“You’ve hardly talked to me at all,” Mike says. “You just keep looking around the restaurant. Are we on a stakeout or something?”
His expression turns serious.
“Are you a spy?”
“You’re an idiot.”
“Are you a cop? If you’re a cop, you have to tell me. It’s the law.”
“I’m not a cop and that’s not a law anywhere. Do you have any idea how many morons have walked right into a sting because they thought cops weren’t allowed to lie? How do you think they get confessions?”
“So,” he says, “if cops can lie about being cops, then you’re saying you actually are a cop.”
“Oh, for heaven’s sake…”
He smiles.
“Why are we really here?”
“I told you about the confit de canard. It was delicious wasn’t it?”
“Leila, I swear to God, you’ve got to stop calling it that,” he says. “Just call it candied duck. You’re not French.”
“Whatever,” I tell him, dismissively waving my hand.
“See?” he says incredulously.
“What?” I ask, sipping my virgin tequila sunrise. Without the tequila, do I just call it a sunrise?
“Why are we really here? It’s not for the duck.”
“Canard,” I say, not deigning to dignify him any more by actually looking at him while I’m talking.
“Leila.”
“Fine,” I tell him. “I heard Dane on the phone making a date to come to this restaurant.”
“So what?”
“I just want to know if he’s two-timing what’s-her-name.”
“Wrigley,” Mike says. “Why do you care?”
“Mike,” I start.
I don’t know where to go from there.
“Yes?”
“How are things at work?”
“Skillful,” he says. “Things at work are fine. Why are we spying on your roommate?”
“I just want to know,” I tell him. “Isn’t that enough? I’ve lived with the guy for over a month, and I really don’t know anything about him other than the fact that he’s not really a musician.”
“How do you know that?”
“Have you ever met a musician who doesn’t subject you to their dreadful caterwauling on a daily basis?”