Today, Sam and I have been married for eight years.
We’re going out tonight to celebrate, to a nice Spanish restaurant in midtown that serves really good paella. Most nights we stay in and cook or else get takeout, because I’m always so busy, but we always go out on our anniversary.
Sam finds parking a few blocks away from the restaurant, which is something of a miracle. The major bonus of his refusal to lease a spot in a parking garage is he has become amazing at parallel parking. I’m certain he’ll never squeeze the Highlander into that tiny little spot, but he insists he can do it. As he attempts to maneuver his car into the space, a small crowd of pedestrians gathers to watch.
“You’ll never make it, buddy!” one guy yells out. “Watch me!” Sam yells back.
When he makes it into the spot (as if there was any doubt), he’s met with a smattering of applause. I’m still not sure how he did it. There’s no more than a couple of inches of give on either end of the vehicle. Sam always says the eternal goal is to have zero space on either end of the car.
As we walk the short distance to the Spanish restaurant, Sam reaches for my hand. He always holds my hand when we walk—he did it when we were dating, and he does it now, after eight years of marriage. It’s sweet.
“I’m glad we’re married,” he says as he squeezes my hand. I laugh. “Good to know.”
He’s not just saying it because it’s our anniversary—it’s obvious Sam is truly glad to be married. The first couple of years we were together, before the fertility stuff went off the rails, he would say it constantly. I’m really glad we’re married. Or, I’m so glad I have a wife! Or sometimes, Thank God we’re finally married. I don’t think he liked dating very much. He said it was exhausting.
That’s probably why we got married relatively quickly after we started dating. Shelley started dating her husband Rick at around the same time I met Sam, but Rick was always squeamish about commitment. Sam was the polar opposite. We quickly fell into an exclusive relationship with an
implied date every Saturday night and several weeknights too. While Rick had a freak out when Shelley left a toothbrush at his apartment, Sam— unprompted—cleaned out a drawer for me in his bedroom and made me a copy of his key, and soon after, said, “Wouldn’t it be easier if you just moved in with me?” Shelley and I were both in our late twenties with marriage on our minds, and she was dying of jealousy.
Then when we were living together, he started making comments that began with, “When we’re married.” For example, “When we’re married, we can file our taxes jointly.” Or, “When we’re married, we should get a two- bedroom apartment.” Granted, they weren’t super romantic statements (like, “When we’re married, we should honeymoon in Paris” or “When we’re married, we should buy a villa in Milan”) but there was something sweet about his assumption we’d end up together. Eventually, I started making “When we’re married” statements too.
One day, we were passing a Zales, hand-in-hand, and I commented, “When you propose to me, you better get me a ring from Tiffany’s.”
Sam got this odd look on his face and my heart sank. He’d been making so many statements about marriage, I’d thought it was okay. This was entirely his fault!
Finally, just when I was about to stammer an awkward apology, he leaned over and murmured in my ear, “And what if I got it from Kay’s?”
I frowned at him. “Huh?”
That’s when he reached into his pocket and pulled out the little blue box. My mouth fell open. We’d only been dating a year and a half, and even though we were living together, I hadn’t expected this. “Oh,” I breathed. “I didn’t expect…”
He blinked at me. “Well, I love you. Why wait?” Why, indeed.
“Hang on, let me get down on one knee,” he said. And then he did, like he was following some proper procedure for proposing to one’s girlfriend that he read in the relationship manual. He opened up the blue box and the ring was… well, I’m not going to lie. It was tiny. Sam had only recently finished his doctorate and wasn’t making the big bucks in his postdoc program. But still. It was perfect. “Will you marry me, Abby?”
I said no.
I’m just kidding. Obviously, I said yes. A very vehement yes. Because otherwise, why would we be sitting at table, waiting to enjoy paella, going into our ninth year as husband and wife. I have never for one moment regretted my decision to marry Sam Adler.
Although sometimes I wonder if he feels the same.
But there’s no trace of regret on Sam’s face as he watches our waitress place the large pan of piping hot rice and seafood down in front of us. He grins at me over the steam rising off our food.
“What do you think?” the waitress asks us. “Looks great,” I say.
She places a white hand with red nails on my husband’s shoulder, “And what do you think, cariño?”
Our waitress has been flirting shamelessly with Sam since we arrived. This sort of thing always happens—I hardly even notice anymore. And he never notices. You’d think his wedding ring and the fact that he’s here with his wife would be deterrent enough, but apparently not.
“Yep, looks good,” he says, but his smile is directed only at me. It’s amusing to see women try to flirt with him while he completely ignores them. That will never get old.
The waitress gives up and leaves us to our paella. It’s really good. It’s costing us a fortune, but money has never been something I worry about. I’ve always felt a need to strike out on my own, even with my trust fund sitting in the bank, but between my salary and Sam’s, it would be hard to live in Manhattan without that nest egg.
“This is really good,” I say as I pop a piece of sausage in my mouth.
“I don’t know,” Sam says. “I think the paella I made last month was pretty good too.”
It wasn’t. It really wasn’t. Sam is not getting any better at cooking.
“Well, that wasn’t technically paella,” I say. “It was Spanish rice with pieces of sausage and shrimp in it.”
“Yeah, and what is this?” He digs some of the socarrat off the pan. “Same thing. Rice with sausage and shrimp.”
“You don’t have the crackling part at the bottom.” “Sure I do.”
I grin at him. “Burning it at the bottom is not the same thing.” “It was just a tiny bit burned.”
“It was black.”
“Hmm. I think it was brown.”
I roll my eyes. “I will say, I do like that you put fresh tomatoes in yours. Tomatoes are my all-time favorite vegetable.”
He gasps. “Abby! Tomatoes aren’t vegetables! They’re fruit.” “No way.”
“Way,” he says firmly. “It’s got seeds on the inside. That makes it a fruit.” He winks at me. “It’s a savory fruit.”
“That doesn’t sound right.” “It’s right. Trust me.” No… is it?
I whip out my phone to Google it and… wow, it turns out tomatoes really are fruit. Damn. “I can’t believe it! How could tomatoes be fruit?”
“What I can’t believe is you didn’t know tomatoes are fruit.”
“Yeah, well.” I give his shoe a gentle kick under the table, which makes him smile. “You didn’t even know Brad Pitt and Jennifer Aniston broke up.”
“So I don’t follow the recent tabloid news. So what?”
“That’s not recent—their divorce was over a decade ago! Since then, he got married to Angelina Jolie, they adopted a bunch of babies, and then they broke up! You’re one full marriage behind.”
“You sure know a lot about Brad Pitt’s love life,” he says as he kicks me back under the table.
And then we’re kind of playing footsie under the table. I slide off my shoe and get it up his pants leg, and he reaches down to grasp my bare calf. Our eyes meet across the table, and the smile he gives me makes me tingle all over. Shelley always talks about how her husband doesn’t “excite” her anymore, but I can’t relate. Sam still gets me all hot and bothered. I can’t imagine that ever changing. I’m even looking forward to him getting old because I think he’ll be sexy with lines around his eyes and silver hair.
As soon as we’re done eating, Sam wants to exchange presents. He’s more excited over this than an adult should rightfully be. I’ve got his present stuffed into my purse, and presumably, my present is in his jacket pocket. Which means it’s something small. Maybe jewelry.
I hope it’s jewelry.
Sure enough, he pulls a rectangular box from his coat and slides it across the table to me. He smiles when he sees the square box I hand him.
He lifts it, evaluating its weight.
“This doesn’t feel like electronics,” he says. “It’s not.”
“Is it… socks?” He grins. “You know how much I like socks.”
He’s joking—referring to a time when we went to my parents’ house for Christmas, and their gift to Sam was a pair of fancy socks. This was, I suspect, my mother’s not-so-subtle way of saying she wasn’t excited about our upcoming nuptials. I was mortified by that one, but he thought it was funny. He still wears them. He calls them his Christmas socks.
“Yeah, but they’re nice socks,” I say. “Prada socks.” “Ooh, Prada socks. This I gotta see.”
He rips off the wrapping paper and pulls off the lid to the box. His eyes widen when he sees what’s inside. “It’s… a tank top?”
“It’s an apron!”
“Oh…” He pulls it out, holding it up in the light. The apron contains a bunch of mathematical symbols, including the square root of negative i, two to the third power, a summation symbol, and pi. I would never know this, but the website assured me that this reads… “I ate some pie?”
“Right.” I beam at him. “Cool, right? For all the… you know, cooking you do.”
Not that I want to encourage him in his cooking or anything. But since I can’t discourage him, I may as well buy him an apron so he doesn’t have stains on every last piece of clothing in his closet.
“Yeah, this is great,” he says, although it’s hard to tell if he means it. “I’ll be like Euclid meets Martha Stewart.”
“You hate it.”
“I don’t hate it.”
“You obviously do.” “No, I don’t. I love it.”
“You definitely don’t love it.” “I do!”
“Liar.”
“I love it so much,” he says, “I’m going to put it on right now, because I can’t wait to wear it.”
“Okay, okay…”
“No, watch…” And then he stands up, and in front of the whole restaurant, puts the strings of the apron over his head. He makes a big thing of tying it, until I’m laughing into my palm. People are starting to stare at us, but I don’t care. “How do I look?”
“Sexy as hell.”
“Well, that goes without saying.” He grins at me. “Okay, now you open yours.”
I pull the lid off the box of what is clearly jewelry. Sam doesn’t buy me jewelry much, but when he does, he’s actually decent at picking it out. For a guy.
But this isn’t jewelry. It’s a long silver object with diamonds on the handle and the name “ABBY” engraved on the blade.
“It’s a letter opener,” he says. “I got sick of listening to you complain about all your papercuts.”
I do complain about papercuts a lot. “It’s beautiful,” I say, and I mean it. The handle is absolutely exquisite. I can’t say I wouldn’t have liked a necklace, but this is thoughtful. It’s something I don’t have and that I need, and whenever I use it at work, I’ll think of Sam. He always gets me really thoughtful presents.
“I’m really glad you like it,” he says. “You’re not going to impress the Cuddles people if you’ve cuts all over your hands, right?”
I pull it out of the box, admiring the design. It really is beautiful. The blade catches the overhead light and I notice how sharp it is. Well, I shouldn’t have any problem opening letters anymore.
An hour later, we’re walking hand-in-hand back to the Toyota. He’s removed the apron, and he looks really handsome in his dress shirt and slacks. He only had one small glass of wine because he’s driving, but I’ve had two, and somehow it’s enough to make me tipsy. What can I say—I’m a lightweight. So holding hands quickly degenerates into me hanging onto his arm, and then he’s got his arm around my shoulders, pulling me close to him as we walk.
I stumble over a crack in the pavement, which is more a symptom of my high heels than the amount I’ve had to drink, but Sam thinks it’s hilarious. “Are you drunk on two glasses of wine, Abby?”
“No.”
“You kind of seem like you are.”
“Listen, Mister.” I grab him by the arm. Ooh, nice biceps. Thanks, Gym Membership. “You be nice.”
We stop walking and just stare at each other for a moment. He leans forward until I can smell the wine and paella on his breath. He almost certainly would have kissed me except a voice from my left-hand side calls out, “Abby!”
Damn.
I swivel my head to the side. I’m shocked to see none other than Monica Johnson standing only a few feet away from us. We’re nowhere in the vicinity of work. What is she doing here?
“Um, hi, Monica,” I say as I back away from Sam, who on his part looks properly disappointed.
She doesn’t seem at all cognizant of having interrupted us as she clutches her purse to her chest and steps closer to us. “I’m so surprised to see you two here!”
Sam barely acknowledges her, glancing down at his watch then at a streetlamp. He’s not the most social guy in the world under the best of circumstances, but he’s made no secret of how uncomfortable this situation makes him. Monica is pregnant with a child who has half his DNA. It’s an odd situation.
“It’s our anniversary,” I explain. “We were just having dinner.”
“Oh, that’s wonderful!” She clasps her hands together. She’s still wearing the same blouse she had on at work this morning, and I can’t help but notice that while her stomach hasn’t gotten any bigger, her boobs definitely have. She had fairly unremarkable breasts before, but now she’s stacked.
I glance at Sam to see if he’s noticing, but he’s got his hands shoved into his pockets and is looking everywhere but at Monica. At least he hasn’t taken out his phone.
“What are you up to?” I ask.
“Just dinner with some old friends.” She shrugs. “And now, you know, trying to snag a taxi on a Friday night. I’ve heard it helps to show a little leg, but it’s not working.”
“Oh.” I glance down the street, where Sam’s Highlander is parked. “We could give you a ride home, if you’d like.”
Sam’s eyes fly open, but thankfully, he keeps his mouth shut. This woman is pregnant with our child—I’m not letting her wander the city late at night.
Monica’s cheeks color. “Oh, I don’t want to take you out of your way.” “No, we insist,” I say. “You don’t live that far from us. It’s no trouble.” I look at Sam for confirmation and he reluctantly nods.
So instead of making out with my husband on the streets of Manhattan on the night of our anniversary, we all trudge back to the Toyota to head back home. Which is fine. I guess.
But here’s the weird part: when Sam unlocks the doors to the car with his key fob, Monica immediately jumps into the shotgun seat. Considering we’re giving her a ride, that seems odd to me. I’m Sam’s wife—I should be the one sitting next to him. Technically this is his car because it’s in his name, but he bought it with money from our joint bank account. And since I earn way more money than he does, that means, in a way, this car is more mine than his. In any case, it’s more mine than Monica’s.
How could she sit in the front seat?
I fume about it for a minute, but there’s nothing I can do. Sam is the one driving, so I have no choice but to get into the back seat. I know it’s a small thing, but it makes me uncomfortable. When I look at Sam and Monica sitting up in front, they seem very much like they could be a couple. On top of that, she’s pregnant with his child. On so many levels, Monica and Sam make more sense than Sam and I do. Yes, she’s over ten years younger than he is, but so what? Men marry much younger women all the time.
I’m beginning to feel like a third wheel back here. I hope Sam drives
fast.
We drive in awkward silence for about five minutes. I’m good at small
talk, but what sort of conversation do you make with the woman who’s carrying your baby in her uterus? Have you thought of any names for the child you’re giving us? Nothing brilliant is coming to me. It isn’t until we’re stopped at a red light in front of a movie theater that Monica exclaims: “Oh my gosh! The new Quentin Tarantino movie is out!”
Sam’s eyebrows shoot up. Quentin Tarantino is one of his favorite directors and we’ve already made plans to see the movie this weekend. “You like Quentin Tarantino?”
“Uh huh.” She nods eagerly. “My favorite is Pulp Fiction.”
Pulp Fiction is Sam’s absolutely favorite Tarantino movie. Without exaggerating, I would say he’s probably seen it ten-thousand times, and those are just the times we’ve watched it together.
He snorts. “You probably weren’t even born yet when that movie came out.”
It bothers me that she doesn’t contradict him on that point. “It’s still a great movie. Samuel L. Jackson? Classic.” She grins. “Do you know what they call a quarter pounder with cheese in Paris?”
A smile twitches at his lips. “A Royale with Cheese.” “Right,” she giggles. “Because of the metric system.”
And then they spend the rest of the drive quoting lines from Pulp Fiction. I’ve seen it almost as much as Sam, so I could get in on the fun, but because I’m in the back, it’s difficult. By the end, Sam’s smile has become genuine. When he pulls over at the curb next to her building, he seems disappointed that the fun has come to an end.
“So are you seeing the new Tarantino movie this weekend?” Monica asks.
“Yep,” Sam says, looking at me as if for confirmation. I nod.
There’s a long silence, and for a scary second, I think Sam might invite her to come along. Not that it would be awful, but… well, I don’t want her to come along. In any case, he doesn’t offer, and Monica gets out of the car without further fanfare.
Once Monica is out of the car, I unbuckle myself and get into the front seat next to Sam. He gives me a funny look. “You didn’t have to move,” he says.
“I didn’t want to sit in the back like you’re my driver.”
“Why not? It could be one of those roleplaying games where I’m a taxi driver and you’re the mysterious, beautiful woman I picked up at the airport.”
I laugh. “Is that what you want?”
“Actually, I mostly just want to get home so we can… you know,
celebrate.”
“Sounds good to me.”
Sam starts up the car and turns onto Third Avenue, heading back to our condo. I look at his profile in the light of the moon. He’s clean-shaven now,
which means he shaved just before we went out. For me.
“Hey,” I say, “didn’t you think it was weird Monica sat up in front?” He pushes his glasses up the bridge of his nose. “Yeah. A little.”
“I mean, she was the passenger. She should have sat in the back.” “Yeah, I guess.”
Sam doesn’t seem particularly upset about it, so maybe it’s better not to push the issue. Yes, it was weird. I’m sure Shelley would agree with me. But Sam doesn’t get bothered by stuff like that. And anyway, it looks like he had lots of fun talking about Pulp Fiction with Monica.
It isn’t until we’ve been driving for several minutes that I remember a conversation we had at a conference table a few months ago:
“Just watched Django Unchained again on Netflix last night,” I said. Monica, who was arranging coffee on the table, shuddered and said,
“Oh God, Tarantino is so violent.”
I laughed. “Yeah, but my husband loves his movies. Especially Pulp Fiction. We’ve seen that movie more times than I can count.”
I close my eyes, trying to remember what Monica said to that. Did she say she’d seen the movie? I can’t recall. But still. Saying that Tarantino is “so violent” is a far cry from calling him her favorite.
Yet somehow, now it’s not only her favorite movie, but she’s memorized every line of it.
I bite my lip hard enough that it hurts. Sam is still driving, whistling to himself. He had a good night tonight—he has no clue what I’m thinking about.
I’m probably being irrational. Maybe I’m remembering the conversation with Monica wrong. Yes, she said the movies were violent, but she didn’t say she didn’t like them. Maybe she was saying it in a complimentary way, like, “Tarantino’s the only director who satisfies my thirst for violence!” And she never said she didn’t see Pulp Fiction. Most people have seen that movie—it’s a very popular film. A classic, like she said.
Hey, maybe our conversation inspired her to revisit his movies.
I’m definitely making too much of this. So what if Monica sat in the front seat? So what if she shares movie taste with my husband? I’m the one who’s married to Sam. And thanks to Monica’s generosity, we’re going to be parents soon. I don’t know why I’m getting so paranoid.
