The inevitable never came.

After what felt like hours but was probably closer to a minute, I unclenched just a bit and opened one eye. The bright light was still there; it hadn’t been a flash after all. Trying to locate the source, I peered over my shoulder and found the light at the end of the dock, which had hung overhead as we made love, had flared back to life. Sitting up, I looked back at the house, then towards the town; the lights had come back on in both places.

“Shmi. Shmi!” 

She opened her eyes and looked up at me, then around. “Oh shit. Oh shit!” My lover immediately started digging through the pile of clothes that we’d left strewn around the dock, triumphantly holding up the object of her search after a few moments: her phone. Shmi’s eyes went wide as she scanned the screen. “I have a signal!”

I looked over her shoulder. No new messages had come in, but the 5G signal was back. “Call 911. Keep calling until you get through. Find out what’s going on and get someone out here ASAP.” I leapt to my feet, picking through the pile of clothes for my shorts, then hopping around on one foot as I got them back on.

“Where are you going?”

“The house. Gonna grab the flare gun, in case you can’t get through. Fuck, Shmi. I think we might be okay.”

She smiled, anxious but optimistic. “Yeah. I… I hope so.”

“Hey.” I leaned down and kissed her deeply. “I love you. Whatever else happens, that’s true, okay?” 

She nodded, a little less anxious. “Okay. Okay. I love you, too. Now go!”

I sped away from the dock, took the porch steps two at a time, and burst through the front door. Gina, Heather, and Kyle were all coming down the stairs, Kyle carrying the axe I’d handed to Shmi. He asked, “What’s going on?”

“Don’t know. Lights are back on in town. Shmi’s trying to call 911. Have you guys had any luck?”

Heather started poking at her phone before I even finished the sentence; her face was tear-stained, but the expression on it would have given any mama bear pause. This was a woman who would find out what was going on with her kids if she had to swim across the lake.

I dug through the box of supplies, finding the gun and flares just as I heard another set of feet tromping down from the floor above. Glancing over, I saw Blake, barechested and wearing shorts. Behind him stood my adulterous wife, clad in his shirt and a pair of panties. She looked at me, face pale and eyes wide, and tremulously asked, “Dale? What’s going on?”

Ignoring her, I loaded a flare into the gun and snapped it shut, then turned to Kyle. “Can you check on Tyler? Don’t open the shed, though, no matter what he says.” He nodded, gave Heather a hug, and headed out the door, axe in hand.

Blake asked, “Why is Ty in the woodshed?”

His fiancée snarled, “Because your asshole best friend attacked me!”

“What?”

Gina got right up in his face, almost spitting with fury. “You heard me, asshole! I told you, Blake, I told you he was a prick, and you wouldn’t listen! ‘Oh, Tyler’s a good guy!’ ‘Oh, that’s just how he is!’ ‘Can you blame him for hitting on you? I mean, look at you!’” She pointed at me. “If it hadn’t been for Dale…” Tears welled up in her eyes. “If it hadn’t been for Dale, who knows what would have happened?”

Blake looked stunned. “Gina…” He reached for her, but she slapped his hands away.

“Don’t! Don’t you fucking touch me!” Resolute despite the tears, she held one hand up in his face and pulled her engagement ring off. “I loved you. I really did. But if you can keep Ty around after I told you how awful he was, and then turn around and hurt someone like Dale just so you could get your rocks off…” She shook her head and dropped the loop of gold and diamonds on the wooden floor.

“Gina!” he cried, but she’d already turned her back on him. 

Crossing the distance between us in a few steps, his former fiancée asked me, “What do we do now? Can I help?”

“Hey!” Blake’s angry voice interrupted my reply. “Don’t you walk away from me!” I’d be lying if I said his indignation didn’t put a smile on my face.

Ignoring him, I said, “I think we’re doing everything we can right now. Stay with Heather until Kyle gets back and make sure she’s okay.”

“Hey!” Blake repeated, taking a step toward us. “Don’t act like I’m not right here! I–”

I glared at him. “You better goddamned well hope I keep acting like you’re not there.”

He paused for a moment, then squared his shoulders and puffed himself up. “Give me a break, Dale. You didn’t do anything when I took Mari to bed, and you won’t do anything now.”

My jaw clenched so hard I thought my teeth might shatter. Mari whispered, “Oh shit.” Heather looked up from her screen, her features silently echoing Mari’s sentiment. Even Blake realized he’d gone too far, as if fucking my wife hadn’t meant he’d already gone way past ‘too far.’ It was a moment primed for violence, and in that moment, I felt immense temptation to give into my urges.

Instead, though, I closed my eyes, took a deep breath, and opened them again. The low growl in my voice spoke louder than any roaring display could have. “I didn’t do anything because it would have been wrong.” 

I took a step towards Blake; he retreated a half-step in response. My former friend had grown used to having Tyler around, but in that moment, without his meatshield present, I think he first fully comprehended just how much bigger I was than him. “I could have killed you at any point in the last couple of hours, and you’d best believe I thought about it. I could have gotten Ty’s baseball bat or maybe grabbed the axe from the woodshed. Who would have stopped me?” I looked around the room. “Who of you could have stopped me? Not you, Blake, that’s for certain.” I had all their attention, and I planned to avail myself of it.

Grinning evilly down at his cowering form, I confided, “I think, though, I would have done it barehanded. Maybe strangled you or maybe beaten you to death; either one held its appeal when I thought about them, I promise you. But I didn’t, because it would have been wrong. That’s not who I want to be.

My eyes drifted towards Marissa. “I could have slapped you around, too. I’ve never hit a woman in my life, but if anything might push a man to it, his wife looking him dead in the eyes and telling him she was going to another man’s bed would, don’t you think? It almost did for me. You have no idea how close I came to smacking that faux apologetic look off your face. I didn’t want your goddamned pity. I wanted you to not be a fucking whore.”

Her shallow breathing and meek, mumbled apology told me I’d inspired the fear I wanted, so I dropped the malice from my voice. “I thought about it, but I didn’t do it. I didn’t kill him, and I didn’t beat you. I didn’t try to force myself on anyone like Ty or set the house on fire or even trash the place. I didn’t do those things because they were wrong, regardless of the lack of consequences.

“You, both the two of you and Ty, acted like beasts, for a very simple reason: You. Are. Bad. People. All three of you are selfish assholes who only pretend to be decent because you’re worried about the consequences. When you thought there wouldn’t be any, you did what you’d always wanted to do, no matter who it hurt. And, yeah, what Ty did was worse, but it’s only a matter of degrees, not kind.”

I shook my head, then looked at Gina. “I’m sorry for saying this was your fault. It wasn’t. I was just lashing out. You didn’t deserve that. You were a good person, too, even if… Well, I wouldn’t want to live my life like you, but like you said, ‘ethical non-monogamy. It’s right there in the name.’” She chuckled, nodding her acceptance of my apology. 

Mari tried to defend herself. “I just… I saw how happy Blake and Gina were with their arrangement, and Kyle and Heather, too, and–“

I didn’t know a Minnesota homemaker could move that quick. Heather leapt to her feet and lunged at Mari almost faster than I could follow. Between that and the surprise, I couldn’t have stopped the slap if I wanted to, which I didn’t.

Mari held one hand to her face, open-mouthed with shock. Heather screamed, “Don’t you fucking dare compare what you did to what Kyle and I do! Yeah, we swap with other couples, but it’s something we do together, to feel closer to each other! I would never hurt my husband the way you did, you selfish, entitled cow!” 

I almost thought she might hit Mari again, but she turned to me instead. “Dale, I’m so sorry if I, if we, in any way–“

“You didn’t,” I assured her. “No matter who else she blames it on, she made the choice she did.” I held my left hand up to show the missing ring. “And I made the choice I did.”

Mari gasped, “No,” then quailed, “What have you- Where’s your ring?”

“At the bottom of the lake, buried in the muck, along with the rest of our marriage.”

She begged, “No, please! We all thought we were going to die!”

“You know what, Mari? Maybe we still are. I don’t know. Maybe the missiles are about to rain down on our heads any second. It doesn’t fucking matter. I don’t give a good goddamn that you thought it was the end of the world. You looked me dead in the eye, saw how much fucking him would hurt me, and decided my pain was a price you were willing to pay. I’m never giving you a chance to do something like that to me again. Ever.”

“Please! Please, I’m sorry!” My ex-wife–in spirit, if not yet by law–tried to reach for me, but Heather moved between the two of us.

I ignored Mari, instead turning my attention back to Blake. Jabbing him in the chest, I threatened, “Don’t touch Gina again. I still want to fucking murder you, and the only thing preventing that is that it would be wrong. The first time you give me even the slightest reason, though, the first time you try to put hands on anyone, that ethical dilemma goes out the window, and I will end you. You understand me, shithead?” He nodded, and I jabbed him again. “Speak, motherfucker. Say, ‘yes, Dale, I understand.’”

Cowed, he averted his eyes and muttered, “Yes, Dale, I understand.”

“Great.” Glancing at my ex, I asked, “Heather, Gina, can you make sure Mari gets dressed? She looks like a slut, and I think we might have company soon.” 

On my return to the dock, I found Shmi talking animatedly on her phone, but couldn’t make out her words until I was almost on top of her. “Please hurry, we’ve got someone injured. We’ll–” She noticed my presence and asked, “Do you have it? No, officer, I’m talking to my friend. He’s got a flare gun. Should we– Okay, Okay. We will.” She nodded to me. I aimed the gun skyward and pulled the trigger, illuminating the scene in a reddish glow. “You see it? Okay. Okay! Thank you! Thank you so much!” Shmi ended the call with a whoop of joy.

“Did they say what happened?”

She nodded rapidly, almost vibrating with excitement. “It was a false alarm! The sheriff said that there’s something wrong with the system. They think maybe it was hacked, and the folks in charge of it can’t get in to issue an all clear, but he heard straight from the governor’s office!”

“What about the light?”

“Someone hit a pole! I guess the driver freaked out when they saw the alert on their phone, lost control of their truck, and ended up taking out the power in the whole valley. Sheriff said they had to go door to door calming people down.”

“Oh my God.” I felt the tension release from my entire body. “Oh my God, we’re going to live. Shmi, we’re–”

She threw her arms around me, hugging me close, then stood on tiptoe and pulled my face down to hers for a celebratory kiss. I returned it with enthusiasm, and she responded in kind, climbing me like a spider monkey. My hands moved to her shapely, firm ass, her legs wrapped around my waist, and we celebrated with a delightfully amorous makeout session. The euphoric high of realizing death wasn’t going to rain down from the heavens merged with our long-denied spark; yes, we were going to live, and we were going to start right there and then.

That’s how it might have been, anyways. In reality, after a few minutes of trying to fuck each other standing up and through our clothes, I heard a shrill voice cry, “What the fuck?”

We broke our kiss and looked over to see my (legal) wife standing at the halfway point of the dock, with most of our friends and former friends staring dumbstruck at us from the landward end. Mari looked either ready to kill or ready to keel over, and which one she might choose changed from moment to moment. 

Shmi dismounted with a chagrined look; when she walked toward Mari, speaking with a low, apologetic tone to her voice, I wasn’t that surprised. Not immediately, anyways. 

“I’m sorry, Mari. I didn’t mean for any of this to happen, but… Well, this afternoon, when you should have been walking with us instead of trying to get Gina to fuck your husband, I told Dale I was going to divorce Olivia. He comforted me. Platonically, I mean. Unlike you, he’d never do anything to hurt his marriage.”

Mari made an outraged sound, but before she could speak, Lakshmi continued in a voice that couldn’t hide her barely restrained rage. “After you went upstairs with that shithead I used to call a friend, and after Dale saved that shithead’s fiancée from another shithead I used to call a friend, I found this guy, this wonderful guy who’d always been there for me, no questions asked, out here by himself, mourning his marriage the same way I’d mourned mine. 

Her voice increased in volume and fury with each step she took. “We threw our rings into the lake together, since it was the only divorce either of us thought we’d live to see. Our vows meant something to us, you see. We hugged each other and cried after that. When we did that… Well, Dale’s just a man.” 

She chuckled throatily as she stopped, only a few feet from Mari. “No, that’s not right. Dale’s not just a man. He’s a real man, a strong, kind, loyal, and loving man, unlike that foppish fuckboy you threw him over for.”

“I didn’t–” Mari began.

Shmi’s voice overpowered hers, though. “I felt that hard cock of his pressed against me, and his body up against mine–God, that fucking body–and I knew I had to have him. It didn’t matter that I’m gay. I needed his dick inside me, and I needed it right. Fucking. Then.”

“And it was glorious. He was glorious. Just soooo good. So fucking good that…” She cast a coquettish glance over her shoulder, with a wink intended just for me, before turning back to her audience of one. “Well, the truth is, I guess I never knew what I was missing. Your husband–sorry, ex-husband–and that thick cock of his just plain fucked me straight.”

“What?” Mari stared at her, confusion etched on her face. “You- You can’t be serious.”

My lover held the moment for one heartbeat, two, three. Then, laughing, she replied, “Of course not!”

“Then why–”

“Because I’m not gay, you absolute cunt!” Any trace of levity had fled her voice, replaced instead with a cold fury. “I was never gay, but I was too scared to say anything when you stole my date from me! I was too scared to ever say any of the things–to do any of the things–I wanted to! I’m not scared anymore, though, and I’m not going to hide from who I am and what I want. And you know what else? You better stay the fuck away from my man, you worthless skank.”

I joined the others in their dumbstruck state. Lakshmi had never talked to anyone like this, and I wondered how much of herself she’d repressed over the years. Moreover, I’d never seen Mari intimidated the way Shmi had managed with only a few words. 

I think, at that moment, everything finally hit Mari. For the first time, she’d fucked up beyond my ability to forgive, regardless of how she tried to make it up to me. We wouldn’t be getting back together, no matter how she begged. I’d already moved on, and with the woman who’d introduced us in the first place, a woman she could never in a million years have expected to show any romantic interest in me.

My ex melted down, and she melted down big. Fell to her knees, wailed, sobbed, the whole nine yards. I thought at first that the last few embers of my love flared as I felt a pang of sympathy for her, but then I realized that’s all I felt: sympathy. Pity, even. But no love. She’d killed that.

Shmi turned on her heel. Her vicious mask had dropped, and she wore an exaggeratedly anxious grimace as she walked towards me; I remembered the old saying that being brave first requires being afraid, then overcoming it, and I knew that’s what she had done. She’d done it for herself, yes, but she’d done it mostly for me. For us.

When she reached me, Shmi looked up and whispered, “How’d I do?”

I chuckled. “Terrifying.” Then, unable to help myself, I added. “I have the weirdest boner right now.” She laughed and kissed me again, and we let the world fall away for a little while longer.

The sheriff’s department showed up not long after, a paramedic crew in tow, and took statements from all of us. Tyler lived, but I’d broken his jaw; as they carted him past on a gurney, he howled at me like a Wookiee, pure hate in his eyes.

While Shmi gave her statement, Gina pulled me aside. “Hey, I just wanted to thank you again. And apologize again, too. I really would have been happy with, you know, just me and you, or me, you, and Mari, but I think in the back of my mind I knew what their ultimate goal was.”

I shrugged. “Yeah, maybe, but you wanted to believe the best of someone you loved. I did the same, and it’s not like I can blame you for their lies. Still, I meant what I said. You backed off when I asked you to, and you didn’t go along with them later. If you need to hear it, I forgive you, but I don’t blame you for any of this. And as to thanking me… Honestly, who the hell wouldn’t have intervened?”

Her face clouded for just a moment; a hint, perhaps, of painful personal experience. “You’d be surprised.” Then, the model smile was back. “But you did, and… Look, I’m not saying ‘Oh, my hero!’, but I already wanted you before that, and now? Goddamn.” She looked over my shoulder at Shmi and the cop questioning her. “Seems like you might already be off the market, though?”

I shrugged. “Early days, but, yeah, I think so.”

“And do you take the same stance on monogamy when you’re just dating?”

“Yup.”

“Damn. Lucky girl.”

“I think I’m the lucky one, honestly.”

Gina smiled a little wistfully at me. “See? That’s what I mean. Lucky girl. Still, if it doesn’t work out, and you find yourself in L.A., look me up. I promise I’ll show you a great time.” She gave me a peck on the cheek, then walked away with a “See you around, hero,” over her shoulder.

“Ahem.” Shmi cleared her throat behind me.

“Oh! Hey. She, um, she was just thanking me. For earlier.”

Lakshmi smirked, then licked her thumb and rubbed the lipstick Gina left behind from my cheek. “I can see that. And did she offer any kind of reward for your gallantry?”

“Yes, but I told her I’m spoken for.”

Shmi grinned, “Damn right you are.”

It wasn’t quite as easy as that, of course. We wanted to explore this new thing between us, but the real world threw up a number of barriers to prevent that. 

First, we both agreed on the ride to the airport the next day that we needed to do the responsible adult thing and pump the brakes just a little bit. After all, we’d gotten together during a time of crisis and also while both of us were going through significant heartbreak. Even with our long friendship, we needed to make sure we actually felt the way we thought we did in the light of day. Once we were both home and had moved out of our respective living arrangements, we spent long hours talking most nights about all the important stuff a couple should. You know, in between all the sexting.

Second, we had to deal with the end of our marriages from a practical perspective. Shmi’s ended up being the easier of the two, surprisingly. All the talk about chatter and meetings and the rest from Olivia had been a smokescreen; the day Shmi returned home, a process server showed up to present her with divorce papers. 

Turned out Mari wasn’t the only one who had a very loose notion of fidelity. Olivia had spent the weekend moving in with her affair partner, leaving Shmi most of the stuff in their apartment, half the money in the bank accounts, and the gift of freedom. Given how stressed she’d been about the confrontation, we both had a good laugh about it.

On my end, things didn’t go quite so swimmingly. Once the smoke cleared, Mari tried to corner me one last time at my new apartment. She begged and pleaded, promised she’d make it up to me, and generally prostrated herself in front of me. I told her in no uncertain terms that we were over, but that didn’t stop her. 

Over the next two weeks, she tried to get everyone involved that she thought could possibly sway me, including my parents and hers, our Dallas friends, and her sister. Most of them declined, but the ones that remained tried all the excuses you’d expect: she thought she was going to die; it was just a mistake; we had been together for almost ten years; and tons more besides. I didn’t find the arguments any more persuasive coming from other people than I did from her.

She didn’t stop until I finally told her, “There’s nothing you can do to make me want to stay married to you. I don’t love you anymore, and that’s not going to change. All you can do now is make me hate you instead. Please, if you ever really loved me, just let me go.” 

When I said that, her face softened with sadness. She lowered her head, then looked back up at me with tears, haltingly saying, “I want you to- to know that… That no matter what, back then or in the future, you were never my second choice.”

“Except that night, when you picked him.”

Mari shook her head. “That’s not what I mean.” She sniffled. “It really was love at first sight, and I knew I had a future with you. Blake could never have–” She saw the expression on my face and stopped, then sighed, before pulling a pen and the papers from her purse. “I’m sorry for what I did, for hurting you. I’ll always regret that. But I’ll never be sorry for falling in love with you. I hope you and- and-” Mari couldn’t finish the sentence, not able to admit I’d moved on. Instead, she signed the settlement and handed it to me. “Goodbye, Dale. You’ll always have a piece of my heart.”

A month later, I heard that she moved to L.A. and had shacked up with Blake. 

As to the third bump in the road for my burgeoning relationship with Shmi… Well, that was a little bit of a different story.

Our divorces only took a few months to make it through the courts. Uncontested divorces with a clear division of assets can go like that, and we were both grateful that ours did. As we waited for the pieces of paper that legally proclaimed what we morally had when we threw our rings into the lake, she and I continued to live our lives in our home cities. 

“Our home cities.” That was a problem in and of itself, although not as big an issue as one might expect. I’d been working remote for years, after all, and I could always move to D.C. if necessary, and she was looking at going back to school for her doctorate, so maybe even that wouldn’t be necessary. We hadn’t talked that far in advance yet, but I kept it in the back of my mind, as I expect she did. Instead, the discussion came around to who would visit whom first, and when. Ultimately, we tossed a coin, and I won. I chose to visit D.C., since I’d never been there before. 

That was the plan, anyways. Instead, a few weeks before I was supposed to fly into Dulles, and about three months after the eventful trip to the lake house, Shmi went almost entirely radio silent for the better part of a week. I tried not to worry; she still had a busy life in D.C., and she returned my texts when I checked on her. Even those felt off, though, with none of the playfulness she’d previously exhibited. 

By the fifth day, I wondered if perhaps she’d cooled on the notion of us as a couple and was looking for a way to gracefully exit. I’d meant what I said on the dock that night, that I’d love her as a friend regardless of whether we worked as a couple. Still, I’d seen such a marked change in her behavior and attitude over the months since that terrifying night that I couldn’t believe she’d ghost me or even pussyfoot around the topic.

That evening, as I was about to try to call her, I heard a knock at the door. I’d ordered Doordash, so that didn’t surprise me. What did surprise me, however, was that instead of an order of kung pao chicken on my doorstep, I found Lakshmi, wrapped in a winter coat far too heavy for January in Dallas and sporting an anxious look. 

“Hey,” she meekly said. Then, with somewhat forced enthusiasm, “Surprise!”

“Shmi!” I tried to wrap her in a loving hug, but she stiffened, and so I relented. “Hon? What’s wrong?”

“I, um, nothing. Not… I needed to talk to you, and it felt like the kind of thing we should do in person. I know I should have asked, but…” She shook her head. “Can I come inside?”

“Of course!” I stepped aside, trying to hide my worry. “Where are your bags?”

“They’re in my rental. We can get them in a little bit, if… Um, later, I guess.”

“Ooookay. Shmi, you’re kind of freaking me out here.”

I sat and patted the couch next to me, but she declined, instead pacing as she began to talk, still wearing her voluminous coat. “I, um, I… Fuck, I had a whole speech ready to go, and I’ve forgotten all of it.”

She took a deep breath and started over. “I love you. Let’s start there. I don’t mean as just friends or anything like that, either. I mean, that too, but we’ve had a little while to think about this and how we feel. I love you, and I mean I love you the way…” 

She chuckled, an anxious, self-deprecating little noise. “I love you the way I loved you that night on the dock, even if I didn’t want to admit it. Even if I didn’t want to- to scare you. I told you that I didn’t carry a torch for you, but that was only half-true. I didn’t think I carried a torch for you, but I guess I’d had one the whole time and just hadn’t realized it was with me. Like… Like I’d doused it and forgotten about it, but it blazed back to life that night on the dock.” 

I tried to speak, but she held a hand up. “Please. Please, let me get all of this out before I lose my nerve.” Shmi swallowed, clearly afraid and clearly trying to hide it. “I’m not telling you this to make you feel obligated or guilty. I hope you feel the same way, but even if you do… Even if you do, I don’t want you to feel like… like it has to mean something. Like you have to do anything about it, just because… Just because of the decisions we made when we thought we were going to die.”

Lakshmi had begun to unbutton her coat as she talked, then to unfasten the belt holding it closed. Once she shrugged it off her shoulders and onto my floor, it only took me a moment to see why she’d come here for this talk: the beginnings of a cute little baby bump. I looked, wide-eyed, first at it and then up at her tear-streaked face.

She croaked, “I wasn’t on the pill. I’ve never had any reason to. I don’t want… My father married my mother because he felt obligated. I don’t want that in my life. I don’t want someone to be with me because they feel like they should be. I’m going to keep the baby, but I don’t expect you to stay with me or- I mean, I not saying that I wouldn’t expect you to, like you’re a bad guy, because you’re not, and I don’t want you to think that I’m saying that, so please–”

“Shmi.” 

“–because I know that you’re a good guy, and–

 “Shmi. Shmi, stop.” Once her panicked ramblings petered out, I beckoned her closer. “Come here.” 

She shuffled towards me, wiping her face with her sleeve, until she stood in front of my spot on the couch, then started to speak in a subdued voice. “I’m sorry. I didn’t–”

“Shh.” I leaned forward, kissed her tummy, and spoke to the new life growing inside. “Your mother is a very silly woman.”

Shmi, abashed, murmured, “Dale…”

“She thinks that loving her, that marrying her and raising you together, would be an obligation instead of a joy.” I kissed her tummy again, then stood, gazing into Shmi’s eyes. “She’s a silly woman, and I love her. I’ve loved her as my friend for a long time, and I love her as my mate now.”

“Dale, we haven’t even lived together yet,” she argued, although with no force behind the words. “We don’t know if we’ll get on each other’s nerves or–”

I kissed her, silencing her protestations. “We haven’t lived together, true. But your parents didn’t, either. Our grandparents didn’t. They made it, and so will we. As to getting on each other’s nerves…” I shrugged. “I already know I get on your nerves. That’s part of my charm.” 

Shmi laughed and kissed me. I swept her up in my arms, carrying her like the new bride she’d be as soon as we could manage, returning the kiss with a hunger born of too much time apart. She broke away for a moment, gasping, “I should get my luggage from the car.”

Smirking, I strode towards our bedroom, my beloved cradled in my arms. “Why? You’re not going to need it for a few days.”

—

Morrissey’s voice crooned through the car’s speakers

Trudging slowly over wet sand

Back to the beach where your clothes were stolen

“Really?”

Shmi cackled. This was always part of the game on our Labor Day vacations. We’d take a road trip, I’d drive, she’d control the music, and somewhere in there, she’d slip in a song about nuclear war: “2 Minutes to Midnight,” “I Melt With You,” “99 Luftballons,” and now “Everyday Is Like Sunday.” Always an 80s song, so I’d know she did it on purpose, as if her dorky giddiness as the previous song ended wasn’t clue enough.

I sighed deeply. That was part of the game, too. I’d act aggrieved at her music selection and she’d laugh harder than ever. Then, later, in bed that night, she’d “make it up to me.” If it really bothered me, she wouldn’t do it, and if either of us wanted to indulge in anything between the sheets, they just had to ask. Knowing it was all a bit of fun was what made it a game, though, and one we’d both win once we reached our destination. She was just an immense goofball, with even more of a dad sense of humor than me.

Usually, we’d have driven to my folks’ place or flown to hers–the “road” part of the latter trip being the interminable journey from the airport to their house two hours away–so the grandparents could spend a little time with Morgan, our son. This year, though, while we did drive to my folks’ house, we’d dropped Morgan off there for a couple of days so Shmi and I could relax at a little bed and breakfast, with plans to work on a little brother or sister for him.

Soon, she was singing along, and I was, too, making a hash of both the lyrics and a Manchester accent, to her delight. Shmi ran her fingers through my hair, saying, “I love you,” with a look of absolute adoration in her eyes. Life was good, far better than I could have expected on that horrible night four years before. Well, for some of us, at least. 

Kyle and Heather were still together; I think it would take a crowbar to tear them apart. The four of us weren't close like we used to be, but we remained friends on social media and even saw them once every couple of years in person. They’d added a third child to their family, a little boy that looked disturbingly like a tiny version of Kyle, and had made noises about a fourth and final addition. As far as I knew, they were still swinging, but Shmi and I had absolutely no interest in that sort of thing, and they knew it, so it hadn’t really come up.

I’d say that I last saw Gina that night by the lake as the police took our statements, but that’s not strictly true. It’s the last time I saw her in person, but her modeling career had taken off in the intervening years. Every once in a while, I’d open a magazine or look at a billboard, and there she’d be, hawking perfume or clothes. Shmi even teased me one time about it while we lay in bed together one night. Gina showed up in a lingerie ad on her tablet, and she pointed at it, saying, “You missed out on that? For me?” For the next hour or so, I showed my wife, quite vigorously, that I didn’t feel like I’d missed out on anything.

Mari and Blake’s relationship didn’t work out, quelle fucking surprise. According to what I heard from acquaintances, the two of them lasted about nine months–which was about six months more than I gave them–then broke up spectacularly when Blake cheated on her. Well, I say they lasted nine months. In a sense, they’re actually still stuck with each other, due to something else that lasted nine months, i.e. her unplanned pregnancy with Blake’s daughter. 

Last I heard, Mari’s still single. She might have been a 9/10 in college, but she wasn’t an L.A. 9. Almost fifteen years later and after having a child? Hah! No chance.

On top of that, our little blowup at the lake house made the news, if only as a smaller human interest piece in the larger story about Eastern European hackers, cyberwarfare, and the retributive movements of the U.S. government against a certain former world power. Still, if someone searches for her name, the few mentions on the web don’t paint her in a particularly flattering light. Add to that the fact that she’s a single mom, and I doubt she’ll be making another trip to the altar anytime soon.

Tyler went to jail, thankfully. He didn’t get as long as he deserved, but he did get longer than I expected. It turned out he’d blown most of his money on partying, along with a chunk of Blake’s, and he had to rely on an overworked public defender who plead him out on a lesser charge. He got eighteen months but was out for good behavior in twelve.

That good behavior didn’t last long. The prison notified me when they released him, and I watched my back for the next month; after all, I’d smashed his jaw with a baseball bat, and that’s the kind of thing that makes a guy a little sore. 

Blake, however, either didn’t take the same kind of precautions or they didn’t do him any good. His betrayal of Tyler–first by banishing him from the house that night and later by cutting him loose entirely once he’d been arrested–apparently hurt quite a bit more than a broken jaw. A few weeks after Ty’s release, a couple of junkies found his former best friend beaten to a pulp in the back alley behind one of Blake’s favorite clubs. He needed multiple reconstructive surgeries to even get within spitting distance of his former good looks. 

According to the same acquaintances that spilled the tea on Mari, he also turned twitchy and nervous after the attack. It’s hard to be charming when you’re constantly looking over your shoulder, which meant he couldn’t manage to be anywhere near the earner at work that he’d been previously. His dad kept him on at their family’s company in a diminished role, but his cousin, a solid family man, took his slot as the heir apparent. 

Eyewitnesses said they saw Tyler loitering outside the same club earlier that evening; being in another state alone would have been enough to violate the terms of his parole, but the cops found plenty of physical evidence in his car, too. He’d gotten eighteen months the first time around, but between his parole violation, crossing state lines to commit a felony, attempted murder, and all the other things they charged him with, he’d be in the pen for something closer to eighteen years before he got out.

As for my bride and myself? We got along even better than we’d hoped, although we did have a bit of a bumpy time with her parents. She’d already told them about her sexuality and why she hid it from them even before that night she showed up on my doorstep; surprisingly, it didn’t all blow up in her face. Her father didn’t exactly take it in stride, but he understood why she did what she did, and when her mother realized the lengths she’d gone to avoid the arranged marriage, her reaction was one of shame rather than indignation. 

On the other hand, when she visited them two months later, fiancé in tow and visibly pregnant? That didn’t go over so well. We got past it, though. Turns out that giving her Amma a grandchild went a long way towards any animosity they might feel, as did the fact that I wasn’t just some random guy but a longtime friend. The rock on her finger showing my commitment didn’t hurt, either.

As “Everyday Is Like Sunday” drew to a close, Shmi’s expression changed again from adoration to impishness. I didn’t understand why until “Two Tribes” began to play.

“Another one? Honestly, woman.”

Shmi went straight through a cackle and into a belly laugh as I rolled my eyes. When she finally regained control, my wife answered, “Well, I guess I’m gonna have to make it up to you extra hard this time, huh?”

I put my hand on her thigh and squeezed. “And how exactly would you do that?”

She tilted her head and affected a seductive little moue. “I guess you’ll just have to see when we get there. But, ah, there’s a reason I didn’t ask you to help me pack this time, if that gives you any ideas. My bag seemed awfully light, didn’t it?”

I opened my mouth to reply, then thought better of it. I had more important things to do than talk, after all, like drive.

The engine roared, my beloved laughed with glee, and we sped toward our future together.