She lets out an offended huff of air before taking a step back and I smirk wider. “I can have him call you once he’s up. Will that do?”
“I guess it will have to. Make sure he understands the importance of calling me. His behavior yesterday?—”
“His wife died. I think you can manage to give him some grace, no?”
Her eyes narrow. “His wife, but my daughter. We are all grieving.”
I nod slowly. “Yes, but a relationship between a parent and child is different from a partnership. There’s a deeper level between partners, an intimacy you understand with your husband.”
Carol glances away from me, subdued for a moment at my honesty before sighing. “Please just have Ethan call me.”
She turns around and walks back to her expensive car idling in the driveway. I wait a few moments, watching her car disappear down the road before heading back to the kitchen. Rummaging through the fridge, I manage to find enough for a solid breakfast of eggs, bacon, and fruit. I feel like a stranger playing guest in a house I am renting, and it saddens me that we’ve grown apart this much over the years.
He wakes up around noon, sauntering into the living room, and I look up from my laptop. His eyebrows are scrunched together, dark hair sticking up places that shouldn’t be possible without gel, and his brown eyes squint.
“Hungover?” I ask.
“Yeah, a bit,” he says with a groan and flops down onto the couch.
I shut off my laptop then grab him some ibuprofen and water.
“Here.”
Handing him the best headache remedy, I sit back down and study him carefully as he swallows it. The dark stubble forming on his jaw is a few days old, but the slight softness of his stomach tells me he hasn’t been working out as much as he used to. Ethan always prided himself on his body to the point I made fun of his vanity. I wonder what’s gone down the past few weeks, and why he never reached out to me until the funeral.
“Carol stopped by. She wants you to call her when you’re up.”
Ethan groans. “Fuck, she say anything else?”
“No, she seemed a little disturbed I was here and couldn’t wait to leave,” I say with a smirk that he returns before it drops.
He pinches the bridge of his nose. “I thought she’d give me more time.”
“Well, we did leave the funeral kind of suddenly. Right after you made your niece cry.”
He snorts. “I doubt that little witch shed a tear. She’s horrible.”
I sigh. “What’s going on, Ethan? I feel like I’ve been dropped in the middle of a shit storm.”
Ethan shrugs, tilting his head back to rest on the couch. “I don’t even know anymore.”
My knee bounces and I rest my tangled hands on my thighs as I glance at my best friend. “Was Lyndsey’s death an accident?”
He blinks once, then bursts out laughing before letting out a slight moan and grabbing his temple. “Fuck, don’t make me laugh.”
I shake my head. “I’m serious. Do I have to worry about you getting arrested?”
“No, I didn’t murder my wife. Though, I wish I had.” Ethan chuckles again.
Words stick in my throat, relief and confusion rattling around in my chest.
“What the fuck, Ethan?”
He pushes off the couch, and I follow him into the kitchen a moment later, sighing when I see the whiskey bottle being raised. I let him swallow a gulp before attempting to take it from him. He holds it tight and I stumble into him. Our bodies are pressed against one another, and I can feel the heavy curve of his length against my hip before he lets go, and I step away.
“Let’s try to get through most of the day sober,” I say, my voice deeper with embarrassment.
“Whatever,” he mumbles, walking past to grab a banana. He eats it in two to three bites, barely chewing and I watch in gross amusement. When he tosses the peel into the trash, he faces me, then stretches. His arms flex over his head and his sweatpants dip a little lower, showing off the thin trail of hair from his belly button to under his waistband. I glance away, testing my willpower not to pop a boner.
