“Screw it.” Kyle was sick of this. He finally found the fucking clicker and pointed it at the television, which for a second refused to go off.
“You’re holding it backward,” Dennis informed him. Kyle stared at the device in his hand, turned it around, and pointed it at the television. It still didn’t work. Alison was silently laughing at some young Adonis now. She had a towel wrapped around her and her hair was wet. The towel slipped suddenly, revealing a black bikini underneath for a moment before she glanced down, picked up its edge, and pulled it close again.
“I should have just slept with her,” he said.
The sentence fell between them, clear, final. He looked around for that scotch bottle. Dennis picked it up from the floor beside him and passed it over.
“You really never did?” Dennis asked. “You always told me you never did, but seriously. You never did?”
“That night at your party,” Kyle admitted. Repeated pressing got the remote to work and blessedly, the television set went blank.
“Wait a minute. You fucked her, at my Christmas party?”
“I didn’t.”
“You just said—”
“We almost did.” He couldn’t believe he was admitting this, but he was tired, and drunk, and it felt good to tell it, finally, even to Dennis. “We were up in your dad’s bedroom, and we were drunk, and—you know—”
“No, I don’t know,” Dennis said. He was laughing, delighted. “You did it in my father’s bedroom? How did I miss this?”
“We didn’t do it,” he clarified, for the second time. “It was late, I was leaving. Who knows where you were. You were passed out somewhere. And she was up there, hanging out, and—” He paused, feeling the buzz from the alcohol, and tried to tell the story without getting the sequence wrong, or confusing the words. Dennis was just watching, finally, and finally serious. “Van and I were in a bad place. It just felt like we had, like the whole thing was a mistake, and I was trying to keep everything steady but then Alison showed up, and I wasn’t—and then it was, honestly we didn’t even have a chance to even talk to each other. And it was terrible, we hadn’t seen each other since we broke up, in Seattle, I, you know, we couldn’t, I know that’s why she, and I was so fucked up but I didn’t blame her.” He was frustrated that he was rambling, and not making his points. If he had been locked in a confessional and blathering on to some somnolent priest, it would never have passed muster. But Dennis, for all his drunken narcissism, Dennis might actually understand what it was he was trying to admit to, if he could simply find the words and admit to it.
“I was in some crazy space back then, I know it was ridiculous, I wouldn’t have sex with her. And I knew, Christ, it’s not like I didn’t, man, all those years. To want something that entirely and not be able to, but all the shit they shoved into our heads? And that’s no excuse. Seriously, I’m not making excuses. She wanted to. And I was the one. I was a fucking moron.” He reached for the scotch bottle. What did it matter how drunk he was, now? “It was a power play. I was just, I wanted to win. I knew it was driving her crazy. And I’m not, listen—I don’t think it was a game for her. I don’t think that. I think she was just, we were, when we were together in it? Nothing else, you know. I’m such an asshole.” It felt great to admit it. Every shred of his stupidity laid open to the air. “I was a fucking child. And then she was gone. And it was like I woke up, one day, and I had a wife who really didn’t like me, and there was Alison, at your house, at a really stupid Christmas party. Wearing those boots. And then we didn’t have a half second to even talk, because Van was so paranoid. Which, why wouldn’t she be? But there was so much that Alison and I, we hadn’t finished, we weren’t anywhere near finished with anything, between us, and then she disappeared, it was like she vanished. I thought she had gone home. It was the end of the night, everyone else was either passed out or had taken off, and I was just, I thought maybe—her coat was still there, on the steps, so I thought she might still be there.” Having relived the memory so many times in the past three years, this part of the mystery was exquisitely present. “And then there she was, in your father’s bedroom. And we, honestly I can’t remember what we said. It didn’t matter. Maybe it’s just that we were tired of punishing each other. That’s what I thought. I was just done with all the shit in my head. She was there and I didn’t care about anything else. And then she, you know, I don’t know, she . . .” As much of a relief as it was, he couldn’t, finally, describe the moment. Dennis was hanging on his every word, and Kyle couldn’t tell it. “Anyway,” he shrugged. “We almost did it.” He took a breath.