Wife #2 called last night.

She calls sometimes when she's drunk.

"Why were you such a bastard to me?" Another Tanqueray night and from the sound of her, it was a doozy.

"Hello Cari. How's Oscar?" She had taken my Border Collie when she walked out on me.

"He's fine, I'm fine, we're all just Zippity-Fucking-Doo-Dah wonderful here!" I think she was being facetious. I decided not to point that out.

I heard her taking a drink. "I think you miss that damned dog more than you miss me."

"That's not true Cari , I miss you," I said. "A lot." Of all the women, before and since, Cari was the one I should have kept.

"Not enough to keep from fucking around on me." It was the gin talking.

"Cari, I'm sorry."

"You always said that. Every single time, 'I'm sorry, Cari.' 'It will never happen again Cari.' 'I can change, Cari.' But you never meant it." She was crying now.

I sighed. "Cari, I did mean it when I said it."

She laughed and cried in that drunken, sad way. "You still don't get it, do you, you bastard. I didn't give a rat's ass whether you meant it when you said it, I cared whether you meant it before you decided to stick your dick into the cunt of that fat cow real estate agent."

The C-word. Cari never used that word. I'm thinking six, maybe seven martinis. At a minimum. I decided it was best not to offer anything.

"Wasn't I good enough for you? Didn't I give you everything you asked for?" The crying again.

"Yes, Cari, you did."

Another drink, the sobs stopping long enough for a few gulps. "I know it wasn't my tits. You couldn't find better tits, no matter how many bitches you fucked."

That was true. Cari had a spectacular athletic body, the combination of a lifetime of playing tennis competitively and very good genes.

"You know I thought your breasts were phenomenal, Cari."

She laugh-cried again. "Know what, they still are. Full and round and perky. Not a sag to them. And you will never, ever see them again." She had a bout of hiccups.

"You know what I hate the most?" she continued. "I hate the fact that I still love you. After all the shit you put me through and the lousy way you treated me, I still love your sorry ass. I don't know why. It's not like I can't find anyone else. I've been dating a guy up here in Boston, he's got his own software company, a loft that overlooks the Common and he loves me. He's good looking, tall, great smile, no beer gut . . ."

Ouch, that wasn't necessary. I looked down at my stomach. Okay, maybe I deserved that.

She went on. " . . . and he worships me. He's everything you're not. He would never treat me like you did."

Maria sat up in bed next to me and lit a cigarette. She had started smoking this past week although I had warned her against it. The Zippo made a loud clink as she shut the lighter hard in the dark.

Cari went on, still crying. "And you know fucking what? Tonight he proposed to me."

Cari was a fine catch for any man.

"This is how fucking stupid I am. I turned him down. Can you believe that shit? You know why I turned this great guy down?"

I decided it was a rhetorical question and that a guess wouldn't help right now.

"I refused to marry this wonderful, wonderful man who thinks I'm a goddess because I don't love him. I'm still in love with you. He's not as funny as you, he's not as smart as you, he doesn't know how to dream like you do. And that's the fucking cruelest thing you've ever done to me. You made me love you forever, you piece of shit." Loud sobs now.

"I don't even know why I'm calling . . . you don't fucking care . . . you never cared . . ." and she hung up the phone.

I took a deep breath and placed the phone down. I lit my own cigarette.

"That was one of your wives?" Maria asked, a chill in her voice.

"Yes, it was Wife #2."

"It sounds like she still loves you very much. To call you at this hour when you are in bed with another lover."

"She's just drunk," I said.

"I am thinking this. I am thinking that maybe you still love her too." She elbowed me for emphasis. "Maybe you love her more than me, no?"

I recalled that I had used the L-word once or twice this past week, but only in the heat of climax. This was another of those questions that was best left unanswered. Lying would be wrong. The truth would get me slapped. I stayed quiet.

Maria stubbed out her smoke and rolled out of bed. "You sunuvabitch!" she yelled, slamming the bedroom door on her way back to her own room.

I finished my cigarette and lit another. I laid there, alone in the dark, listening to Maria's loud wailing from across Harry's sprawling home.

Sometimes I feel like such a shit.


Writing
fiction