Marriage For One

When Jack pulled my chair out for me to sit down, I studied him a bit more carefully out of the corner of my eye as I took my seat. His face was as it always was: set and aloof, his expression cool and unreadable. If his lips hadn’t been a little more reddish because of my lipstick transferring onto them, I wouldn’t have even guessed he had just kissed someone—kissed me. There was absolutely no evidence left of what we had just shared.

Feeling confused, I picked up my fork and didn’t even realize my plate had been switched out for some sort of chicken dish as I dug in without another word. Jack and I were quiet for a long time, letting other voices fill the heavy silence between us.

“You think that was better than a turtle?” he asked after the better part of fifteen minutes had passed in silence. The event was plenty loud, and he had to lean toward me so I could hear him. The other two couples sitting across from us weren’t exactly silent as they laughed out loud in a way that made me cringe every time it started up again. I had to lean toward Jack as I had him repeat his words. My stomach still wasn’t sitting right after the whole thing.

“Oh yeah, that was very professional.” I winced and tried to salvage the moment. “As in I think we did a very good job of making people believe this is a real thing between us.” It had almost fooled me, too—almost. “Hopefully I wasn’t too bad either?” I asked lightly, trying to look like I didn’t care much about it either way but at the same time regretting the words as soon as they left my mouth because I was curious, dammit.

I broke a piece of bread in half and stuffed the whole thing in my mouth.

“No, you were fine.”

My chewing slowed down as I processed his words then I forced myself to swallow the bread that tasted so much like cardboard.

“Great,” I mumbled, low enough that he didn’t hear me. I was fine.

He leaned in again, his arm carelessly slung on the back of my chair. “What did you say?”

I leaned away, nothing obvious, just a little, as I reached out for my second glass of white wine. A hell of a headache would be waiting for me when I woke up the next morning. I just knew it.

“Nothing,” I mumbled into my wine, and Jack leaned in closer, his shoulder on my back. I couldn’t lean away because the damn wine glass was already in my hand.

“You need to stop talking into your beverage. Is everything okay?”

I put the wine glass down, took a breath as I did so, and then set my eyes on his jaw. “Everything is fine, just a little tired after all the excitement—not the kissing part, obviously. That wasn’t much of a workout. Easy peasy.” Stop moving your lips, Rose.

“Why are you not looking at me?”

“I’m looking at you.” I looked down at his pants and then at the table where his left hand was resting, turning the whiskey glass around and around—anywhere but his eyes. Then I got pissed at myself and looked straight into his eyes with a raise of my eyebrow.

He stared at me in silence for a good twenty seconds, and I stared right back. Nothing was going on between us. This was Jack. This was temporary. I was the one who was making things awkward by trying to put some meaning behind something that didn’t…well, it didn’t mean anything. He had told me he was about to kiss me and then he’d kissed me. It wasn’t anything new. Everyone kissed with their mouths and tongues; we hadn’t done anything special.

His jaw tightened and he stood up.

“I need to check on a few clients then we can leave.”

I opened my mouth to say something, but he had already walked away. When the waiter presented the dessert, I gave him a forced smile. It looked like some sort of eclair with three dots of something green on the side. A jam? Sauce? I had no idea. Making sure certain people weren’t looking at me, I looked over my right shoulder and found Maddy and Sierra; they were six, seven tables behind us. When I caught Maddy’s eyes, I smiled warmly and waved at her. She enthusiastically waved back.

My gaze searched for Jack next, and I found him talking to an elderly man a few tables away from the girls. I faced forward and accidentally met the eyes of one of the guys sitting at our table. The ladies were absent, and the other man was busy talking on his phone quite loudly. The one whose eyes I’d met gave me a sly smile and lifted his red wine glass in a salute. I looked away.