Olive Juice

Maybe they’d break up at some point, and she’d stay at their house in her old room for a week, and they’d make her waffles in the morning while dancing around the kitchen to Snap! every morning. She’d cry a little, sniffling against her daddy’s shoulder while her papa threatened to murder that little asshole.

Or maybe they wouldn’t break up at all.

Maybe they’d stay together, and one day, they’d come over to the house, and she’d be beaming. She would be glowing, and she’d ask if they could tell anything different about her, and David would ask if she got a haircut, much to her dismay, and then Phillip would start screeching, grabbing her hand, the obscenely large diamond on her finger glittering in the light overhead.

They’d give her away, of course.

They’d walk her down the aisle, and it would be David who would be the one crying, because that’s just the way he was with stuff like this. This was his baby girl, his sweetheart, and both Phillip and Alice were the only ones who knew just how big of a softy he was. He’d be crying as they took another step and then another and then another, and right before he’d give her away, right before he gave his daughter to her future husband, she’d lean forward, kissing his tears away, saying, I love you, I love you, I love you.

Those were the dreams he had, late at night.)

(Sometimes, there were the nightmares, where she was begging for him to come get her, that she just wanted to come home, and why wouldn’t he help her? Those were the ones that ripped his heart still beating from his chest.)

The bathroom door opened.

David looked up.

Phillip had changed into his sweats. He carried his clothes in his arms. He hesitated when he saw David sitting on the bed, his face stuttering with something awful for just a second, but he just shook his head. He dropped his own clothes into the hamper next to the bathroom and looked back at David.

David felt out of place. “I’ll go to the guest room,” he said, picking at his sweats. “Or I can just wait until the clothes are dry and then I’ll go back to the apartment.”

“Is that what you want?”

No. It wasn’t. But David didn’t know exactly what he wanted. So he shrugged and looked away.

Phillip sighed. “You’re not driving home tonight, David. Not in this weather, and especially not since you look like you’re ready to collapse. Honestly. You never could take very good care of yourself.”

“That’s what I had you for,” David mumbled before he could stop himself.

“What?” Phillip asked sharply.

David winced and shook his head. “Nothing. I’ll just… the spare room. Sheets on the bed?”

There was no answer.

David looked up.

Phillip’s hands were in fists at his sides, his jaw tense, brow furrowed.

David stood quickly, realizing he was still sitting on Phillip’s (their) bed. He bent down, scooping up his wet clothes, taking a step away from the bed. “I know where the dryer’s at,” he said hastily. “I can do it. You should just—you can go to bed. I’ll—tomorrow, I’ll go back to the apartment tomorrow. Okay? I’m sorry. I’m sorry, I didn’t—”

“Stop,” Phillip snapped, and David froze in the middle of the room. Phillip rubbed his hands over his face. “Just—stop. You can’t—Jesus. You’re not—” He let out a huff of air, sounding aggravated. Then, “Give me the clothes. I told you I would handle it.”

He knew that look. That look meant that Phillip wasn’t taking any of David’s shit right at that moment, and that whatever he’d said needed to be done would be done. He didn’t even stop Phillip when he stepped forward and grabbed the wet clothes out of David’s hands, tie trailing down, looking defiant, like he expected David to say something.

He was heading toward the door, and David was unsure whether or not he should follow, when his mouth opened all on its own and said, “Wait.”

Phillip stopped in the doorway, glancing back over his shoulder and frowning, eyebrows doing that thing that meant you have three seconds, David Greengrass.

“My wallet. It’s in the pocket. Could you…?”

Phillip nodded and turned back toward him, shuffling the clothes in his arms until he could reach the pants. He started digging through the pockets and it was then David remembered the one thing he should not have forgotten. That even though this night had been an onslaught against the shredded remains of his heart, twisting through him with a dizzying sense of vertigo, he should have remembered.

He knew the moment Phillip found it in the front pocket.

His brow furrowed even further for a moment, then his eyebrows jumped in confusion. Then there was surprise and understanding followed by something fierce, something that almost looked as if it burned like fire.

He pulled David’s wedding ring from the pocket.