Family Affair (9 page)

Ah, the practice isn’t quite over. The team gets back into formation and Brett turns to face me again. I’m wondering when he’s going to introduce me to his
friend
, the chick standing next to him. I notice that I’m clenching my jaw in a forced smile as I look in her direction, wondering who she is. Brett notices, too.

“Sorry. This is Heather,” he finally says, as he gestures to the undeniably gorgeous woman. “Heather, this is Layla. My wife.”

“I’m his wife,” I repeat. “The old ball and chain,” I add pathetically, not really knowing why I suddenly feel the need to do so.

“Great to meet you,” she says, reaching for my hand and flashing her veneers. “I’ve heard
so
much about you.”

She has? Because I’ve heard nothing about her. Not a word. Not a lone syllable even.

“Yeah, you, too,” I say, as I smile.

“Really?” she asks.

No
. “I think so …” I say as I look to Brett. “Have I?”

“Heather’s our new PR guru,” he jumps in. “Teaching them to meditate?” I ask, almost prickly and unlike myself.

“Ha, no,” Heather says. “Everything but.” This gets a bunch of snickers from the perverted young minds within earshot.

“Okay, then, I’m going to take off,” I say, with a quick kiss on the cheek to Brett and a smile and nod at Heather. “Nice to meet you!” I practically shout, instantly aware of the exclamation-point enthusiasm I’ve used to drive the point home, all out of proportion to the moment.

“You, too,” she says.

“Thanks so much for the booty, baby.”

As I walk away, I wonder so hard that I feel like my brain should be oozing out of my head: Why the hell didn’t she excuse herself when I showed up? Why do I feel like the interloper, the one interrupting a moment? A moment that they are going to get back to as soon as I’m out of their sight. Doesn’t she have somewhere to be? Shouldn’t she take a hint? I’m not a jealous wife. I’ve never been the jealous wife. But I’ve never walked into a situation like this. And I know he was at work and I was just there dropping off the brownies, but couldn’t he steal away for a moment to properly thank me? And why does the new PR woman need to be at football practice? Let the team drop and give him twenty and let her drop back down to hell.

When you come to a point in a movie where you know something bad is about to happen to your favorite character, you want to tell him. You want to yell at him and say, “Dude, can’t you hear the ominous soundtrack? You know that guy who you think is your friend, the one you fought with in the war? Well, he just called the bad guy and double-crossed you, and you’re about to take a bullet. Just thought you’d like to know.” So when you come to a point in life where you know something bad is about to happen to a favorite character, and this time it matters because it’s real, you warn him, right? In my case, wrong. Nobody says a thing. I must not be anyone’s favorite character.

So that’s how shit like this happens. I stay out with the guys later than I probably should. I tried to tear myself away, but there was something happening that I hadn’t experienced in a long time: fun.

I miss going out and staying out. And I miss being excited about who I’m coming home to. Lately I’ve been so annoyed….I got married too young. I never thought that before, but clearly I did.
We
did. It’s not her fault or mine, really. I love Layla. Even when I compare her to Heather—who’s talking to me again, at
least in a work capacity, kindly forgetting the whole “Jeremiah was a Bullfrog” incident—she comes up looking pretty good. But when I hear Doug talk about things he’s doing with his new wife and how excited he is about everything, it just makes me feel like Layla and I are missing something. And when I hear my single friends talk about how blissful and uncomplicated their lives are, I can’t help but feel a little bit jealous.

So I mention this to my friends, because we’re friends, and that’s what friends do: They bitch about shit. Their wives, their jobs, their performance anxiety. Well, no one ever mentions their performance anxiety.

But to add insult to misery, Doug slips about something so monumental—such a colossally freakin’ big deal—that I do an actual spit-take. Which is less outward-spitting and more choking on my beer as it goes down my windpipe.

“What did you say?”
I ask, once I regain my composure, because what he said doesn’t make sense.

“I said, if I’d known you were gonna be so ungrateful, I’d have held on to Layla when I had her.”

“Held on to her? In your
dreams
you had her.”

“Well,” he says, a little defensively, “I suppose that one time in my parents’ basement doesn’t qualify as a dream….”

My face feels like it just got set on fire and then put out with a rake. And my expression must read something similar, because Doug immediately stiffens.

“Look, I don’t mean anything by it,” Doug adds. “Layla’s great. And you have her, so what the hell are we talking about?”

“Nothing, we’re not talking about a damn thing.”

Which still probably sounded a little angry. It would appear that my friend Doug is trying to tell me he was with Layla before I was—and I don’t buy it, since I know that Layla and I lost our virginity to each other. But on the off chance that the world is coming to an end and he actually did sleep with Layla before I did, I don’t want him knowing I’ve been oblivious to it all these years.

I get home and Layla is in our bed, wearing a lace getup, high heels, and a come-hither smile…. And if you believe that, you’re not paying attention. The reality is this: I get home and Layla is in our bed, wearing her ratty ten-plus-year-old
Yo quiero Taco Bell
Chihuahua T-shirt (which I once tried to throw away and she fished out of the trash), eating dry Cap’n Crunch straight from the box, and scowling at me.

“Major pileup on the freeway?” she says, and then shifts her eyes back to the TV. “Or just in the part of your brain that knows how to tell time?” She’s watching one of those cop shows.
Law & Order SVU Need 2 Get a Life
.

“I don’t know,” I answer, and look at my watch. “Is it that time when you give me a bunch of shit for staying out too late—which, by the way, is
so
welcoming. I can’t imagine why I didn’t race home earlier.”

“Had you raced home earlier, I wouldn’t be giving you shit. This is my point.”

“Oh, is that your point? You’re just so subtle I was having a hard time reading between the lines.”

“Nice,” she says. “Sarcasm is definitely going to help.”

“Tell me what
will
help and I’ll do it.”

“Okay,” she says, and places the cereal box down on the bed to free her hands. “One, don’t stay out so late and not even bother to call. Two, don’t come home drunk every time you do stay out so late.”

“So wait. I
can
stay out late as long as I don’t come home drunk?”

She ignores me, resumes her tally, and ticks off her third finger. “Three, act like a grown-up. You spend so much time around college kids, I think sometimes you forget you’re not one of them. You’re irresponsible.”

“Okay, so we’re done with the things I need to do, and now we’re just calling names?”

“I’m not calling you names, I’m saying you need to grow up.”

My head just about explodes.
I
need to grow up? When she’s been quietly backing out of the relationship for the past few weeks, or at least not caring about what makes me happy anymore, and spending all her time with my family and her friends? When she quite possibly has been lying to me for
years
about us sharing the most special moment of our young courtship?
Shit
.

She’s right. I do need to grow up. We both do. And I think that may be the real problem. I think I
am
growing up, and growing
out
of this relationship. I went from being totally convinced that there was nothing better out there, to being mostly convinced, to being kinda convinced. Now I’m starting to be convinced that she’s
not
the one. But now is not the time or place for this conversation. Not with the booze I drank burning in my brain.

“You’re right,” I say.

She’s stunned. “I am?”

“Yeah.” I nod. “You’re right, and I’m sorry.”

She softens immediately. “It’s okay.”

“No, it’s not. I really am sorry. And I think we should talk about this, about us, about a lot of things, but not right now. It’s too late and I’m too intoxicated. But tomorrow? Dinner?”

“Yes. Yes, please. That sounds perfect.”

“Can I sleep in these clothes and start growing up tomorrow?” I ask.

“No,” she says, with a wicked smile. “But I’ll help you out of them.”

This is a surprise. I miss her being like this. If things were always this way …

Even though I’m conflicted about us and where we’re going and what our future holds, if that smile is any indication of things to come, I’m not saying no.

There are two ways to describe my clothes after a day of work: stretched out and/or hairy. My jeans fit every morning when I put them on, but by lunchtime they are always stretched out and look like I’ve been dragged behind a horse. Why? Because I spend the majority of my working day on the ground. I sit on the floor, because when I’m shooting I like to be at the dogs’ height. It makes them feel comfortable, and I think it helps us develop a good rapport. But the rapport you need with a high-strung, short-haired pointer who would rather lick your face and nuzzle your crotch than sit for a photo, and with a decidedly low-key, brush-cut husband who, come to think of it, would also rather face-lick and crotch-nuzzle than sit for a photo, are two very different things.

Brett’s been tough to read lately. And this whole situation is new: He was weirder than I’ve ever seen him last night, though it all ended well. There was an intensity to his lovemaking, something almost desperate. I tell myself not to read too much into it. I’ve been proposed to, but I’ve still not heard that most delightful and dangerous proposal that two people float at each other when they’ve decided they’re ready to become more than two. Maybe
others feel guided by an unseen biological hand. Maybe they have love to spare and want to shine the excess on a new life. Maybe they get the feeling that something more between them is needed. In the case of Brett and me, it’s hard to say what’s prompted it.

TLC has three shoots today, and then I have my dinner with Brett. Trish is convinced he’s going to talk about us starting a family. I brought a change of clothes so, in that miraculous moment, I’m not covered in fur.

Shoot number one is of Rex, a skittish Siamese cat we met a few days ago at his consultation. When Rex and his mom arrive, Trish takes Lou and locks him in our office, so Rex doesn’t have a conniption.

“Sorry, Lou,” Trish says, as she shuts the door. “It’s a cat. You know how
they
are.”

“Can we not disparage the cat population?” I quietly admonish, since Rex’s cat-loving owner is a mere twelve feet away.

“Hello,” Trish says warmly to the woman to whom the cat is stuck. Literally. The cat has clawed into the woman’s sweatshirt and will not let go.

“Hmm,”
I muse. “Do you want to be in the photo, too?”

“No,” the woman says. “He’ll warm up.”

What happens next happens so fast I’m not even sure how to describe it. I
think
the woman plucked the paws from her shirt and put the cat down, but the cat may have released its own grip and flown off. Either way, in a Tasmanian-devilish blur, the cat moves past us and out of sight.

We spend the next two hours (our studio is
not
that big, mind you) searching for Rex, calling for Rex, crying for Rex, and assuring Rex’s mother that he has not left the building, as there is no other way out.

But then she hears movement in the back office and insists Rex is there.

“No, that’s Lou, my dog,” Trish says.

“You have a dog? There’s a
dog
here?” she screeches.

“It’s just a dachshund,” I say. “They’re small. Low to the ground. Zero jumping ability. Very nonthreatening.”

“Rex!” the woman shrieks, and flings the door to our office open. Lou cocks his head and looks up at the screaming woman. “What did you do to my Rex?”

“He didn’t touch Rex,” Trish says calmly.

“It’s been two hours,” she screeches. “He could have devoured him in that time. Call nine-one-one!”

“What? Why?” Trish asks.

“Before he starts to digest! They need to pump his stomach!”

“Really?” Trish deadpans. “So in addition to you believing that my dog—who happens to actually be
smaller
than your cat
—ate
your cat, you also believe that he’s swallowed the cat whole.”

Trish is losing her patience. Part of working well together is being intuitive—knowing when your partner is sixteen seconds away from choking a customer. I see the look in Trish’s eyes, and I rush to stand as a buffer between the two. The woman is hurling accusations at Lou, Trish’s baby. And them’s fightin’ words.

“The door was closed,” I offer. “There’s no way Lou even saw Rex.”

But Lou does smell him. Lou scurries over to the kitchen and starts standing on his hind paws and scratching at the oven, wagging his tail.

“What is it, boy?” Trish says.

We follow Lou and open the oven. Thankfully, Rex isn’t in there, but Lou is insistent. We stare at the oven, at the microwave, at the cabinets … nothing. And yet Lou is now trying to jump on top of the oven, bless his tiny little legs.

“What’s he saying?” the woman asks, as if we speak dog. I mean, if anyone speaks dog, it’s us, but she’s looking at us like we have a dog-to-English dictionary.

“He may smell Rex,” I offer.

“He’s certainly not lethargic, what with having eaten your whole cat and all. Look at all that energy,” Trish muses.

And then I see a tail. At least the hint of a tail. It’s behind the microwave in a cavity that’s barely within reach. A spot that only a frightened cat would seek out as a hiding place.

“Okay, crisis over.” I exhale. “I’ve found Rex’s tail. And I’m certain that Rex is attached.”