“So is Fiducia going to get away with this crap?” she asks as we stand to leave.
“I’m not sure,” I reply. I’m too disheartened for optimism today. “Men will call you weak if you’re soft, and they’ll call you abrasive if you’re not soft. They’ve set it up so there’s no way for us to succeed, and they get away with most of it.”
She bites her lip. “Will Fiducia have to apologize, if Margaret wins?”
“Yes,” I reply with grim certainty. “I’ll make sure of it.”
I walk down the hill to the ferry. I haven’t even climbed on board before Lauren texts to say she’ll testify.
I got exactly what I came here for. It doesn’t feel like much of a victory, though.
38
I get back to LA early Friday evening. I have no intention of seeing Ben, but he just shows up at my door, having gotten my flight info from Terri.
I want him to go away, but it feels like I’ll either scream or burst into tears if I try to address this in person, which means it’s better left to email or text—somewhere I can remain in control.
He kisses me, and if he notices how stiff I am as it happens, he doesn’t say so.
“I was just about to go to the store,” I lie. “And then I’m going to bed.” In truth I was planning to eat a handful of chocolate chips and reevaluate my life, but I need to get him out of my apartment first.
He says he’ll come with me and I immediately regret the lie. I don’t feel like going through the ruse of shopping in addition to the ruse of not being mad at him.
He asks how the trip to Seattle went and I answer, but I’m growing steadily angrier as we walk to the elevator. How can he be the guy who shows up at my apartment the second my flight lands, and also be the guy who lies to my face? How could he push so hard for me to let him in, to lean on him, when he never intended to stick around?
We walk into the store and he grabs us a cart. He’s talking about deposing Lauren quickly before she changes her mind, and I’m thinking about him holding me after I talked to my mom the other night. He should never have gone down this path with me in the first place, should never have pushed me to invite him over and take a trip out of town with him. It’s utter bullshit that he led me on the way he did.
“What should we make?” he asks.
I thought I could do this, but I can’t. I’m not letting him back into my apartment, making dinner by his side as if nothing’s gone wrong.
“Some marcona almonds and a little Manchego. I don’t feel like cooking.” I’ll claim to have a headache as we leave and send him on his way.
He raises a brow. “Don’t you think you ought to learn how to make a few meals for your widowed veterinarian?”
The widowed veterinarian. Yes. Someone who won’t cheat, who won’t trade up, who won’t claim he’s seeing his family when he’s taking another woman to a Michelin-starred restaurant.
“I kind of pictured him doing most of the cooking,” I reply, feeling vicious now, more myself. “Or I pictured becoming the kind of person who enjoys cooking.”
“Do you have a timeline for when this magnificent transformation will take place?” He smirks. “When you suddenly want to take time off work and cook?”
Rage is turning me into the woman I become in court sometimes—ruthless and without mercy—and I welcome it. The Castrator wouldn’t weep like a child over some cheating asshole. She’d just remind him she has all those extra teeth. “It won’t happen overnight,” I reply. “The widowed veterinarian has to teach me how to slow down and smell the roses first.”
“Right,” he says a little dourly. “I want to see how many shoes you throw the first time a man tries to provide you with advice on how to live.”
“It will be different with him. Because he’ll be wise. Like Dumbledore.”
“I guess that explains why you’re taking those walks in the country,” he mutters, “because I don’t see you begging Dumbledore to fuck you harder.”
He’s jealous of a hypothetical future husband while planning to take out a very non-hypothetical woman tomorrow night. What gives him the fucking right?
“He’ll be so good at it,” I reply with a bitter smile. “I won’t even have to ask.”
He stops suddenly, in the middle of the produce section. “I’m leaving,” he says, fury stamped on every feature of his face.
I stare at him in shock. This is what I wanted, and now I also…don’t want him to go. “What?”
“You heard me. Call your widowed veterinarian and have him tell you a bunch of patronizing shit about how to live your life better. See how well you like it.”
And then he heads out the door, leaving me behind.
I stand frozen for a moment before I walk stiffly toward the exit, barely holding myself together. I put the cart back, but by the time I reach the elevator, I’m crying. My sadness feels ancient, as if these are tears I should have cried years ago, yet they’ve got nothing to do with Kyle.
It’s Ben, and how disappointed I am that after two years of wanting him, he’s breaking my heart, just the way I knew he would.
It’s nearly two a.m. and I’ve cried myself to sleep when I hear a key in the door.
Ben enters the room, taking slow steps toward the side of the bed. In the dim light, he seems exhausted, his shirt untucked and wrinkled, circles under his eyes. He strips down to his boxers and climbs in beside me, pulling me against him. He smells like bourbon. I know I’m being weak, letting him stay. It was weak to ever allow this to begin in the first place. I just want one last night of pretending he’s mine.
“I’m crazy about you, Gemma,” he whispers against the top of my head. “I don’t want to be, but I am.”
My hands slide over his back, memorizing the feel of him, his shoulders blades, his spine, the breadth of him. My God, he’s so perfect I want to weep.
It’s not just an expression. I do want to weep. I’m struggling not to. I roll away, letting him tuck me tight to his chest.
“Then don’t go tomorrow night,” I whisper. I’m begging and it’s fucking pathetic, but I can’t help myself. “Please just don’t go.”
I wait for him to answer. To apologize, to tell me he made a mistake and swear he’ll fix it.
Instead, his breathing just grows deep and even as sleep overtakes him.
39
I’m sick to my stomach as I head to the office on Saturday. Ben stumbled out early, unhappy again and oddly quiet, seeming to regret he came over at all. I wanted to ask for my key back but I just couldn’t do it. I knew I couldn’t get the words out without bursting into tears.
I meet Keeley and her newest boytoy at a bar that night. I don’t like the guy and I don’t like his friends, either, but it would be hard to focus on much tonight anyway, given the circumstances.
Ben is at Ardor by now. I wonder if he’s asking her if Malbec’s okay, if they’re talking as easily and animatedly as we did. If he’ll whisper, “maybe I just want to be someone you trust” when he kisses her. I thought it was different with us, that I wasn’t like every other woman he takes out. I now have no idea why.