asked, ignoring me and giving my soon-to-be fiancé a docile, cowlike gaze.
“Hey, Jodi, what’s up?” Dennis said, grinning past her 36-Ds to her face. “How’s the little guy?”
“Oh, he’s great, Denny. It was so nice that you stopped by the game the other night. He just loves you! And you know, without a father in the picture, I think T.J. really needs—”
“Okay, we get it, Jodi-with-an-i,” I said, smiling pleasantly up at her. “You have an adorable son and are still quite available. Dennis, however, is with me. If you would just take your boobs out of my boyfriend’s face, I would deeply appreciate it.”
She narrowed her eyes at me and sashayed away. Dennis watched her departure as one would watch the lifeboats paddling away from the Titanic. Then he swallowed and looked at me. “Listen, Harp,” he began. “You’re…you know…great and all, but, uh…well, if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it, right? I mean, why change a good thing? Can’t we just keep hanging out together?”
Again, totally expected. I straightened up and tilted my head a few degrees. “Dennis,” I said firmly, well aware that this kind of circular conversation could go on forever. “This isn’t high school. We’re not kids. We’ve been together for the past two and a half years. I’m thirty-four next month. I don’t want to hang out indefinitely. If we’re not going to get married, we need to break up. So…shit or get off the pot, honey.”
“That was beautiful,” murmured Father Bruce as he opened a menu.
I favored him with a withering glance, then turned back to Firefighter Costello. “Dennis? Let’s do this.”
Dennis was granted a brief reprieve by a roar from the bar. We both looked over. On the television, various and sundry members of the Sox were spitting and scratching their groins. Did they have no PR department, for heaven’s sake? And a game was just what Dennis didn’t need…more distraction.
Clearly, choosing a public place for this discussion was a tactical error. I’d originally thought it would work in my favor…even had a little vision of Dennis shouting, “Hey, everyone, we’re getting married!” and people (even the people who kind of hated me) cheering and clapping.
Didn’t seem like that was about to happen. “Dennis?” I said, my chest tightening just a little. “Can I have an answer?”
Dennis picked up his napkin and started ripping off little pieces.
A small, sharp blade of uncertainty sliced into my consciousness. Dennis was usually so…agreeable when I made plans. Yes, I was the one who took control of our relationship, but wasn’t that typical? Men didn’t plan things on their own. They didn’t suggest picnics or trips to the city or what have you. And even if his words tonight indicated reluctance, Den’s actions bespoke permanence. Two and a half years—years!—in an exclusive and mutually satisfying relationship without one significant fight. Of course we were headed for marriage. He had all the necessary qualities of a husband…he just needed a little shove into full adulthood.
Actually, I had right here next to my plate a honey-do list to help Den on that front. Get a second job, as he had too much free time as a firefighter and really shouldn’t be playing Xbox as much as I knew he did (or downloading porn, which I suspected he did). Get rid of the 1988 El Camino he now drove—one door green, all other parts rust—and drive something that didn’t make him look like an impoverished pimp. Cut off the rattail, because please! It was a rattail! And lastly… Move in with me. Despite our four or five nights a week together, Dennis still lived in a garage apartment he rented from his brother. I had a two-bedroom house on the water.
My plan had been to wait till he accepted my offer, then pass over the list and discuss.
But he wasn’t accepting.
I confess that I was a little confused. I asked Dennis for very little and accepted him the way he was—a good guy. Sure, he was still something of a kid, but that was fine. Though I wasn’t one to get all sticky with proclamations, I loved Dennis. Who didn’t? A native Islander like myself, Dennis was mobbed by friends wherever we went, from the guys who worked on the ferry to the road crew to the summer people who occasionally dropped in at the firehouse.
Granted, maybe he wasn’t the, uh, most intellectual man on earth, but Dennis was kindhearted and quite brave. In fact, he’d saved three children from a house fire his second week on the job a few years ago and was something of a local legend. And speaking of kids, Dennis was very good with them, natural and at ease in a way I’d never been, despite my hope to have kids of my own one day. Dennis, though—he’d get on the floor and roll around with his seven nieces and nephews, and they adored him.
And—one couldn’t rule this out—Dennis liked me. Honestly, I couldn’t tell you how many men got that retracting-testicles look when they learned what I did for a living. Women too, as if I was a pox on our gender just because I facilitated the end of crappy marriages. There was a fair number of people who’d cheerfully slash my tires after I’d signed on to represent their spouses. I’d been called a bitch (and worse), had coffee thrown in my face, been spit on, cursed, threatened and condemned.
I took it as a compliment. Yes, I was a very good divorce attorney. If that meant a larger-than-normal percentage of the population owned voodoo dolls with red hair and a tight gray suit, so be it. In fact, I’d met Dennis when my car was rammed by an angry wife and the MVFD had to cut me out (no injuries, and a nice damages award from Judge Burgess, who had a soft spot for me). “Wanna grab a beer? I get off in half an hour,” Dennis had said, and more shaken than I’d let on, I agreed.
He didn’t seem scared by my reputation as a ballbuster. Wasn’t intimidated by my healthy paycheck, funded by the dissolution of happily-ever-after dreams. So yes. Dennis liked me. Though I didn’t sigh with rapture when I looked in the mirror, I knew I was attractive (very, some might say), well dressed, hardworking, successful, smart, loyal. Fun, too. Well…sometimes I was fun. Okay, sure, there were those who’d disagree with that, but I was fun enough.
All in all, I thought we could be very content. And content was vastly underrated.
As I well knew, marriages were fragile birds of hope, and one in three ended up as a pile of dirty feathers. In my experience, the vast majority of those were the oh-my-darling-you-make-my-very-heart-beat variety…the type that so often ended in a pyre of hate and bitterness. Comfort, companionship and realistic expectations…they didn’t sound nearly as glam as undying passion, but they were worth a lot more than most people believed.
There was one more reason I wanted to get a commitment from Dennis. Soon, I’d turn thirty-four, and when that happened, I’d be the same age as my mother the last time I saw her. For whatever reason, the thought of being (alone, adrift) single…at that age…it felt like a failure of monumental proportion. In the past few months, that thought had been pulsing in a dark rhythm. Same age as she was. Same age as she was.
Dennis was silent, his napkin now confetti. “Dude, listen,” he finally said. “Harp. Er. Harper, I mean. Uh, hon…well, the thing is…”
At that moment, Audrey Hepburn’s whispery voice floated from my purse—“Moon River,” the song indicating a call from my sister. Like Audrey, my sister was lovely, sweet and ever in need of protection. She’d moved to New York recently, and I hadn’t heard from her much these past few weeks.
“You wanna take that?” Dennis asked hastily.
“Um…do you mind?” I said. “It’s my sister.”
