Page 73 of Play Dirty

“Shh,” he says. “Quiet. We did this your way and it’s not working. So it’s my turn now.” He directs his attention to me now. “Did we?”

“You know you didn’t,” I say. “Nothing beyond, ‘She was bored. I wasn’t enough for her.’ You know, your typical bullshit lies.”

He points his finger at me. “For the sake of everyone’s sanity, I’m gonna go ahead and ignore your standard sarcastic defense mechanism. It was about…” He looks at Augustine. “What? Four years ago?”

“Three and a half,” she says back.

“Fine. Three and a half years ago.”

I laugh. “That honeymoon didn’t last long.”

“We were in our old Westwood neighborhood for a theatre production at UCLA. And we were walking past the old apartment. I sold it shortly after you left. We moved into a house in Silver Lake. Anyway, I said…” And he stops to look at Augustine. “I said, ‘I miss those days.’ And she said, ‘You hated those days. You were never into sharing.’ And I said, ‘I don’t like sharing you, that’s true. It turned me into a jealous asshole. But I always knew he never wanted you. Not really, so I didn’t care. I always knew I could outlast him. I always knew he’d leave eventually. I always knew he’d get sick of you and move on.’”

“Ouch,” I say, looking over at August. She’s not looking at either of us.

“And she said—”

“And I said,” Augustine says, cutting him off. “I said, ‘Well, he was the only thing holding us together.’”

Alexander nods. “That’s what she said. It took me a few more months before I really thought about that. And another year to admit it was true. And another year after that to finally realize… I mean, I don’t know how I love you, Jordan. But this,” he says, waving his hand between himself and his wife. “This only works if we’re all here. Sometimes things come in threes. And… you know, I lied to her that day in Westwood. I lied. I liked it. I stayed because it felt good. I wasn’t jealous of you because… because I knew it wasn’t the attraction of a magnet. There was no push-pull of opposite poles. It wasn’t salt. That’s sodium chloride, right? Table salt. Those two things are held together by positive and negative charges. But simply adding water can undo those bonds. We were never that fragile. Not while we were three. We were like… triple bonds. Those rare things in nature that require more than one or two but three to be stable. And that makes us stronger, I think. That makes us… unique. And no, it’s not common. And no, it’s not for everyone. But we can’t help who we are. We can’t change our inherent natural qualities. We can’t be two.” He pauses. Draws in a long breath. “We simply cannot be two. We either exist alone or all three of us together. That’s just the way it is.”

I glance over at Augustine. Who has gone absolutely still. Like this is the first time she’s hearing this little speech from her husband as well.

“So fuck it. We lied. OK? We lied. We’re here for you and we’re using this building to get what we want because…” He shrugs. “It just doesn’t work any other way. Do I wish I could have a wife to myself? I dunno. Maybe? I really don’t know. Because that’s never going to be an option if I stay with Augustine. It’s just not an option. And I love her. And you too, I guess. I don’t know. But I’m certainly willing to give it a try if you are.”

I’ve been holding my breath and it comes out in a soft, low exhale. “Well, I admit. I didn’t expect that.”

Augustine takes Alexander’s hand and places it on her cheek. She smiles up at him like he’s her God. And then she turns to me and says, “I’d like to try too.”

There’s two things running through my brain right now. One. They’re full of shit. Something else is going on and this was just… I dunno. His way of distracting me. And two…

God, that’s hard to admit.

Two.

They’re serious. We had something good, we lost it, and now we want it back. I mean… besides Ixion. Because what we had included him, regardless of what he thinks about it.

I don’t want to be cynical Jordan anymore. Life is short. That’s one thing I’ve learned since we fell apart. One thing that really hit home these past few months when the games took a dark turn.

I mean… I had a US Senator killed a few months ago.

He deserved it. He was a total piece of shit. And in my defense, I did wait for him to make his choice before I made the call.

But who do I think I am? Really. Who the fuck gave me the right to kill a man for another person’s vengeance?

Chella never asked me to do it. She didn’t complain after, but…

“Jordan,” Augustine says, pushing herself so close to me, I can practically hear her heart beating fast. “Just… give it a try. You have nothing to lose.”

Is that true?

“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” Alexander says, getting irritated with my indecision. “Forget it.”

He turns to walk away but I grab his arm and say, “Wait.”

“Why?” he growls.

“I’m just… I’ve got a lot on my mind. And you two, man. You came out of the fuckin’ blue and I don’t know what to think about that.”