Leaving Amy (Amy #2) (15 page)

Tom found me hiding in the kitchen pantry. I pretended to be seeking out cereal. It was a sure bet he’d have something with grains and raisins in there. He was a reasonable man when it came to food. He certainly wasn’t the marshmallow-type like Wesley.

“Amy—”

“Say, you look sharp!” I gave him the obvious once-over, trying to avoid getting my eyes stuck on certain regions. “Be careful or she’ll gobble
you
up and you’ll have wasted money on an appetizer.”

By the look on his face and the serious tone in which he said my name, I needed to inject some levity. I suspected he wanted to say something about that whole closet thing. Had he sensed something too? And yes, I’ll admit it was weird having him leave the house to pick up a woman. After being the only one in his life for the past year, it would be tough to share him. But how was that fair? He deserved someone to make him happy. Ours was a friends-only type of thing. It had always been. Ever since I spelled it out, right before I moved out of his house the last time.

Oh no! We’ve been down this road before.
What was I thinking?
Was it possible he was slipping back into the complete “Amy moving in with me, again” routine? Was I royally screwing up our friendship by leaning on him too much, again? At least that time I
did
only see him as a friend. I was still pining over Mark. The difference now was that Mark wasn’t in the picture. He was on a plane, headed across the country.

What was I saying? Of course Tom was only a friend. My best friend, in fact. Then, of course,
When Harry Met Sally
claimed men and women couldn’t just be friends. No worries; we’d prove that theory wrong. Tom and I were thicker than thieves. Up until that little time in the closet just now, I saw Tom as my best friend. A very black-and-white situation. What just happened was totally something wrong with my radar.
Not everyone wants you, Amy. Get a grip on reality. And stop liking guys in their tee shirts.

Tom stared at his shoes. His ultra-cool brown shoes. They looked like the ones in men’s magazines. He had impeccable fashion sense.

“I won’t be late getting home.”

I put my hand on his chest and suddenly wondered whether that was such a good idea. Coming back home in those jeans and shirt, sitting around with me. “Be late, Tom.”

He did that kind of half-nod with pinched lips. There was something he wasn’t saying and I wasn’t sure I wanted him to. There was a fuzzy haze around us now. What kind of cologne was he wearing anyway?
You might need to go to a man-free island and hit your reset button.

“You’ll be all right? You know how to set the alarm, right? The code hasn’t changed. And I picked up some tofu. I don’t eat it, of course. But I figured I’d be seeing you this weekend sometime and I wanted to have—”

I pulled down a box of whole wheat grains and smiled. “I’ll be fine, Tom. Go and have a good time.”

He walked out, leaving a trail of the best smell I’d had the pleasure in partaking in a while. It made me think of Mark, and then about him in Chicago. I put the cereal back and went out to scour the cabinets for liquor. Not my usual dinner but then nothing usual had happened in my life for quite some time. Besides, the other night at Jim’s house, the sensation of feeling tingly all over was pretty spectacular. I could use spectacular right about now.

It wasn’t quite seven o’clock when Wesley called. I’d only had two mixed drinks. Jack and Cokes. Tom had brandy but it felt as if it tore off a layer of tissue from my esophagus when I drank it, so I went with something I could chase better. I was a smidge tipsy but nothing I couldn’t think cognitively about.

“Hello.”

“Amy, are you busy? What are you up to?”

I looked around at Tom’s living room, and then to the television. I was watching some movie about two people in love and she moved away and he couldn’t take it and followed her.
Was this telling me something?

“I’m watching a movie.” I paused it. I needed to know how it turned out.

“You want to come over here and watch it?”

He sounded lonely. I felt a pang of guilt for letting him suffer, knowing he wanted me there. Knowing how lonely that house must’ve felt without me in it. It always did when he traveled.

“It’s on Netflix, Wesley.”

“Well, I was going to tell you to bring a chair, anyway, if you did come over.”

“What?”

“I haven’t got living room furniture yet.”

Holy mother of
…
I forgot I took it to the apartment. Well, he got what’s-her-name when he left. I thought the couch was a reasonable pillage.

“The movers are coming Monday to load up my stuff. I’ll have them deliver the sofa.”

“Will your other things be coming with it?”

I tried to hear whether there were any background noises. Like maybe he was at a bar and it wouldn’t be as hurtful to tell him the truth. Sadly, I heard crickets. He must’ve really been at home, sitting on a floor, looking at where couches used to be. Where I used to be. Why do I feel so guilty?
He
left me.

“Not yet, Wesley. I need time. I told you that.”

“I know. I just thought you’d had some.”

“What, a day?” I watched the people frozen on the television screen.

“What is it that you’re figuring out, Amy?”

Good question. I didn’t know. It just didn’t seem perfect etiquette to move right in after both our respective relationships failed. I needed to know we weren’t just falling back onto plan A. I couldn’t have our marriage morph into a consolation prize. It had to have intention. There needed to be time for reflection. Time to gather strength to get it right for the last time. Days, weeks? I wasn’t sure. Anyway, I had to help Tom put together a party. That sounded more fascinating than watching Wesley watch boxing on television and yelling out for a beer.

“Give me until the New Year.”

“The New Year? Are you serious?”

Who was I fooling? I was going back. Where else did I have to go? And certainly he learned his lesson by now. Did he learn his lesson? Which lesson: not to cheat or to not take me for granted and try to actually woo me? A little bit, anyway. And I know. I needed to be more spontaneous, more out-of-the-box than cooking spicy food and equating it to amazing foreplay. I just wanted my last vacation before going back into wife-mode. Time to re-wire myself into knowing I was going to spend the rest of my days on earth being the wife of an attorney…the managing partner in our fathers’ law firm, responsible for planning all the office retreats and dinner parties for new clients. For now, though, this was Amy time. A buffer between the past epic fail and the new do-over. I just needed a breather to clear my head. And the thought of punishing him a little by making him live alone only crept in my thoughts a few times!

“Yes, the New Year. I think that will give us some healthy time to get reacquainted with each other a little bit at a time. We should maybe go out and see if it’s really what we want. We screwed up before, Wesley. I’m not filling out divorce papers twice on the same person.”

He was quiet. I couldn’t interpret this silence.

“Okay.”

Wow, that was easy. No tantrums like usual?
Maybe I needed to be more assertive in the future. Noted.

“So, how about Sunday night? Can I take you out then?”

How sweet. He was acting as if we were back in high school. But I didn’t get the opportunity of a date with him then; Ashley did. I think it would be good for me to see him in a different light than the two-timing sleaze ball I’d been referring to for the last couple of months. This was nice. Just what I needed. To set the tone for a new beginning.

“Sure.”

“If they’re packing you up Monday, where are you going to be staying until New Year’s?”

“A friend’s house. Now, I’ll meet you Sunday. Where do you want to meet?”

The last thing I needed was him all over this Tom and I cohabiting thing. It would prove to bring no mojo to whatever was going for us at this moment.

“I guess the Tavern. Is that good for you?”

And look at that, he even asked my opinion.
Not just a “this is where we’ll go.”

“Sure. I’ll meet you there around six?”

“I’ll be looking forward to it.”

You know what? I believed him. All of that empty space at home was doing him some good. Better than a marriage counselor, I bet.

I didn’t see Tom at first when I went downstairs. I didn’t wait up for him the night before, either. I went to bed early on purpose. He seemed to be complicating my mind lately. I was trying not to concern myself with how possessive I felt seeing him drive out of the driveway to pick up Kate. I didn’t know her and I felt as if she’d been convicted of illegal cock-fighting. This wasn’t normal. I needed to feel the way I did when he first told me he had a date. A little in disbelief—Tom? With another girl? But still not…
jealous
.

“Hey you.”

He startled me. I was looking out the kitchen window. There was a blue jay eating something on the ground. Poor guy, he was tricked by the sight of the birdfeeder. I bought it and put it up, but it seems when I moved into my apartment Tom abandoned the idea of keeping it full.

“Hey.” I turned around to see him.

He wore a sweatshirt and jeans. It knocked his age down by ten years.

“How was it?”

“Well, I was hoping to dish last night, but I was surprised not to find you waiting up.”

He noticed? He wanted me to be waiting up?

“No, I was tired.”

“Must’ve been the Jack.”

I scrunched my face. “Huh?”

“You left out the Jack Daniels. I wasn’t aware you had a habit of drinking before bed.”

“It’s a part of the mourning process.” I moved out of the way for him to put water in the coffee pot.

“Give me a break. You and Mark hadn’t spent the last month together more than a few evenings.”

I hated when he was right. The truth was Mark was always working. Then when I continued my routine of attending charity events with Tom, Mark grew resentful and worked later for no reason, I felt. We weren’t the poster children for best relationship. But the fact remained I thought we’d one day have one. I could lament that, couldn’t I?

“And your point is?”

“The point is I hope you’re not going to try to drown your sorrows in liquor and act as though all your dreams have been smashed to hell.”

“What if I do?”

“I won’t let you. Amy, it wasn’t that good of a relationship.”

“I beg your pardon. I was going to move in with him.”

“And God one day smiled down and said, ‘Amy Whitfield, I’m going to save you years of sadness and waste.’ Then he sent Mark to Chicago.”

I shook my head. “Tom McTavish, you’re a jerk sometimes. I loved Mark.”

“I don’t doubt you thought you loved him. But it wasn’t going to work out.”

“I see.” I smiled an apathetic smile and nodded. “And you knew this all along?”

“Yes.”

“Well, wise one, what is going to happen then with Wesley? Why don’t you save me the trouble of guessing and trying to wrap my head around it and tell me?”

“You don’t want to hear it.”

He finished filling the pot and poured it into the machine. His smugness was killing me.

“Or rather you know it, but you’ll go through it because you like to feel pain.”

“Sure, that’s it. I love pain. But enlighten me. What’s going to happen?”

“You’ll go back with Wesley. You’ll do it to prove to yourself that you’re a forgiving person. Then when you can’t stand it anymore, you’ll just check out. You’ll be that woman at the company parties who stares off with nothing in her eyes. No future, no happiness. You’ll die just going through the motions.”

“Lord, you make me want to stand in front of a moving train right now. Anything to avoid that train wreck of a life.”

“You could avoid it by not going back with him.”

“I told him I needed time, Tom. It’s not like I’m not giving this serious thought.”

The fact Mom could have known about Dad and she still stayed with him flashed in my mind. People did it and lived to be happy. Didn’t they?

“By the way, I’m going out tomorrow night with him. Don’t expect me for dinner.”

“You’ll let me pick out your outfit, won’t you? I’ve got just the right one in mind. It’s black with a veil.”

I punched his arm. “You’re bad. It’s just a date, not a reconciliation.” I took some filtered water from the fridge and grabbed a banana off the counter. “Let’s go and get a tree today.”

“Okay. I’ll be ready after my grapefruit and paper.”

He didn’t even put up a fight. His date must’ve gone well. I’d extract the details when he least expected it. I was excited to be doing something other than pining for a failed relationship, past or present.

“So did you have a good time?” I couldn’t take it anymore.

“It was fine.” He sipped his coffee and picked up his knife to cut into the grapefruit.

“Fine? Come on, tell me something about it.” I went to get the jelly from the refrigerator.

“It was a date, Amy. Not a marriage ceremony.”

“Tom, you haven’t been on one in years. Did you like the restaurant? What did she wear? Did she say anything about your jeans?”

He laid down his knife and looked at me over his glasses. He always wore them when he read. The paper was spread out next to him on the table.

“For your information,
you
were my first date in years.” He went back to sawing the fruit. Juice ran down the sides of it and the tart smell fragranced the air. “The restaurant was all right. The clam chowder was runny and her chicken was tough. She wore something.” He waved his hands in the air, possibly trying to help in his recall. “Blue or other, and no, she didn’t say anything about my jeans.”

“Me? I was your first date? What are you talking about?”

He took off his glasses and laid them on the paper. I guess he figured he wasn’t going to be reading that morning. I tried not to be chatty, but I couldn’t help it.