Are you enjoying the lessons?  🙂  Let’s see what Emily has to teach us today.

Emily Life Lesson #3…  Assuming your ex has gotten smarter in your absence is a fail.

“So, what’s up?” I asked after a pause.  “I don’t know if Cass has done anything with that paperwork, if that’s what you’re wondering.”

He shook his head minimally, still looking at the pictures, and the little warning bells went off in my head.  Kevin was nothing, if not opinionated and in your face.  For him to come to my house and then not come look me in the eye—told me it wasn’t going to be his normal rant.

I decided to abandon my dinner for the moment, and pour myself a glass of wine.  I poured two on instinct, and offered him one as I sat at the table.

“You aren’t going to eat?” he asked, glancing back at the stove as he sat down. 

“It can wait, what’s going on?”

He met my eyes and chuckled.  “Is something going on with you and Landry?”

My whole body relaxed.  “Jesus, Kevin, is that what you came over to ask me?”

“No, I’m just wondering.”

“Well, quit,” I said, getting back up to revisit dinner.

“Sherry wants to get married,” he blurted out.

I looked back at him, at the genuine worry and anxiety in his face, and sat back down.

“O—kay.  I’m guessing you don’t?”

He toyed with his glass.  “I should.  I mean, yeah, I guess I do.  I just—”

“You’ve been together long enough to know.”

“I know,” he said, pushing back his chair and rubbing at his eyes.  For the first time, I noticed the perfection was waning.  There were the little lines around his eyes, and some gray in his eyebrows.  “And in that respect, I do.”  He blew out a breath.  “She’s perfect for me.  We have a great relationship.”

“You have a great relationship?”  I leaned across the table toward him.  “You sound like you’re describing a dog.  Or a car.  Or an insurance agent.  Do you love her?”

He met my eyes.  “I loved you.”

That backed me up a good foot.  I sat up and blinked at him.  “Wh—What—”

“I loved you with all I had, Emily.  Since junior high, I was in love with you.  And look what I did with that.  I still had to screw it up.  I couldn’t be happy with what I had, I still needed what I didn’t have.”  

I didn’t want to go down that road.  I scooped my hair up and tried to look patient, but reminders of what the whole town knew my husband was doing behind my back was not my idea of memory lane.

“So you’re saying you might do it again?”

He scoffed and looked away.  “I’ve already done it again.  And again.  That’s my point.”

I dropped my hair and stared at him.  “Seriously?”

“I do love her, Em.  She’s amazing.”  He got up and pushed his chair in, lining it up with the others.  “But clearly, that’s not enough to keep me faithful.  Should I let her marry into that?”

I wanted to shake him.  “No!”  I got up and left my chair out on purpose.  “Kevin, grow the hell up.  You’re not special.  Everybody has temptations—hell, I could have had three different flings while we were married, but I never gave it a second thought.  I made the choice.  You have that ability too.  Get help if you need to, or let her go.”  I walked up to him and put my finger on his chest.  “But if you love Sherry like you say you do, be a man.  Don’t fuck her over.”

He narrowed his eyes.  “Who could you have had flings with?”

I turned around and headed back to my cooling dinner.  “Really?  That’s all you heard?”

He followed me.  “I’m sorry.”

I looked at him, annoyed.  “For what?”

“Cheating on you.  Messing things up.”

His voice was soft.  Sincere.  Probably for the first time in all the apologies he’d made. 

“I know,” I said, and then looked back down at my chicken that wasn’t looking so good.  “Things happen as they’re supposed to, Kevin.  Maybe Sherry’s the one for you.”

“Maybe.”  He started to leave, then turned around.  “Thanks for talking to me.”  He shrugged.  “I didn’t have anybody else.”

I gave him a small smile.  “Any time.”

“So is Landry the one for you?”

I closed my eyes.  “Bye, Kevin.”

He chuckled, and left.  But I knew he’d registered the fact that I hadn’t said no.

***

You gotta love Kevin.  🙂

You can preorder BEFORE AND EVER SINCE right here, and you’ll have it on release day!

Okay, so what did you think of yesterday’s lesson?  Ever had that happen to you?  Lord knows I have.  And what did you think of our first Hot Tool Guy?  🙂  Suddenly have a project that needs fixing? LOL  

Now to hear from BEFORE AND EVER SINCE’s Emily on Lesson number 2…

Emily Life Lesson #2…  The most likely time to be found is when you’re trying to hide.

“Where are you?” Cassidy asked.

“The grocery store.”

“Again?  Didn’t you just go there?”

I cursed my bad lying.  “Oh, I forgot a few things.”  I pushed my cart faster, wanting to get done and get home.  “So, anyway, that’s fine if you want to do th—”  I choked back the last word as I rounded an aisle into the produce, and there stood Ben.  Fondling peaches.

“What’s the matter?” Cassidy asked.

“Nothing,” I said under my breath into the phone, jumping backward and tugging my cart with me.

I dead-ended at the meat section, thinking I could stay there, then had a panicked thought that he was a man and would probably buy meat.

“Shit,” I said under my breath, forgetting Cassidy was still chattering.

She stopped.  “What?”

“Oh nothing, baby, I just—can’t find the sea salt.”

I darted across the end caps till I found what was sure to be a safe aisle, and jumped in there with the tampons and sanitary pads.  And then flattened myself as best I could to all the pink packaging, just in case he tended to look down each aisle.  We said our goodbyes and I strongly considered stalking the registers from afar to make sure he left.  Then again, if I’d just hurried up I would have been gone by then.

As if on cue, he passed my aisle, slowly pushing his cart as he studied a piece of paper in his hand.  I stopped and froze in place, holding my breath, not blinking or breathing till he passed.  Then I ran for the registers like the chicken shit I was, not caring that I’d only grabbed four of my thirty-something needed items.  They’d be there tomorrow. 

I quick-scanned the registers for the fastest choice, and picked one with an elderly man with only a pack of toilet paper and a box of candy under his arm.  I’d be out of there in minutes, as compared to all the other lines sporting three and four people each, with mountains overflowing their carts.

I did a little shuffle move, waiting for my turn, looking behind me every five seconds.  Why the hell was I so paranoid?  Why was I hiding in my grocery store, in my town?  He should be hiding from me.  And no sooner had that thought crossed my brain, when he rounded the corner, and I ducked.

Pretending to closely inspect the latest celebrity gossip on the rack, I silently begged the checker to hurry the hell up.

“Price check on four!” she called into a microphone, holding up the box of candy.

“It’s five-ninety-nine,” the elderly man said.

“I have to check sir,” the pink-cheeked checker said, pulling out a reference card to prove it.

Great.  I picked a newbie with anal retention.

“I actually saw it too, and it was five-ninety-five,” I said, nodding from my bent over stance.

The girl looked at me with giant eyes.  “He said five-ninety-nine.”

I blinked.  “That’s what I said.”

“No, you said five-ninety-five,” the man said.

“That’s why we check it,” the girl said, nodding.

“For four pennies?  Seriously?”  I said.  I really actually kind of hissed it.  “Don’t y’all scan everything now, anyway?”

The girl scowled at me.  “The scanners are down,” she said. 

The man just kind of shrugged, and I gave him a weary look.  Of course the old man didn’t care.  All he had planned for the day was to sit on the toilet and eat chocolate caramels.

Finally, a greasy-haired stock boy ambled up, holding a hand out for the box.  The old man looked almost physically pained to watch it leave with the boy, as if he’d taken great measures to select that very box and didn’t trust the boy not to switch it.

I was still very much bent over, when legs stopped behind me.  Somehow I knew who they belonged to before I ever looked up.

“You okay?” Ben asked, not sounding particularly sincere.

I slowly lowered my stoop to a crouch, pretending fascination with a tabloid.

“I’m fine, how are you?” I asked, hoping I sounded as uninterested as he did.

He reached over me and plucked the tabloid out of the rack, giving off an aroma of warm soap when he did so. 

“The end of the world, huh?” he read off the headline.  “Nostradamus’s prediction keep you up at night?”

I saw the humor in his eyes, but I refused to play. 

“Lots of things keep me up at night.”

 ***

Who’s been there?  *raising my hand*

Stay tuned to Facebook again today for the next Hot Tool Guy of the Day!

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