Page 27

“I’m fine,” she said, though she looked a little green around the gills.

“Are you sure?”

“I’m just a little bit nauseated. It should pass here in a moment.”

“Oh,” I said, realization dawning in my mind at last. “Is this a pregnancy thing?”

“Yes, it is.” She smiled. “Don’t get me wrong, my life with Marshall is perfect and I wouldn’t change a thing. I’m not about to complain about some morning sickness. Here I thought it wouldn’t happen since I got up so early. I guess I don’t have to be sleeping for it to strike.”

I leaned down and spoke to her belly.

“Hey, Jake or Ramone, stop making your mama sick.”

Jennifer chuckled.

“There’s no way I’m naming one of my children after either of those clowns.”

I heard her say it, but I didn’t believe her.

“So, things are going well between you and Marshall?” I asked.

A dreamy smile came to her lips.

“Yes, you could say that. Very well. We had a somewhat rocky road to our happily ever after, but now that’s just what it is. A happily ever after. I mean, life’s not perfect. Sometimes I burn my toast, or they lose a suit at the dry cleaners or what have you. But I wouldn’t change anything about my life, you understand?”

I sighed. “I hope I have that someday. You know, if I didn’t upset my karmic balance or something by having a fake wedding.”

“Ah yes,” she said with a chuckle. “Hera, the Greek goddess of marriage and family, will surely smite you down. Or turn your hair into snakes. I forget.”

“It was Athena who turned Medusa’s hair into snakes, and it was so that men would stop forcing themselves on her and she would have a way to fight back.”

“Really?” Jennifer asked, blinking. “That sounds… dark.”

“The old myths were all dark. I took Greek mythology as one of my electives in community college because I thought it would be all easy like Clash of the Titans. Instead, it was some fucked up, harsh shit that would turn you white.”

“Don’t bother going into details,” she said, holding a hand over her mouth. “I’m sick enough already.”

“Do you need me to flag down a waiter and get you a bucket or a trash can?”

“I don’t think so, no,” she said, looking a little bit better at last. She drank some of her tea and looked relieved.

“I think the worst of it is over now. What were you saying about me and Marshall?”

“I was just asking; how did you know that Marshall would change from being a total alpha male dickwad to this perfect loving husband? Did you have some kind of sign or are you just that good at blow jobs?”

Jennifer spat out her tea in a laugh and then spent a few moments wiping up the mess she’d made.

“Look at what you made me do. To tell you the truth, I didn’t change him at all.”

“Shut the front door,” I said.

“No, really. You see, Marshall may have acted like an alpha male jerk, but on the inside, he really was a loving and nurturing man. He just buried it very deep. In his environment, the place he grew up in and cut his teeth, he had to develop that attitude as a survival tactic. But eventually he realized he needed to let his real self bubble up if we were going to have a life together.”

She gave me a long look and then cocked an eyebrow.

“Wait, why are you asking me this specifically?” Her mouth gaped open in a gasp. “Oh my God, have you got something for Evan?”

“No!” I said, a little too loud and a little too emphatically.