Page 4 of The Lipstick Flip

“We’re still fucking married?”

It was supposed to come out as a question. It started as a question. By the end, it was a shout.

The silence had a trembling quality that might have been Noah or might have been me. It was like I’d brushed a cymbal.

“I didn’t—” Noah’s voice sounded small. And then, trying for brusqueness, “I’m at work. I can’t talk about this right now.”

“If you hang up on me, I am going to go ape-shit on this fucking tampon you call a car. Get your ass out here right fucking now.”

Noah’s silence lasted longer this time. Then he muttered, “I need a few minutes. Try to act like a human being until I get out there.”

The call disconnected.

My knuckles throbbed. I had to force myself to loosen each finger.

It was closer to ten minutes—probably because Noah was hoping if he waited long enough, I’d give up and go away. But finally a fire door on the back of the building opened. He was just a silhouette, but I knew who it was. He shaded one hand, as though he might be able to see past the headlights and into the truck. And then he gave a little wave, and I realized he wanted me to go inside. Probably so there’d be plenty of witnesses when I murdered him.

I killed the engine. I got out of the truck. I didn’t even feel my feet hit the ground; everything was gone from the knees down, and for the first few steps, my balance felt off. I didn’t fall or anything, but it was like someone else was walking. Someone else was moving. And I wasn’t doing any of it, because I was falling deeper and deeper into the big red emptiness inside my head.

When I got closer, Noah beat it backward, and I had to catch the door to keep it from falling shut. I blinked, my eyes adjusting to the light as I stepped inside. We stood in what looked like the back of a commercial kitchen. A six-burner range. A walk-in deep freeze. Only a single strip of fluorescents glowed overhead, probably safety lights that never went off, and they left a dull smear along the linoleum, across the battered pots and pans, over the stainless steel of appliances and countertops.

Noah.

The same white-blond hair. The same undercut. The same fucking lip gloss—bubblegum pink. That moment of recognition was so disorienting that I almost forgot how angry I was. Enough makeup that you couldn’t miss the fact that he was wearing it. One earring—a single pearl that, knowing Noah, was probably real. He’d lost weight; he’d always been petite, and now, in the baggy scrubs, he looked almost frail. He twisted at the waist to glance over his shoulder, as though he’d heard something. He still had a great ass.

“Before you—” he began as he turned back.

“Be quiet.” I drew a deep breath through my nose. I let it out again. “This is some kind of mistake.”

He didn’t say anything.

“You didn’t tell your dad, and so he didn’t tell the lawyer.”

Noah tried to hold my gaze. But he slipped, and he cut his eyes away.

“This is one big misunderstanding,” I said. “Tell me that’s what this is.”

He folded his arms across his chest, and it made him look even smaller.

“Noah!”

“I don’t know what you want me to say!”

“I just fucking told you what I want you to say!”

Now his gaze snapped back to me. “Stop yelling.” It came out as barely more than a whisper. “There are people here who need their rest.”

“Oh yeah,” I said. “I’m real fucking worried about Grandma Gladys getting a full night’s sleep.”

“Howie!” It came out like a whipcrack—not loud, but with a lot of sting behind it.

I waited. But Noah just stood there, arms folded, until I finally said, “What the fuck did you do?”

“Yes,” he finally said.

“Yes what?”

“The divorce. It’s not, you know, final.”