He put another quarter in the jukebox and punched in a song.
He emptied his pocket of quarters and punched buttons five times.
He could see her standing behind him for the first three.
And when he heard her chair scrape back again, he went back to his buddies, whose heads all swiveled in tandem toward the wall-mounted muted television to pretend they weren’t watching him with the same avidity they watched any sporting event.
He went back to them without another word.
“I was saying hello to Eden. She was having lunch with Mr. Jasper Townes, who is apparently an old friend in town for only a short time.”
He reached for the pitcher and tipped it.
Beer glugged out into his glass to the sound of near total silence.
Apart, that was, from the John Mayer song on the jukebox.
The song he’d chosen.
Five times in a row.
He hoped Jasper Townesthoroughlyenjoyed that.
His body was jangling with a cacophony of emotions. He couldn’t isolate any of them for inspection. The net result was a sort of numbness that seemed to result from all emotions, the way all noise was white noise.
He finally looked up.
He’d never seen so many subtle variations of the Pitying Gaze before. All limpid-eyed, fidgety, sympathy fromthisgrizzled, disreputable bunch. And they weren’t even drunk enough to be sentimental yet.
He supposed he could add “moved” to the variety of very complicated things he was feeling.
“To Bud getting lucky and accidentally getting that home run.”
“Luck, my ass! I hit that thing on purpose.”
Eden sat back down across from Jasper. She felt like a cat who’d been vigorously rubbed backward until all of her fur was erect and shooting sparks. She’d once rescued a saucer-eyed, patient yet astounded Peace and Love from the loving ministrations of four-year-old Annelise, who knew she was supposed to only pet him forward.
“But Mommy, I love him so much I wanted to pet both sides of him.”
A lesson in compromise for Annelise, that moment, and in love and power dynamics: always default to kindness when something is smaller than you are and dependent upon you. Sometimes whatyouwant means less than what someone you love wants.
Did she want to pet both sides of Gabe?
Her heart was slamming so hard, she was a little nauseous and her mouth was arid from nerves.
His face. Implacable, stunned, and behind that, something much worse: a hard resignation. He’d already indicted her and she hadn’t done anything wrong.
Or had she?
Shesatin reeling silence a moment. The way she felt now told her that it wasn’t about who did or didn’t have rights. She just never wanted to betray Gabe.
“What the hell is wrong with you?” she said finally to Jasper, and so suddenly he gave a start.
He shrugged. “That dude rubbed me the wrong way.”
“So?”
“I have a feeling he’s been rubbing you the right way. Am I right? Which is a good thing. I mean,someoneshould rub you the right way,” he said charitably.