bob has been a Sherlock Holmes buff since they started their own detective agency when they were kids. “Who was she?”
“Old friend.”
“Female.”
“Yes. And don’t look so smug. You had a fifty--fifty chance of getting that one right.”
He’s trying to keep it light, but Bob is earnest.
He’s also the only person in the world Rick told about his near miss with adultery. Besides Vanessa, anyway.
And she doesn’t count, because she’s no longer even in this world anyway—-thanks to me.