Say When Read Free Page A

him away, saying, “No! That’s not going to work! Please, will you please just listen to me!”
    He moved away from her, and she sat up, yanked a tissue from the box beside the bed, wiped her eyes. “Look, I know this came out of the blue for you. But I’ve been thinking about it for so long, Griffin.”
    For so long! For how long? The fall afternoon last year when he was raking leaves, and looked up to see her standing at the window looking out at him (and he gaily waved!) —then? The last time they made love? When they sat watching The Sopranos together and he passed her the popcorn bowl, giving her the last bite even though he wanted it? On Zoe’s seventh birthday, when he found Ellen crying in the kitchen and she said it was because their daughter was getting so old? Was she in fact mixing the batter for Zoe’s cake and thinking, Oh, God, I can’t stand my husband, I want a divorce? Unwillingly, he remembered a day shortly before their wedding when Ellen told him they shouldn’t go through with it, she didn’t really want to get married—that that’s why it had taken her ten years to agree to it. He’d put it down to nervousness. As he did her taking a stiff drink in the bride’s room before she walked down the aisle. He’d forgotten about it almost as soon as it happened. But he remembered now.
    “Griffin?”
    “Frank.”
    “What?”
    “Call me Frank.” He sat up, straightened his shirt. Damn it, he’d have to learn to iron.
    “Stop playing games, Griffin.”
    “Call me Frank.”
    She stared at him. “Fine. I will call you Frank. Okay? I will call you Frank.” She fell silent.
    Griffin waited a while, then asked impatiently, “So what did you want to say?”
    He would handle whatever she said. Whatever she said, he would handle.
    She took in a deep breath. “Okay. I told you this morning that I was in love with someone.”
    “Yeah, the grease monkey. Congratulations on your lofty standards.”
    “Well, I’m certainly not going to defend him to you, Frank.” She looked away, envisioning her lover, Griffin thought. What did he look like, anyway? What did he have?
    Ellen rubbed her forehead, sighing. “I don’t know what to say to you. What do you want me to say to you? I mean, I care about you. I really do. I don’t want to hurt you. I’d just like you to understand, so that we can cooperate.”
    He considered this, pursing his lips, thinking. Then he asked, “How long have you been fucking him?”
    Her hands dropped from fidgeting with her hair into her lap. “Oh, God. I might have known.”
    “What?”
    “That that is what you would choose to focus on!”
    “Oh, excuse me. Perhaps I meant, What does he think of postmodern fiction? But I don’t think so. I think I meant, How long have you been fucking him?”
    She closed her eyes for a moment, then opened them and looked sadly at Griffin. “A few months or so, I don’t know.”
    “You don’t know? You don’t know? Oh, I think you know, Ellen. A romantic like you? I think you know the exact day, hour, and minute that you began. I think you could tell me every delicious detail about how you undressed, who was on top, every single thing he did to you—and you to him, too. Go ahead, pretend I’m one of your girlfriends. Oops, I forgot. You don’t have any.” It was true. Ellen was painfully shy and had always had trouble making friends. In the three years since they’d moved to Oak Park, the only “friend” Ellen had made was Louise, the waitress whose section she always requested when she went to the Cozy Corner, a local coffee shop. When Griffin once suggested she go out somewhere with Louise, or invite her over to their house, Ellen had quickly said no. “Why not?” Griffin had asked, and Ellen had gotten up and walked away from him, saying over her shoulder, “I’m sure she has a lot of people to do things with.” But he had seen it: Ellen was afraid.
    Now, offended at what he’d said, her voice hardened. “What