Single in Suburbia Read Free

nickname. “His name is Rob, and at the moment he’s still married to me. He and I need to have a conversation. We’re not going to have that conversation here in front of an audience. You can go sit down until we’re done, or you can go play on the slide, I don’t care which. But if I see your face again tonight, I’m going to rip every one of those blonde hairs out of your head and stuff them in your mouth.”
    Tiffany gasped and stalked off. Without looking to see if Rob followed, Amanda marched in the other direction. She walked until she reached a tree beyond the stands and out of the others’ line of sight. When she turned around Rob was standing in front of her.
    “I didn’t mean for her to come tonight. She just couldn’t wait to meet Wyatt and all…” His voice trailed off.
    “You didn’t mean for her to come?” She shook her head in disgust. “But big bad Tiffany didn’t listen to little Robbie?” She delivered the last in the most offensive baby talk she could manage. “What a crock!”
    “Amanda, I…”
    “No.” She looked into his eyes searching for the man she’d fallen in love with all those years ago. “I don’t even know who you are anymore. The person I married would never have run away from his family like you have, or humiliated them like you have tonight. What happened to you?”
    Rob ran a hand through his newly coiffed hair. “You don’t know what it’s like to wake up one day and realize that the best part of your life is over; that all the rest is just an unavoidable downhill slide.”
    Amanda took the blow and flinched. All they’d become to him were a symbol of the downhill slide.
    “I just felt so trapped.” He put a hand out toward her and she noticed that his fingernails appeared to be freshly manicured. “Things started getting out of control. I could barely get up in the mornings.”
    OK, so knowing the truth was definitely overrated. His reasons didn’t change the destructiveness of his actions; his total lack of concern for them.
    She looked him straight in the eye. “And where do love, honor, and commitment fit into your little scenario? What about us?”
    He sighed as if this was something to be weighed and considered. “I don’t know.”
    She studied her husband for a long moment, took in the new polish and salon-styled hair, the stupid red sweater knotted at his throat. And she realized that it didn’t really matter what either of them said now. Even if she wanted him back, and she didn’t know that she did, what was she supposed to do? Yell him into sending the lovely Tiffany away? Force him to burn the clothes and never let another woman shop for him again?
    And then what? Then she’d be waiting every moment for his next attempt to break free. She’d know that even if he was there, he’d be wishing he were somewhere else. She and Wyatt and Meghan weren’t exciting enough for him? Well, then he didn’t deserve them.
    “Well, I know what’s going to happen now.”
    He looked up, surprised.
    “I’m going to the ladies room and then I’m going to go back and watch the game.” She raised her chin a notch. “You’re going to leave.”
    His mouth opened but she didn’t give him a chance to speak. “Before I come out you and that…girl…are going to be gone. And you are not to bring her to this field again until we’re divorced.”
    “Divorced? But…”
    She stopped him with a look. “That’s it, Rob. Your dick has drained all sense from your brain if you think you can go out and have a good time and wave it in our faces and then just come home as if nothing’s changed.”
    “Well…”
    Amanda looked down at her watch. “You’ve got ten minutes to leave; ten, and not a minute more. You don’t deserve to watch Wyatt play baseball.”
      
    Amanda stayed in the bathroom for the required ten minutes. This was not easy given the primitive nature of the ballpark’s ladies room. The bare concrete walls and floor, overflowing trash