He tilts his head to the side. “Well my mother is Welsh, so she’s more of a shepherd’s pie for dinner kind of woman. She never made fish and chips that I know of, but this was one of my favorite dishes when I was in boarding school.”
I preen. “Then I totally picked right.”
He laughs again. “You did. You really did.”
But then he sobers. “Cynda?”
“Hmm?” I ask, lowering my fork for another bite of haddock.
“Why did you do this?”
“Because it’s your birthday,” I answer.
“So you’ve done this before? For all the other men who came after me? This is simply protocol?”
His eyes are still shining with amusement, but his questions feel…dangerous.
Like little grenades casually placed on the table between us.
And it feels like I’m pulling the pins when I answer, “Actually there haven’t been any men after you.”
He stills on the other side of the little table, his face turning to stone. “Cynda, if you’re lying….”
“Why would I lie about that?” I ask before he can finish that threat. “And it’s not like it had anything to do with you. I was just busy taking care of the twins. I didn’t have time for guys. Not like you apparently had time for all the girls.”
A smile spreads across his lips. “Are you jealous of the other women, Cynda?”
Yes. Sort of. “No,” I answer out loud in a very firm voice because this mini-quarantine relationship is already confusing enough as it.
A moment of silence. Then: “You know, I only slept with them to get over you. If it had worked, I wouldn’t be here right now.”
I have no idea what to do with that information. No idea how to respond to it or what to feel about it.
So I do what I always do when things get too intimate to bear. Change the subject. “Anyway, I’ve got one more gift. But I’m not sure about the execution on this one because I had to practice silently when you were outside working.”
Without waiting for him to answer, I go to the piano where I’ve got the sheet music I’ve been practicing pulled up on my iPad.
After getting situated, I take a big breath, just like I used to before every pageant performance. Then I begin playing “Remember September,” the only Death Buddha song that isn’t hard, fast, and screechy.
Muscle memory is a hell of a thing. Other than falling a little off-tempo in the careful beginning, the song comes out perfectly. And after a few bars, Rhys crosses the room and starts quietly singing along.
He’s no West Nygard, but I think the lead singer of Death Buddha would appreciate the solemn resonance in his voice. And the fact that Rhys has apparently memorized every word of the sad “life on the road” song that every rock band was required to make back in the 90s. I play and he sings until the last few notes when it’s just a few more bars of bittersweet music until the song is done.
We’re quiet for a long time after I play the last note.
Then I say, “I just wanted to do something nice for you on your birthday. This damn virus. It’s ruined so much, and I figured it was the least I could do.”
“Cynda…” he starts. Then stops. Then he says, “Thank you. Thank you for doing this. I love…”
The possibilities of what he could say next hanging between us, ticking like a bomb. Then he finishes with, “I love everything you did. The game, the food, the song. Truly thank you.”
“You’re welcome,” I answer. Then I have to ask. “So am I forgiven yet or what?”
“You’re getting close.” He laughs.
But it doesn’t feel like a joke to me. It feels like a promise.
Chapter Seventeen
A week later, Rhys still hasn’t forgiven me. But we’ve spent a lot of our quarantine time making up. Sex, two to three times a day. On the bed, on the couch (apparently it wasn’t too small after all), in the shower, on the kitchen counter, and against, like all the walls.
Really, I’d be hard put to come up with one surface we haven’t christened. They say you’re supposed to get less interested in sex as you age. But we’re more like a couple of horny teenagers than two medical professionals with degrees and noble intentions.
I blame the off-the-chain horniness on Rhys being off from work and me having almost nothing to do for the first time in my life. Also, the cicadas.
The night of our last day in quarantine, Rhys wakes me up in the middle of the night. “Those damn cicadas,” he explains after kissing me awake. “They woke me up again. Help me fall back asleep.”
I laugh because this wasn’t the first time he’d made this claim. “You’ve been back in Missouri for two months now. You should be used to it.”