She’s the steak. She knows it, and I know it.
“This is fine,” I manage to say, and she laughs, trailing her hand across my back as she leaves to attend other patrons. I watch her sway and laugh and flirt, and I try not to, but my gaze keeps getting drawn back to her, over and over and over.
Her hips sway as she works the room, her skirt tight as she bends over. I picture what I would do with that ass, and...fuck.
My phone rings and I pick it up.
“Babe, I’m so sorry.” It’s Corinne. “Fields is stuck in Barbados, and he didn’t let us know until tonight. Lucy is trying to get someone here to take over for me, and I fell asleep in my chair. I’m so sorry. I’ll just have to see you at home.”
“That sucks,” I tell her honestly. “I wish I had known. I would’ve just stayed home.”
“I’m so sorry, Jude,” she says, and she sounds so sincere. “I’ll make it up to you.”
“Okay. Just try to get home early, okay? Maybe we can still salvage the evening.”
“Deal.” She hangs up, and I look up to find Zoe watching me, a strange look in her eyes.
I’ve got to get out of here.
I wolf down my food, and just when I look up to wave her over for my check, she’s in front of me with a drink in each hand.
“I don’t know what you like to drink,” she admits, setting one down in front of me. “But the rum and cokes aren’t bad. I’m off work now, so I need a drink, and you look like you do, too. Vilma’s drinks aren’t fantastic, but at least she has them. Most of these hole-in-the-wall places don’t.”
Son of a bitch. I didn’t get out of here fast enough, and here she is at my table, tucking her legs up under her. With her short skirt, I can actually see her crotch if I try. I pointedly look away.
“That’s one of the reasons I started coming here,” I tell her, watching the condensation drip down my glass. “Vilma’s has a liquor license. My wife used to like to come here on Sunday mornings for Bloody Marys with breakfast.”
“Oh?” Zoe’s eyebrow is raised again, and her lips are plump as she runs her tongue along the rim of her glass. I follow that pinkness with my eyes, imagining the wetness of it. “Why doesn’t she come anymore?”
“She comes sometimes.”
She giggles. “I’d think so, with a sausage like that in her bed.”
Damn it, I can feel my cheeks flush. I haven’t spoken with anyone like this but Corinne in fifteen years. It’s a rush that I can’t ignore as the blood pumps hard through my groin.
“I’ve had no complaints.” I sound smugger than I am as I gulp at my drink. Half of it slides down my throat in one big swallow.
“I bet.”
She smiles again and takes another sip, and this is okay. I’m talking about my wife, for God’s sake.
Zoe examines me over the rim of her glass, and she twirls her hair in her fingers.
“Tell me about you, Jude Cabot. You seem fascinating.”
“I’m not,” I assure her, but she’s already shaking her head.
“That’s a lie,” she protests. “You’re sexy as sin, you’re married, yet here alone talking to me. You’re confident, you’re strong. You’re in the prime of your life. That all sounds very interesting to me. Tell me your story. How long have you been married?”
She sips at her drink again, and this is all very conversational. She’s just a girl and I’m just a guy and we’re just having a chat. That’s all. I’m not wrong. This isn’t wrong. It can’t be wrong because we’re literally talking about my marriage.
I smile back.
“Fifteen years. Since college.”
“So...” Zoe counts on her fingers. “That should make you...what...thirty-five? Thirty-six?”
“Yep. Thirty-six.” I eye her clear skin, and the face that is unmarred by a single line or blemish. “You’re...twenty-five?”
“Bite your tongue, heathen!” She laughs. “I’m twenty-four.”
“That’s a fun age,” I tell her. “I was still eating ramen at that age, I think, while my wife was in med school, but it was good.”
“Your wife’s a doctor?”
I nod. “Yeah. In the emergency room.”
“She sounds very important.”
Somehow, Zoe’s words are complimentary, but her tone is unimpressed, almost droll.
“She is,” I tell her. Because Corinne is important. And smart and beautiful. But Corinne isn’t here right now, and this isn’t about her.
“What do you do?” Zoe asks now, and she’s so interested as she waits for my every word. God, it’s flattering.
“I’m a therapist. Marriage and family, obsessive disorders, depression, etcetera, etcetera.”
“Etcetera.” Zoe laughs. “How modest.”
“I’m a very modest guy,” I tell her. “Just ask me.”
She laughs again, and she’s so enthralled with what I’m saying that she literally is sitting with her face in her hands, waiting for me to speak. I’m trained in body language, and she’s turned toward me openly, tossing her hair every once in a while, her eyes smiling along with her mouth. She’s in this moment, and she’s enjoying it.
I’m her sole focus.
I can’t lie. It feels fucking good.
“Being a therapist must be so gratifying.” She sips at her drink. “You get to help so many people through their issues.”
“Well, I’m not a doctor like Corinne, but I make do.” Now I’m the droll one.
Zoe rolls her eyes. “You’re more important in your own way, I think,” she tells me. “You heal people’s minds.”
“Well, it’s all I ever wanted to do.” And that’s the truth. “My parents wanted me to be a psychiatrist, but I never wanted that. They end up being pill pushers. I wanted to learn to actually help my patients, not just overmedicate them.”
“That’s commendable.” Zoe nods. “You hear about so many people who are just fed antidepressants and that’s the end of it.”
My phone vibrates, and a message pops up. Zoe and I both glance at it.
I’m definitely not gonna make it. I’ll be home later.
Fuck.
Zoe takes a drink and stares at me over her glass. “Are you happy, Jude Cabot?”
It should be a simple question. It really should be. But here I am, talking to this girl while my wife is at work, and suddenly, I don’t know.
“Yes,” I tell her finally. “Of course I am.”
But am I? The question actually makes me uncomfortable, and I want to change the subject.
“Enough about me. What about you?” I ask. “What’s your story?”
I’m surprised to realize that I’m actually interested in hearing it. For the first time in fifteen years, I’m enjoying a conversation with a woman other than my wife over dinner.
Corinne was supposed to be here and she’s not.
I’m not doing anything wrong.
I’m not.
14
Now
Corinne
Reflections Mental Facility
I twist and turn, but I can’t get away from the blood. It’s everywhere.
It’s spattered on the walls, on the floor, even on the ceiling. Worst of all, it’s on their faces.
My horror is immense, so much so that I feel deadly calm. My heart is a cold pool and my feet are blocks of ice as I move through the bloody rooms.
Why would my father do this?
But my stomach knows.
My heart knows.
“Miss...you can’t be here,” a policeman calls out, his face white and a drop of orange vomit on his mouth. He already threw up from the horror here. Why haven’t I?
I let him take my shoulders and lead me out, and that’s when I see my father. He’s sitting in a cop car, in the back, and he’s got blood everywhere. It’s smeared on his face, on his hands, on his shirt.
He looks at me, and his blue eyes are so cold and empty that I have to close my own. I can’t look at him.
“Fix this,” he whispers, and somehow, I hear him through the glass and across the yard. “Fix this. Corinne? Corinne!”
Then I realize that it’s not my father’s voice, it’s Jude’s.
I wake with a start, and I’m unable to shake the uncertain feeling all day.
“Why would Jude tell you to ‘fix this’?” Dr. Phillips asks me in session later in the afternoon. I fiddle with the arm of the chair.