Picking it up, I turn around and look at Ariel questioningly.
“Is this an antique?”
Ariel walks over and snatches it out of my hand.
“Yes. It’s a dinglejumper. It was used to comb hair in the sixteenth century.”
When I don’t say anything for several seconds, she rolls her eyes at me.
“It’s a fucking fork. And no, it’s not an antique. I was in the middle of eating lunch when you called crying and snotting all over the place, and in my haste to get to you, I set it down when I ran out of here,” she explains, gingerly stepping around items as she moves through the living room and heads into the kitchen.
I follow behind her, careful not to knock anything over, my eyes growing wider as we get into the kitchen. I’m not as shocked by all of the antiques covering every available surface in here as I am by what else I see.
“You have seven fish tanks.”
“Excellent. You can count,” she replies sarcastically, tossing the fork into the sink.
“They’re . . . very nice fish tanks,” I tell her lamely.
And really, they are very nice. She’s decorated each one with different colored rocks at the bottom and, upon closer inspection, what looks like smaller antique pieces, like brooches and padlocks and random skeleton keys. Each tanks looks to be about ten gallons; they line the entire counter top, with two on the island in the middle of the room. But still. She has seven fish tanks. In her kitchen.
“I have a thing for fish. Stop judging me.”
“I’m not judging you. I just thought you’d told us that you sold a lot of your stuff,” I reply to her softly.
“Are you insane?! This house is practically empty, I’ve sold so many things. And can we stop talking about my shit and move onto your shit? You didn’t do anything on the ride over but cry and mumble about fairy tales being bullshit and how everything sucks.”
My lip starts to quiver, and my eyes fill with tears all over again.
“Son of a bitch. We’re going to need booze for this, aren’t we?”
I just nod my head silently as she reaches above one of her fish tanks, opening a cupboard and pulling out two wine glasses. She moves over to the fridge, pulling a bottle of white wine out, studying me for a few seconds, then reaching back inside and pulling out a second bottle.
Leading me over to her kitchen table, which is covered with stacks of at least ten different antique china sets, she pushes a pile of plates and bowls to the side, setting down the glasses and the wine.
She pours me a glass, and before she even pours her own, I’ve already chugged it. I smack my glass down on the table, pointing for her to add more.
“If you puke on any of my good china, I’m gonna be pissed,” she mumbles, pulling out a chair and taking a seat as I flop down into the chair next to her. “Talk.”
For the next twenty minutes, I tell her everything. From all of the sweet things Vincent said to me over the last few weeks that were all just lies, to the whopper of a lie that he’d been keeping from me this entire time.
“He’s Canadian?!” she shouts when I stop talking, wiping more tears from my cheeks.
“That’s the part you’re most shocked about?”
Ariel shrugs.
“I mean, aren’t Canadians supposed to be super polite? I bet you they wouldn’t even take him back if he doesn’t get a green card. All he’d have to do is growl and glare at them and they’d be like, ‘Nope! You aren’t one of us! Go back to America with all the other rude, annoying people!’”
She laughs at her own joke, and I just pour myself another glass of wine.
“I’m in love with him,” I whisper, staring down into my glass. “I’m in love with a guy who lied to me about everything.”
Ariel sighs, grabbing my wineglass and sliding it away from me.
“That was your first mistake. You should have just kept it about sex. Love is horseshit and it does nothing but cause people pain. And honestly, how do you know he lied to you about everything? Didn’t he say things changed right after he got you to his house?” she asks.
“Whose side are you on?”
“I’m on your side, asshole! Believe me, I want to murder him in his sleep for making you cry, but think about this for a minute. He’s rude and annoying, but he doesn’t really strike me as the type of guy to let a woman take over his home, teach him how to be all domestic and cook, who would admit to fucking up his life with another woman so much that he lost his job, and who would be all overprotective and shit and refuse to sleep with you until you were comfortable if he didn’t have real feelings for you. Feelings that go a hell of a lot deeper than what you think. Yes, he lied about the whole green card thing, but put yourself in his shoes. He liked you. He liked you before you even moved in, and after he got to know you more, he was probably scared shitless you would hate him.”