Page 48 of The Wife
Jake
Iopenedmy eyes and then closed them again. My head felt like it was stuffed with cotton balls. Like I couldn’t think because all this white fluffy stuff was in the way. And my mouth—for the love of all that was holy in this world, I needed water.
I blinked again and saw the glass of water on the coffee table. I just needed to get up and reach for it. I sat up, noticed the trash can on the floor, and decided all I needed was the water and whatever two white pills Ellie had left out for me.
Ellie.
I started to put the pieces back together. The drive to the cabin. The drive back. I told her about Carol and…
I kissed her. It wasn’t like I was going to forget that. She’d pulled away. I remember that. Because I was drunk, she had said. Then nothing.
All things considered, it could have been worse. Awake now, I realized I smelled food. Sausage, which made my stomach grumble with hunger. Nothing like a greasy breakfast to work off a hangover.
I made my way to the kitchen to in fact find Ellie making me breakfast. It was strange the other day when I came down to find Carol… that had looked so wrong in my head.
I looked at the clock on the microwave and saw it was already eight a.m. Ellie had let me sleep off some of my hangover and now she was making me breakfast. I took this as a good sign.
“On a scale of one to ten, how bad did I screw up last night?”
She whipped her head around. “Ten. You drove drunk! That’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever seen you do in my life. And while there would have been no other cars on the access road, you could have done something else to hurt yourself. Remember Janet last year? You were so pissed at her for doing that. It was not cool.”
I wiped my hands over my face and made my way to the fridge for more water. That first glass was only touching the surface of my thirst.
“You’re right. It was stupid. I don’t even know why I did it.”
That wasn’t exactly true. I did it because I wanted to not think about shit for five minutes. I forgot that sometimes when you get drunk you think about shit even more.
I had the idea that Ellie was cold and needed to come home, and in my drunken state I had to make that happen.
“Sit. I’ll feed you and you’ll feel better.”
Ellie was fussing over me. Ellie was taking care of me.
Because I broke up with Carol. Made sense. I was no longer hurting her.
I sat down and she filled my plate with half a pound of sausage, three eggs, and four pieces of toast. She set a jar of peanut butter in front of me and I went to town.
“Thank you,” I mumbled around a piece of toast. I hadn’t realized how hungry I was, and nothing tasted as good as hangover food.
“You’re welcome. I have to head out to the grocery store. A little food and a hot shower and I’m sure you’ll be as good as new.”
She was about to stand up when I reached across the table and caught her hand.
“I meant what I said the other day. If you want me to move to the bunk house, I will.”
She shook her head and I watched the sway of her ponytail.
Had I talked about her hair last night?
“You don’t have to move. We had a fight. I misunderstood the situation and you were upset. It’s over now. Behind us.”
“We’re good?”
She nodded.
I smiled. “Did I say anything really stupid last night?”
“Not too stupid, no.”
