Page 21 of So Thirsty

“I’m sure it’s cute on you,” she says. “Perfect for church.”

“All right, I get it. I need to dress conservatively for work, not show up on calls with full cleavage. And I could never pull off…” I gesture to the getup she’s in. A denim minidress, fishnets, her cowboy boots, a cropped cardigan with fringe.

“False,” she says, taking my hand. “Let’s go play dress-up.”

There’s no point in resisting. I let her drag me to her room and choose outfits for me.

“If I knew what we were doing I could dress myself,” I say as she rifles through her giant, overstuffed suitcase. “I don’t know what’s appropriate.”

“Are you wearing cute underwear?”

“Are you kidding?”

She laughs maniacally. Which could mean she’s kidding, or it could mean she’s dead serious. I’m too afraid to learn the answer.

We come to terms on the third outfit, a vintage T-shirt long enough to pass as a dress over a pair of black faux-leather leggings and under a long camel-colored cardigan. I’ll wear my own boots. My own frumpy winter coat.

“Let’s get some music on,” she says as we move into the bathroom to do our hair and makeup. She slides her phone over to me. I let my own die, avoiding contact. Avoiding reality. “You can DJ.”

“You’d so readily relinquish your power?”

“For you and you alone,” she says. “Don’t play anything depressing.”

“And you accused me of having no faith. Let me do my thing,” I say. I put on “Another Night” by Real McCoy.

“Oh, okay, okay. I see what we’re doing here,” she says, dancing around, swinging her hips.

“You forget that I can be fun, too.”

“Never. I never forget that,” she says, heating an eyelash curler with the Waterfront-provided blow-dryer. She starts to sing. “ ‘Another night, another dream, but always you…’ ”

“ ‘In the night, I dream of a love so true.’ ” The words “love” and “true” leave a vinegary taste in my mouth. The bathroom shrinks around me, becomes claustrophobic. In the last few hours, I’d been successful at not thinking about Joel, about his ulterior motive for sending me on this trip. His choice to brand it as a present for me.

I remember his other present. The gift box that’s currently up in the loft, that’s wrapped in gold paper with a pretty pink ribbon.

I’m tempted to go open it, but then I hear his voice in my head. Present shaker.

His voice was what first attracted me to him. We met standing outside of a bar in Morristown, New Jersey. It was December, and the trees in the park across the street—the Green—were all wrapped in bows and string lights. I heard Joel’s voice—he was saying something about how public executions used to be held on the Green, right where Santa’s house was now set up for the season—and I turned to look over at him, and he looked back at me. I remember thinking that everything about him was ordinary except his voice. He has this 1930s radio voice.

He walked over and introduced himself. He was confident but not cocky, well put together but not showy. I liked him immediately. I liked that he knew nothing about me, my past. He seemed like the perfect person to start over with, start fresh. I remember thinking that he seemed right. I remember that word, “right.” Not charming or sexy or handsome or polite. Right. Like trying on something that fits, that distinct feeling of relief in the dressing room.

I could tell straightaway that he was nothing like my father; or any of the men my mother dated postdivorce; or any of my high school boyfriends; or Smith, my first love, who tossed my heart in a meat grinder before setting it on fire, who made it impossible for me to trust anyone, especially myself.

Joel took me inside and bought us ginger beers; I was sober at the time, and I appreciated that he didn’t seem to mind. We sat talking for so long that we closed down the bar. He was witty and he was smart, studying law at Seton Hall. He wasn’t religious, if you didn’t count Sunday worship of the Buffalo Bills. He liked hiking and cooking and watching documentaries. He was stable, financially and emotionally—came from a happy family. He told me that after he graduated he planned on moving back to western New York, and I knew then that I wanted to go with him. I pictured this nice life with us together; I could see it so clearly. It seemed very low-risk, very easy, very practical, which was exactly what I’d been searching for. A partner. Someone to split the bills with, share the burden. And the joys, too, I guess.

We’ve been together ever since that night, the night we met. Almost fourteen years. In those fourteen years, I’ve caught him cheating three times. The first time was just after we got married. The girl messaged me on Facebook. She said it’d been going on for a while, that she wasn’t the only one, and she felt bad, and fuck him. When I asked him about it, he denied it, and I didn’t believe him, but I pretended I did. I deleted my Facebook.

The second time was four years ago. A different woman. One of his coworkers. I found texts on his phone. This time, when I confronted him, he copped to it. He apologized and told me he loved me, that it was a one-time thing, and it would never happen again. I stopped looking at his phone.

The third time was last night.

“Another night, another dream, but always you.” The song plays again. The air is thick with hair spray, and for some reason it makes everything seem surreal. Like I’m lost in the mist, crossing into the Twilight Zone.

I’m not quick to dismiss his indiscretions because I’m so in love with him. I do love him, but it’s never been about that. Nothing about my compliance is for his benefit. It’s for my own. It’s because I made a choice. I committed to the life I built with him, a life I like just fine. That’s familiar. That’s comfortable. I fear losing it if I lose him.

I fear the unknown.

It’s true that I can’t control whether he’s faithful, but as long as I turn the other cheek, I know he won’t leave. That gives me some semblance of control over the situation. Over my fine little life.