Page 56 of Afternoon Delight

Meg

Georgia is having a May Day sale. Your mom is setting up the window.

Please let me show her this.

#MayDay

Zak added the photo of me tangled in the swing.

I looked ridiculous, but I was laughing, which made me chuckle all over at the memory. The sheer glow of attraction and joy on my face made me wistful, too. I missed him in a way that was nearly unbearable.

Tell Mom she should wrap one of the monster dildos like a maypole.

I wouldn’t dare.

Your mother is a creative genius.

She’ll get there on her own.

“That must be your man again. No one else makes you smile like that in the middle of the day,” my new boss, Folami, said.

“Sorry.” I set aside my phone.

“I wasn’t scolding. Life is short. I just wonder why you’re not there with him if he makes you happy.”

“Mostly because I’ve got this brand-new job I’m trying to keep,” I said wryly.

“Pssh,” she dismissed. “But you’re right not to let a man hold you back, career-wise. I learned that the hard way. I’m running out for coffee. You want anything?”

“I’m trying to cut back. Sleep better, eat better. Be more boring.”

“You’re nailing it.” She slung her purse strap over her shoulder, flicked her beaded braids over the opposite one, and flashed me a cheeky grin as she headed for the door.

I liked Folami, even though I didn’t know her very well.

She’d joined the small business division at Peterson, Londale and Funk when I was switching to remote work so I could be in Victoria more often with Dad.

At the time, I mostly interacted with her through online meetings and chat.

She was always pleasant but stuck to business, which I appreciated.

She was ruthlessly efficient, too—another quality I liked.

The only time I’d been miffed with her was when she called in sick for a week during tax season. It was made worse by the fact that the rest of our division was a pile of listless potatoes who hadn’t picked up the slack like I did.

When Folami returned, the photo of her with her husband—who looked like he’d been ordered from the L.L. Bean catalogue—had disappeared from the shelf behind her. She’d replaced it with a photo of her dimpled twins in Sunday dresses, standing next to an elderly woman in a wheelchair.

Soon after, I left Joel. We didn’t talk about it, but I felt a kinship with her.

I had quietly envied the way she navigated her divorce and tried to emulate her.

Anytime I saw her, she was in full makeup, with hair and nails impeccable, outfits always professional yet made from warm colors that gave her a cheerful, approachable vibe.

Her unspoken ‘better off without him’ message had kept me washing my own hair and making an effort. I’d started going back into the office, hadn’t I?

She left for another firm without any fanfare and that’s where I thought she’d stayed so I was surprised to learn she’d opened a boutique accounting office last year, one that specialized in small businesses.

Since I was looking for work, I impulsively messaged her to congratulate her—and to ask if she was hiring.

I added, Or we could just get a drink and bitch about exes and PLF.

Two drinks and a shared plate of nachos later, I had a job. Folami already had an associate and more clients than she could handle. Within days of my posting online about my new job, four of my best clients from Peterson, Londale and Funk reached out, asking to make the switch.

I felt good about bringing fresh clients into Folami’s office, but it was scary, too. It meant I was putting down new roots here in Toronto.

Which was okay, because Roddie seemed to be thriving. He was back at his old school, staying at Joel’s a couple of nights midweek, but officially, he lived with me, eating his weight in groceries and leaving his shoes in the middle of the floor like old times.

Actually, he was staying with Joel tonight, wasn’t he? I grabbed my phone again and texted Zak.

Want to have phone sex tonight?

Hi Meg, it’s Zara. I have Zak’s phone.

Oh, he thought he was funny?

Offer’s still open.

I hate you. What time?

God, I loved him.

Thankfully, I was alone in the office so no one heard the whimper that caught in my throat. I really did. I loved Zak with my whole entire being, in a way I had never loved Joel.

And I had loved Joel in many ways. There’d been the sexual crush and teenaged romantic idealism, along with a co-dependent’s love of being needed.

There was the love built on shared years and fond memories.

I mean, yes, he was a self-involved dickhead, but he had a decent sense of humor and could tell a good story.

He made great kids, and he’d never been afraid to spend money on what he wanted.

We’d taken some amazing vacations, like taking the kids to see gorillas in Rwanda.

I’d call it a trip of a lifetime, but we’d also taken them to all the Disney properties, snorkeling on the Great Barrier Reef, and we’d once watched a space shuttle launch.

When we’d gone to counseling after his first affair, Joel had shared some things about his dad’s alcoholism that helped me understand him better. He’d missed out on a lot in his own childhood, which led him to indulge himself as an adult, sometimes in ways that weren’t entirely healthy.

So, even though I had a lot of mixed feelings about Joel, I loved him in the way you love a place that you know is gone.

He was that copse of trees at the end of the street that’s now a shopping mall, or my grandmother’s attic after the house was torn down.

The special thing we had no longer existed.

I accepted that. I was okay with only having the memory of it.

But I didn’t have enough memories with Zak to sustain me.

I didn’t want the safari, either. I wanted to roll over in the dark and feel him beside me.

I wanted to wash the car while he mowed the lawn, then drink beer and debate ale versus pilsner.

I wanted to feel his arms come around me while I washed the dishes, and have him rub my feet while we watched TV.

I wanted him .

So I made do by texting Georgia, asking her to bag up one of the remote-controlled masturbation sleeves with some lube and walk it over to him.

Fifteen minutes later, she texted.

I said that’s from Meg. He said, For Dad?

He’s such a weirdo.

I know. Isn’t he great?

We texted a little more about how she was feeling— Great !—and how the store’s sales were picking up thanks to some videos she was posting. Then she sent me a photo of Mom wrapping ribbons around a double-headed dildo to make it look like a Maypole.

Zak had called it; Mom was a genius.

I stopped at a local store on my way home, picking up a new vibrator that worked with the same app as the masturbation sleeve. While waiting for Zak, I figured out how to connect it and texted him which app to load on his phone.

Time zones were another piece of the long-distance relationship puzzle that people didn’t always talk about. By the time Zak was home and had Dale tucked in for the night, I was usually asleep.

I was eating take-out Thai food I’d picked up on the way home, still browsing the instructions and figuring out how the chat function worked, when Roddie walked in.

I leapt to my feet and swept my arm across the table, brushing the vibrator and its packaging onto a chair, but he caught me and knew what it was.

His brows came together. “Are you still working for Georgia?”

“This was something I was texting with her about, yeah.” It wasn’t a complete lie. I finished tucking it out of sight. “What are you doing home? I thought you were staying at your dad’s tonight?”

“I forgot my good shirt for band. Dress rehearsal is tomorrow. Can you drive me in the morning?”

“Sure.”

“Is there any more of that?” He pointed at my plate.

“In the fridge. Help yourself.” I picked up my phone and texted Zak.

Roddie’s home. Rain check?

A few minutes later, Zak sent a photo of the blue rooster with a stack of wooden children’s blocks beside it. Cock-blocks. He added a snorting-face emoji puffing out clouds of outrage.

I chuckled and replied with a GIF of a girl with her mascara running.

I’m sorry.

“Who’s that?” Roddie asked as he put his filled plate into the microwave.

“Zak.” My tone said, Do you need to ask? I set my phone aside.

“Oh, Mom.” His voice dropped several octaves. “Did you guys have a date?” His appalled gaze slid to the end of the table where I’d hidden all the evidence.

“What?” I wanted to die. I wanted to lie . But I also wanted to be an adult about it. Model healthy sexuality, right? But also: Noooo.

“I’m really sorry. I’ll go to my room.” He looked that way, clearly calculating the fastest escape route, then glanced at the still-humming microwave. “Actually, I’ll grab my shirt and catch the train back to Dad’s.”

“No, Roddie. It’s fine. Zak has plans anyway.”

“I thought you guys broke up,” he said defensively. “I didn’t know you were still...” His hands floated through the air, searching for a term without touching anything too personal.

“We’re still friends. We text.”

“That’s actually called sexting.” He put on his best dad voice. “Are you aware of the dangers of sending nudes online?”

“Are you being serious right now?”

“I don’t know. You haven’t dated since before they invented the telephone.” He shut off the microwave before it finished and brought his plate to the table. “Dad hasn’t figured out how to have safe sex. Maybe you need a refresher too.”

“Wait, wait, wait.” I pushed my half-finished plate aside to lean forward as Roddie sat down. “Please tell me you’re not saying what I think you’re saying.”

“Yeah.” Roddie let his jaw drop dramatically, eyebrows lifted like he was preparing to release a nuclear bomb. “Wanda’s cookin’ another one.”

“I’m speechless.” I was. “On purpose ?”