Swim Read Free Page B

and it made me ache for home as I nodded, too ashamed to say yes. You know what you need? I’d asked Rob the night before, at one in the morning, afer we’d finished our script. He’d lifted his shaggy eyebrows. Me, I said, marveling at my own boldness, holding my breath until he grinned and said, Well, Ruthie, I wouldn’t say no. I’d looked straight into his eyes, imagining—oh, it made my insides cringe to think about it—that I was Taryn Montaine as I unbuttoned my blouse, as I crossed the room, knelt, and unzipped his pants. His quick inhalation when my lips had touched him, the way, at the end, he’d groaned my name, all of it had made me think that he was feeling something more than mere gratification, or gratitude; that he was falling in love.
    Afterward, snuggled against him in the Barcalounger, I’d been foolish enough to hope for the impossible: the workplace romance that actually worked. We were good together. Our months as writing partners proved it. And maybe, after one night of bliss on scratchy synthetic tweed, Rob would realize that I was the love of his life, that we belonged together.
    My grandmother sat down next to me and stroked myhair. “Are you okay?” she asked, and I’d nodded again, without knowing whether it was true.
    On Friday I’d gone to the office and Rob hadn’t been there. I accepted congratulations numbly, nodding my thanks, asking everyone if they’d seen him. Nobody had. I spent the weekend in agony, looking at my cell phone every thirty seconds or so, imagining horrible scenarios: Rob dead in a car accident, Rob in a hospital with amnesia, or cancer, or both.
    The show-runner, a twenty-seven-year-old named Steve, called me into his office first thing Monday morning. “So where’s that partner of mine?” I asked with a smile.
    “Sit down,” he suggested. I sat down on an impressive, wildly uncomfortable Lucite and metal chair underneath his Emmys. “Rob and Taryn eloped over the weekend.”
    “He...Taryn... what?” This was a joke, I thought. Had to be. Rob barely spoke to Taryn during the read-throughs and rehearsals, and when he talked about her, it was usually to make fun of her implants or her pornographic past.
    Steve kept a Magic 8 Ball on his desk (ironically, of course). He picked it up and shook it gently. “I guess she’s pregnant.”
    I nodded numbly. I couldn’t speak, couldn’t move. I breathed deeply, hoping he wouldn’t see that the blood had drained out of my face. I pictured Rob and Taryn together, his arm around her shoulder, one hand resting lightly on her belly. The little family.
    “Hello? Excuse me?”
    I looked up, startled, and sucked water into my nose. The janitor was standing by the side of the pool, pointing at the clock on the white-tiled wall as I coughed and spluttered. “Ten o’clock. We’re closing now.”
    I shook the water out of my ears, took a quick shower, and toweled off, avoiding the ubiquitous mirrors as I pulled on myclothes. On the way home I bought three fish tacos at Poquito Mas, and a chicken burrito for Grandma to eat in the morning. She was asleep when I arrived, snoring on the gold brocade sofa. My plate of flanken, covered in plastic wrap, sat on top of the stove. I put the food in the refrigerator, then eased my grandmother’s legs onto the couch, slipped off her mules, covered her with a blanket, and flicked the television set into silence. My muscles were singing and my head still felt waterlogged. As I tumbled down into sleep, I remembered Caitlyn, the crack I’d made about babysitting. I should get her a book, I thought. Let her look at all the colleges in the country. Let her make a real choice . . . Then I was out.
    “Excuse me?”
    I looked up, ready to defend my right to the table I’d once again commandeered at 9:30 on the following Saturday morning. Mostly the screenwriters would just glare and mutter, but occasionally one of them would work up the nerve to walk over and demand to know when