Reggie
Hey.
Larissa
She sees him and something in her face does a quiet, controlled thing — not a smile exactly, but something that was there before she had time to decide about it. She lets it stay.Hey.
Stephanie
She looks between the two of them for exactly one second — enough to clock whatever just passed between them — and picks up her drink.Finally. I've been sitting here for twenty minutes reconstructing the entire evening from context clues and facial expressions. Sit down.
Reggie
Guinness, please, Sam.Samantha (Sam) looks at him disapprovingly.I see you both already have drinks. Just one tab, Sam.
Sam sets the Guinness down in front of him without a word. The look she gives him is the same one she gave him with Katie — that particular brand of Wicklow-waitress disapproval that communicates everything without saying anything. She moves off down the bar.
Stephanie
Okay.She leans forward and puts both elbows on the table.I want the whole thing. Start with dinner.
Reggie
Well, if you really want a play by play, we started at the Granville Skytrain Station at 5pm. We met there on Granville. There was some black guy rapping outside. Most street musicians are tolerable. This guy was awful. We took the train to New West and went to the Spaghetti Factory which is a two minute walk from the station. Lots of homeless. Lots of drug addicts. I had the spinach lasagna and Lari had sudden envy and changed her order to match mine. We both just had water with dinner. And it was good in a Spaghetti Factory way. I usually have spaghetti there because of the name but I felt like something vegetarian. And we both had the minestrone soup and vanilla ice cream after. I had a coffee and she had a tea. And if you don't know how it works there, all of that is included with the entrees so it wasn't an expensive dinner and I preferred it to most five star places. Lari, any corrections?
Larissa
She wraps both hands around her coffee cup.No corrections.A beat.The ice cream was better than it had any right to be.
Stephanie
The Spaghetti Factory. Okay. And the play?
Reggie
Yes, then we went to the Anvil Centre which is another 2 minute walk from the Spaghetti Factory. We were 15 minutes early for the 7:30 start. And the play was excellent. Really excellent. I napped through it but I read online that it was very good.
Larissa
Something crosses her face — not quite a laugh, but close.He did not nap.She picks up her coffee.He was awake for all of it. He just wants to see what we do with that.
Stephanie
You napped. During Lizzie Borden. A woman who axed her parents. How.
Reggie
Lari says I didn't nap but she poked me to wake me up about five times. Anyway, after that, neither of us had seen the Riverwalk after the fire last year, so we walked the whole thing up and down. It's really, really nice now. Lots of drug addicts again. New West doesn't control them as much as some other areas. But it was still super nice. Farmer's Markets and little pubs and so on. And then after walking it twice, we stopped at one of the pubs and had a Guinness and talked about nothing, because we had both agreed not to talk about anything heavy until tonight. And then we went back to my place and fell asleep promptly. After about two hours.
Larissa
She looks at her coffee.He napped for approximately the first fifteen minutes.A beat.Then I poked him.
Stephanie
See, that's the part that matters. You poked him. You were monitoring his consciousness. That's — that's actually kind of sweet. Okay. Two hours of sleep at the Anvil Centre. Walk me through the Riverwalk first.
Larissa
We talked about the play on the walk. And the soup. The two hours is accurate.
Stephanie
You agreed not to talk about anything heavy until tonight. So what's tonight, then? What's the heavy thing?
Reggie
Well, nothing, really. We just agreed not to talk about what our relationship was and what it meant and what labels to affix to it or any of that. I didn't ask her if she was seeing anyone else and she didn't ask me. We just...existed in each other's company. And it was nice.
Larissa
She turns her coffee cup a half-rotation on the table and doesn't look at either of them for a moment.That's accurate.She picks up the cup.We agreed there was enough to think about without adding a conversation on top of it.
Stephanie
So you just — let it be. Okay. Is that going to hold? Now that the night is technically over and you're both sitting here with me and the heavy thing is apparently available?
Reggie
The heavy things are neither forbidden nor invited. I'm happy to just exist. But I also know that she might want to talk about them again. Or about something else. So I'm not hiding from the heavy things, I just don't have need to talk about them, myself.
Larissa
She looks at him over the rim of her cup — the particular look she gives things that are accurate and slightly inconvenient at the same time.I don't have anything I need to say right now.A beat.That's not a permanent condition.
Stephanie
So you're both just — waiting to need something. That's either very healthy or it's the calm before something. I can't tell which.
Larissa
Are you fucking anyone new?
Reggie
For someone who has no need to say anything, that was unexpectedly direct.
Larissa
I didn't say I had nothing to ask.
Reggie
That's fair. I had sex with some girl a few days ago.
Larissa
Fuck.
Stephanie
She puts her drink down. Slowly. Like she's buying herself a second to not say the first thing that came into her head.Well.She looks at the table for a moment, then at Reggie, then at Larissa.That's — okay. That's the honest answer.
Is it someone we know?
Reggie
No. I met her at Tim Horton's. It's not serious.
Larissa
She looks at her coffee. One beat. Two. She sets it down with a careful, controlled motion and looks at the table for a moment before she looks at him.Tim Hortons.She says it quietly, not as a question.Just — somebody you met.
Stephanie
How recently is a few days ago?
Larissa
Steph. Is it going to keep being not serious?
Reggie
Saturday a week ago, so nine days ago. And it's going to keep being not serious. And I spent the whole night after asking myself why I did it. I don't love her. I don't especially like her. I honestly think it's because...I felt emasculated when I saw that photo of you with the other man and I wanted to...I don't even know what. Prove that I'm still worth something as a man. Or something insecure like that.
Larissa
She receives that in complete stillness — not the managed stillness, the real kind, where something has arrived that needs to be held for a moment before anything else happens. She looks at her coffee cup. Then at him. Then at the table. When she looks back up her expression is doing nothing in particular, which is its own kind of telling.Nine days ago. That was before the date. You spent the night with me knowing that. You let me stay.
Stephanie
She wraps both hands around her glass and doesn't say anything. She looks at the table.
Larissa
I'm not going to pretend the emasculated part doesn't land. It does. That was my thing to cause and it's — I deleted Bumble under a table. You went to Tim Hortons. I don't know that either of those things counts as winning. And is my hurting you going to become an excuse to have sex with women whenever you feel like it indefinitely?
Reggie
I told you clearly I was going to date other women and sleep with them. I hid nothing. And I dated another girl, but didn't have sex with her. And you know what it got me? I feel worse today than I did before. I should've just watched more Youtube.
Larissa
She looks at him for a long moment — the admission sitting there, the worse-than-before part, the YouTube part. She turns her coffee cup a slow half-rotation on the table and stops it.You told me clearly.She says it quietly.I know you did. I'm not disputing the accounting. I'm just wondering if this is just the new normal. Because it isn't comfortable.
I'm also sitting with the part where you feel worse. That's not nothing.
I'm also sitting with the part where you feel worse. That's not nothing.
Stephanie
The YouTube thing is funny. It's not funny. But it is a little. You went looking for something and it didn't give you what you went looking for. That's not a new story. It's just a bad one.
Larissa
What did you go looking for? Not the general thing about proving something. Specifically. What did you think you'd feel like on the other side of it?
Reggie
Honestly the sex was just about feeling emasculated. And it served that purpose. I didn't feel emasculated after. The other date...God it just made me feel 100 times more emasculated than I felt when I saw that photo of you dating some other guy. It seems occasional emasculation is something I'm going to have to get used to at this stage of my life.
Larissa
She holds very still through that — the two parts of it, the sex serving its purpose and then the other date making it worse, and the resignation at the end about getting used to it. She turns her coffee cup once on the table and doesn't pick it up.What happened on the other date?
Stephanie
She looks at Larissa, then at Reggie, then back at her drink. She picks it up but doesn't take a sip.You don't have to answer that if you don't want to. He doesn't have to answer that.
Larissa
I know he doesn't. I'm asking anyway.
Reggie
Don't you want to know about the sex? Most women start with that.
Larissa
She holds his gaze for a moment — the question sitting there, and she receives it for exactly what it is, which is a deflection wearing the costume of honesty.No.She picks up her coffee.I know what the sex was. You just told me. I want to know what happened on the date that made it worse than the photo.
Stephanie
She takes a slow sip of her drink and says nothing. She is watching Reggie.
Reggie
God. That's the one that's hard to talk about. I did quite well with the sex. The other one was just a disaster. And it was just...I don't know how to tell you what made it worse. I honestly can't point to one thing and say "this happened so now I feel like I'm unworthy". I just...feel unworthy.
Stephanie
Give us the whole thing. Start to finish. Who she was, where you went, what happened.
Larissa
She doesn't move. Her coffee cup is in front of her and she leaves it there.All of it.
Reggie
Why? I mean, neither of you ever make me feel unworthy. Why are we bogging on this?
Larissa
She picks up her coffee cup. Sets it back down. Looks at him.Because you brought it in the room.A beat.You said you feel unworthy. That's not a small thing to just leave sitting there.
Stephanie
And because you clearly want to tell us. You wouldn't have mentioned the date at all if you didn't. You could've just said the sex and stopped there.
Reggie
You're wrong. I don't want to tell you and I only mentioned it because I have an obsession about full disclosure.
Larissa
She looks at him for a moment — the full-disclosure part landing exactly, because it sounds true and it sounds like him and that's somehow worse than if he'd wanted to tell them.Full disclosure is still disclosure.She picks up her coffee.You said it. It's here. We can leave it if you want. But I don't think leaving it is going to make the unworthy part go away.
Stephanie
You don't have to want to tell it for it to need to be told. Those are different things.
Reggie
Lari, is it important to you to hear this? Because it's not important to me to tell it. But if it's important to you, I will tell it.
Larissa
She looks at him directly — not the managed look, the real one, the one she's been keeping at careful distance for most of this conversation.Yes.A beat.It is.
Stephanie
Twenty minutes.
Reggie
Ok, first the girl. I met her on the seawall and asked her to dinner and she said yes. Honestly I wasn't expecting that. She's young, blonde and really, really pretty. Like cover of a magazine pretty. Movie star pretty. I expected her to shoot me down but I was feeling like I had little to lose and she said yes. And we had dinner and walked on the seawall and nothing physical happened at all but it was really nice and we agreed we'd see each other again.
Larissa
She sets her coffee cup down. The motion is exact, controlled, and she doesn't look away from him.Movie star pretty.She says it once, quietly, not as a question. She picks the cup back up and holds it.And she said yes.
Stephanie
Okay so that's — that's the first date. And it went well. Where does the emasculation part come in, because that's not it.
Larissa
What happened on the second one.
Reggie
So a few days later, she texts me and asks me if I'll go to a party with her. And I hate parties so I offer to do 10 other things instead. But she's got her heart set on this party and she's super attractive so I agree. And we go and all her friends look like models and I'm this ordinary looking brown guy looking way out of place. But I do my best. I get introduced to everyone and make small talk and it's fine.
Larissa
She holds her coffee cup in both hands and does not move.All her friends look like models.She says it quietly, not accusatory — just repeating it back like she's placing it somewhere she can see it.And you made small talk. And it was fine.
Stephanie
Okay. So it started fine. What changed?
Reggie
Well, it started okay. She introduced me around and I made small talk. There were about a dozen people there. Few couples. Mostly singles. And then she saw her ex. A tall, blonde white guy. About 6'2", handsome in that traditional way, straight jawline. The exact look I've been insecure about since I was around 12 years old and saw girls noticing it. And I'm just as insecure about it today. And she went and sat near him to catch up and just...stayed. She just started talking to him and forgot about me totally, touching his arm, laughing at his jokes, and I was left to walk around looking for people to talk to. After about twenty minutes I went back and caught her eye, and she didn't hide from it. She looked me right in the eyes, realized what she was doing, looked embarrassed, even turned a bit red, and then...she turned back to her ex, touched his arm again, and started laughing at something he said.
Larissa
She sets her coffee cup down. Quietly, precisely. She looks at the table for a moment and then at him.She turned back to him.A beat. She doesn't reach for the cup again.After you caught her eye. After she knew you were watching. She turned back.
Stephanie
And then what did you do?
Reggie
I went home. Didn't make a scene. Just realized I was dead weight there and I walked out the door quietly and walked to Wick. Right here. And I wish that was the end but it got worse. She started texting. Telling me I was overreacting and she was just catching up and don't make a scene and embarrass her.
Larissa
She looks at him. Something in her face goes very still — not the controlled stillness, the other kind, where something has been understood so completely there's nothing left to do with the body.She texted you while you were already walking away.She says it quietly. Not a question.
Stephanie
Don't make a scene and embarrass her. You left quietly, without a word to anyone, and she sent that.
Larissa
What did you say back to her?
Reggie
I told her it was fine, I hoped she had a good evening, and so on. But she blew up my phone and I guess I said I was going to Wick and she followed me here. Did you notice Sam giving me a dirty look today? That's why. She's seen me with more women here than I should be seen with. And it's not my fault. I didn't invite her here. She just decided she had things to say.
Larissa
She looks at the bar for a moment — Sam's back to them, doing bar things, the disapproval already delivered and absorbed. Then she looks at Reggie.She followed you here.A beat. She turns her coffee cup once, slow, and stops it.And Sam's keeping score on our behalf. That's almost useful.
Stephanie
To be fair to Sam, that's a lot of women in one booth in one week. What did she say when she got here? The girl. What did she actually want?
Larissa
Did she think you owed her an explanation for leaving?
Reggie
Yes, she did. And she felt I was being unreasonable, that I had embarrassed her, that I was overreacting. All of that. And maybe I did overreact. I'm not even sure.
Larissa
She holds very still through the whole of it — the unreasonable, the embarrassing, the maybe-I-overreacted at the end. She looks at her coffee cup for a moment. Then at him.You didn't overreact.She says it plainly.You made eye contact with her. She saw you seeing her. And she turned back anyway. That's not a small thing to just walk away from with a quiet exit and no scene. That's the decent response to an indecent moment.
Stephanie
Yeah. Leaving without making it weird is not overreacting. Overreacting is the thing she did after. With the phone.
Reggie
No, Stephanie, I said she blew up my phone but she sent maybe ten messages. It was rapid-fire and she didn't take no for an answer but she didn't do anything I can point at and say "this was truly wrong".
Stephanie
She adjusts her position in the booth, pulling back slightly from the firmness of what she just said.Fair. Ten messages when you've already said good night is a lot, but it's not — yeah, okay. I take the "truly wrong" part back.
Larissa
So she said her piece and then what. She sat down, she had a drink, and then what happened.
Reggie
She wanted to try again. I told her to go back to her tall blonde white guy. We hit that volley back and forth a bunch of times. I explained to her I had a lot of insecurities especially around race and didn't want to try again. I told her I felt she was ashamed of me, and that it was obvious her friends considered me a huge downgrade to her ex. And I didn't budge at all about taking her back and we left with me clearly expecting to never hear from her again. But then she texted a week later and I agreed to meet her here for coffee. Which is the point at which Sam started to give me really dirty looks and I hope she didn't put anything unseemly in my Guinness.
Larissa
She is quiet for a long moment. Long enough that the bar noise fills the space around it. When she speaks her voice is level, but she has stopped looking at him and is looking at the table.She texted a week later.A beat.And you agreed to meet her. Here. So she didn't accept the door you handed her, and you let her back through it. That's the part I'm sitting with.
Stephanie
What did she say in the text? The one a week later.
Reggie
Nothing really. Just asked to talk. I tried to get her to say it by text. She wouldn't. She wanted to meet. So I agreed. And we had coffee here, which is awful, and we talked for awhile, and then went home.
Larissa
She receives that in complete stillness — the coffee cup in front of her, untouched for the last several minutes now. She looks at the table first, then at him.You had coffee here.A beat.And then went home. That's the whole of it?
Stephanie
What did she say? When she finally had you in person.
Larissa
And did it change anything. The coffee.
Reggie
The coffee made me need the bathroom. That's all it changed. And we talked about exactly what you'd expect. She wanted to try again. Start over, maybe. Or...I don't know if she said start over or just try again or what, but do it again. And I pointed out to her that in the social currency of her circle of friends and family, I just do not rate as highly as her pretty blonde tall white guy. And she had to admit that. And then I went off on some introspective nonsense where I planned out our lives and all roads led to divorce and the only question was if she would cheat first or divorce cleanly first. And I didn't care much which.
Larissa
She looks at him. The coffee cup stays where it is. Something in her face does a very small, careful thing — not quite a flinch, but close.You planned out the whole divorce.A beat.Before you'd even decided if there was going to be anything. That's — That's the unworthy part, isn't it. Not what she did at the party. You already had the verdict written before she showed up at this bar.
Stephanie
The cheating-or-clean-divorce question. You said that to her face?
Larissa
Steph. Did she try to argue with the roads-to-divorce part. Or did she just sit with it.
Reggie
Of course I said it to her face. She's asking me what I'm worried about. I told her. And she didn't argue with the divorce part, just noted it was one of several possible outcomes and that nothing was certain. And then realizing I wasn't going to date her again, she just asked me to not block her, and leave the door open to occasional coffee meetings, which I agreed to.
Larissa
She looks at her coffee cup. Sets it down. Looks at the table for a long moment, not at him.Not block her.She says it quietly.She came to that pub, argued her case for an hour, and what she walked out with was not blocked. And you gave it to her.
Stephanie
That's — actually kind of gutting. From her side. She negotiated herself all the way down to that.
Larissa
Are you going to keep having coffee with her?
Reggie
Maybe. I feel like I owe her...no wait, not owe...that's the wrong word. I just feel that, having walked out on her and ruined her evening, I shouldn't just disappear. I've never respected people who ghost. I look people in the face and say I'm leaving. Well, except when they're busy talking to their tall, blonde exes. But even then I don't ghost, I just don't announce my departure. She seems to feel very guilty about liking tall white guys and I told her she shouldn't. It's fine. Everyone is entitled to their preferences.
Larissa
She is quiet for a moment — the whole of it arriving in pieces, the not-owe, the guilt she has no use for, the tall blonde exes said almost lightly at the end. She turns her coffee cup one slow rotation on the table and stops it.You told her she shouldn't feel guilty about it.A beat. She looks at him.That's — generous. Given what the evening cost you.
Stephanie
The not-ghosting thing is very you. You walked out of a party, got followed to a bar, had a full-length conversation about racial currency and projected divorce timelines, and still made sure she knew the door was open. That's a lot of decency to hand someone who turned back to her ex.
Larissa
Do you think she'll take it? The preference. Leave it where it is. Or is she going to keep trying to argue herself out of it.
Reggie
She seems determined not to. But she loves validation from her friends, and the feeling in that party, knowing that people were looking at me like I was the Honda Civic being driven by someone who had recently owned a Ferrari...it was very humiliating.
Larissa
She receives that — the Honda Civic, the Ferrari, the whole of it — and stays very still through it. She looks at her coffee cup. When she looks up her voice is quiet and exact.That's not a small thing to carry out of a party.A beat.And she knew. She saw your face and she knew and she turned back anyway. That's the part I can't — I'm not saying what she did is the same as what I did. But I'm sitting here aware that they rhyme.
Stephanie
Honda Civic. That's the specific word she put on it?
Reggie
No, Stephanie, that's my analogy, not hers. And Lari, I'd rather what you did any day of the week than what she did. Sitting in the same room as the other guy and watching your girl pick him is a special kind of humiliation.
Larissa
She looks at him for a long moment — the correction landing, and then the other thing, the thing after the correction, which is the preference stated that plainly and that directly, and she lets it sit for a moment without filling the space around it.I know you'd rather.She says it quietly.And I'm not going to make you say it twice or dress it up into something it isn't. But I also want you to know that what you just described — watching her turn back after she saw your face — I don't think I could have named the Honda Civic thing until you just said it out loud. And now I can't un-know that that's what a room full of people were thinking while you were standing there trying to make small talk. That matters to me. That you told me.
Stephanie
For what it's worth — and I know it's not worth a lot right now — the fact that you can name it that clearly means you know exactly what it was. Most guys would've just said it was a bad night and left it there. That's not nothing.
Reggie
I tried to do that. You both twisted my arm into talking.Laughs
Larissa
Something in her face does the thing — a brief, unguarded lift, the real version, before she brings it back to approximately level. She picks up her coffee.We didn't twist anything.A beat.You just ran out of reasons not to say it.
Stephanie
Arm-twisting. Sure. That's what that was.
Reggie
So I've gone out with two women in my testosterone-fueled revenge fantasy where I show you what a man I am and how I can still pull girls and I end up two weeks later wishing I had just paid Pornhub.
Larissa
She holds very still for a moment — the laughter wanting to happen and her deciding, consciously, to let it.Pornhub would have been cheaper.She sets her coffee down.And nobody would have followed you here.
Stephanie
I'm sorry. I know that's not — The testosterone-fueled revenge fantasy is a very honest way to put it. Most men don't call it that until significantly later.
Reggie
Right. I'm ahead of the game in naming my inadequacies.Smiles
Larissa
Something settles in her face — the real version of the smile, the one she doesn't always let out all the way.Being ahead of the game on that is either very healthy or the longest head start on a problem anyone's ever had.
Stephanie
Both. Definitely both. At least you know what you're working with.
Reggie
How about you, Lari? Any dates?
Larissa
She receives the question without blinking — the exact, level reception she gives things that arrive pointed.No.She picks up her coffee cup and holds it in both hands, not drinking from it.I deleted Bumble under a table in front of you. That's been my entire romantic life for the past two weeks. Which felt like enough to manage.
Stephanie
That's a very clean answer. Suspiciously clean.
Reggie
You can tell me where her burner phone is later. And whether it's her boss. How about you, Stephanie? I'm not feeling great about blonde white girls right now but tell us if you've found anyone.
Stephanie
She looks at Larissa for one second, then at Reggie, then back at her drink.The burner phone is in her other purse. Obviously.She picks up her glass.And no. Nothing. I've been living vicariously through this extremely eventful disaster the two of you are running, which is honestly more than enough content for one month.
Larissa
I do not have a burner phone. And don't change the subject just because you asked it. You had two weeks. I had nothing to manage. That's the actual scoreboard.
Reggie
I don't know how adulterers do it. This running around with multiple women is exhausting. And way less fun than it's supposed to be. I feel cheated.
Larissa
She sets her coffee cup down with a quiet click and looks at him — something in her expression doing the unguarded thing before she has time to decide about it.The advertising is a complete lie.A beat.I could have told you that before the Tim Hortons.
Stephanie
Cheated. That's the word. You did the whole thing and came out the other side feeling cheated. That's almost poetic.
Reggie
While I was semi-cheating which is an amusing word coincidence.
Larissa
Something moves through her expression — not quite a laugh, the thing that happens just before one, and she lets it get there.Semi-cheating.She picks up her coffee cup.That's a very precise word for a very imprecise situation.
Stephanie
Semi-cheating. I'm going to need that defined for the record. Is that the Tim Hortons or the party girl, because those feel like different quantities of semi.
Reggie
I will answer you, Stephanie, but first, do you know that little bit of playing with words we did. None of us laughed. None of us even smiled, really. A tiny little curve at the edge of our mouths is all any of us permitted ourselves. And yet, somehow, I will take that kind of humour all day long instead of the belly laughs that these two girls enjoyed. And one of them appeared highly educated and the other wasn't but also wasn't stupid, so they were at different ends of that spectrum. It's just a different kind of humour wiring. I'm sure both of them would've just smiled and looked for something more fun to laugh at.
Larissa
She holds very still for a moment — the cup in her hands, the bar noise doing its quiet thing around them. She turns her coffee cup a half-rotation on the table and looks at it.That's —She stops. She sets the cup down with a small, precise click.You noticed we did that.
Stephanie
I noticed we did that too. I just didn't have words for why it felt like the better version.
Reggie
I don't even know that it's better. I just know that it's how I'm wired. Anyway, I will answer your question.
I didn't feel like I was truly cheating with either of them. So there was no angst or breast beating going on. But while it was happening, I definitely felt more like...like I was crossing a line with the girl I had sex with. That just seemed very...like I was doing something I'd only do if I was sure about stepping us back, and then I thought of your date and did it with my eyes wide open about what I was doing.
In retrospect, I think the other one would be more real competition. More true "cheating" if we were in a monogamous relationship. Just setting aside that she is ashamed of me for a moment, I can't deny that she is beautiful, she is charming, she is elegant, and she's nice to be around. And I can have a serious talk with her about her own behaviour in humiliating me without her getting defensive or lying or rewriting history. And she honestly wishes she was wired differently and is willing to put in the work to be different. And marriage with her would be wonderful until she cheated or bailed, and since I'd know that's coming, it wouldn't hurt as much. Hell I could cheat in advance to even the score if it was more rewarding.
So they were both semi-cheating with one of them clearly a bigger threat to whatever Lari and I have.
I didn't feel like I was truly cheating with either of them. So there was no angst or breast beating going on. But while it was happening, I definitely felt more like...like I was crossing a line with the girl I had sex with. That just seemed very...like I was doing something I'd only do if I was sure about stepping us back, and then I thought of your date and did it with my eyes wide open about what I was doing.
In retrospect, I think the other one would be more real competition. More true "cheating" if we were in a monogamous relationship. Just setting aside that she is ashamed of me for a moment, I can't deny that she is beautiful, she is charming, she is elegant, and she's nice to be around. And I can have a serious talk with her about her own behaviour in humiliating me without her getting defensive or lying or rewriting history. And she honestly wishes she was wired differently and is willing to put in the work to be different. And marriage with her would be wonderful until she cheated or bailed, and since I'd know that's coming, it wouldn't hurt as much. Hell I could cheat in advance to even the score if it was more rewarding.
So they were both semi-cheating with one of them clearly a bigger threat to whatever Lari and I have.
Larissa
She holds very still through all of it — the sex being the lesser thing, the party girl being the larger threat, the cheat-in-advance line arriving last. She looks at her coffee cup. When she looks up her expression is doing nothing complicated. It is simply open.You just told me you'd cheat on her preemptively because you'd expect her to do it first.A beat.And you said it like it was reasonable.
Stephanie
That's the most exhausted romantic logic I've ever heard. And I've heard a lot.
Larissa
And the bigger threat part. You said that like I was supposed to find it reassuring.
Reggie
It was a joke. The preemptive cheating. I almost curved the edge of my mouth. You should've caught that.
Larissa
She looks at him for a long moment — the almost-curve of her own mouth arriving and departing in approximately the same breath.I caught it.A beat. She picks up her coffee.I'm just not ready to let you off on it yet.
Stephanie
The preemptive cheating lands differently when you've been sitting here for twenty minutes hearing about the Honda Civic. That's all I'll say.
Reggie
Women are so strange. Neither of you cares at all about the girl I had sex with. The one I didn't, the one I didn't even kiss, the one I've never been in a room alone with, that's the one you seem threatened by.
Larissa
She looks at her coffee cup for a moment — the sentence landing exactly, and she doesn't reach for a rebuttal because there isn't one.That's because she is the bigger threat by far.She picks up the cup and holds it.The other one — I'm not going to perform concern about the other one. You said it yourself. Eyes wide open. It was about the photo. It served its purpose and that's the whole of it. The other one you took to dinner and walked the seawall with and had a conversation about race and divorce and what your life looks like in twenty years. And you're still thinking about her. I can feel it.
Stephanie
Stress relief doesn't follow you to Wick and negotiate itself down to not-blocked. That's the part.
Reggie
I have never kissed her. I have never held her hand. I'm not sure if I've ever physically touched her.
Larissa
She holds his gaze for a long moment — the cup in both hands, not moving.I know.A beat. She sets the cup down.That's what I mean. You've never touched her and she's still the one in the room right now.
Stephanie
Sometimes that's the whole problem.
Reggie
Do you want to know how petty I can be? There's a big part of me that wants to give her a huge orgasm and say, "See that? Stupid bitch, can your tall, blonde white guy do that?" But the truth is he probably can. And until I can let go of this being some kind of competition with a scoreboard, I'm going to remain diminished.
Larissa
She turns her coffee cup one slow rotation on the table and stops it. She looks at him for a moment, then at the cup.The scoreboard part — yes. That's the thing to let go of.A beat.The other part. I'm not sure the probably is as certain as you think it is.
Stephanie
Yeah. The probably is doing a lot of work in that sentence.
Reggie
So here I sit. In exactly the same place I sat feeling emasculated a couple of weeks ago after learning you were dating other men. Feeling far more emasculated than I felt before, wishing I could just have these two weeks back so I could do just about anything else with them. And, Lari, I'm almost hoping that you go and date other men to even the score because at least then I wouldn't be the only one acting stupid after my pride got hurt. But don't sleep with them. I'm not as mellow about that as you two are.
Larissa
She holds very still through all of it — the emasculated again, the wishing two weeks back, the hope that she'll date other men to even the score. She looks at her coffee cup for a long moment. When she looks up her voice is quiet and exact.I'm not going to date other men to make the accounting feel cleaner.A beat.That's not — I'm not going to do the thing where we both go out and damage ourselves equally and call it fair. But the not sleeping with them part. I want you to hear that you said that. Because that's not a small thing you just asked for.
Stephanie
You walked two weeks ago, and now you're asking her not to sleep with anyone. That's movement. I'm just noting it.
Reggie
God, that was a slip. And it's annoying that you caught it so quickly You can sleep with whoever you want. You've promised me nothing at all.
Larissa
She looks at him for a long moment — the slip sitting there between them, already named by him before she had to name it. Something in her expression does a careful, controlled thing, and then she lets it go.I know I've promised you nothing.A beat. She picks up her coffee cup.But you said it. And now I know what you said before you corrected it. Those are two different things and we both know which one I'm keeping.
Stephanie
For the record, that was the fastest backpedal I've ever timed.
Reggie
So what now? Just keep doing what we're doing?
Larissa
Yes. Get this stupidity out of your system, like I got the stupidity out of mine. Go to coffee with the beautiful one. Fuck the other one again if you want. Just don't fuck too many of them or it becomes disgusting and I'm not sure I can recover from that. But just get whatever healing you need. I'll be here.
Stephanie
She looks at Larissa.She just told you. Don't be disgusting. You can work the rest out yourself.
Larissa
Just one bit of...not advice...just my thoughts. The one you're going to coffee with? Yes, she's a threat to me and yes that might be influencing this, but Reggie, that one could destroy you. You could get stubborn and need to prove to those people that you're not a Honda Civic and you'll show them and before you know it, you're not the man we knew anymore, you're...less.
Stephanie
She looks at her glass.The scoreboard problem. You can't win it. Even if you win it.
Reggie
Will you go out with me again, Larissa? I don't know where, but in a couple of days or a few days. I'll see what's playing or what's going on in the city.
Larissa
Let's not go out. Let's go to your place, or your boat, and just hang out and talk, and maybe cook, and just exist together in the same space. Lizzie Borden was fun and I'm happy we went but I don't need or want a special event every week. I want you to learn to exist with me for hours with nothing going on except for two people who want to be together for a little while.
Stephanie
She picks up her drink.I'm going to need you both to remember this moment when you're arguing about whose turn it is to do the dishes.
Reggie
I might not be able to keep my hands to myself.
Larissa
I'm counting on that.
Reggie
Wednesday? Come over after work and spend the night? Bring an overnight bag with a fresh change of clothes and I'll drive you to work the next day.
Larissa
Wednesday. I'll be at your place at 6 pm. I can't wait.
Stephanie
She looks between them — the Wednesday, the overnight bag, the six o'clock, all of it landing in a row like something that was always going to get here eventually. She picks up her drink and raises it a fraction, not quite a toast.About time.
