in six months – four now – and here I am nearly two months later. I instinctively start to hide my left hand but she should find out sooner than later.
Phillip sees the ring and pulls up my hand for all to see. If Penny is hurt she doesn’t show it.
“Quinn?” he asks.
“Yeah.”
“You got it sorted out then?”
“Not yet,” I say, “but maybe.”
“Congratulations,” Penny says and kisses me again.
Now I’m starting to feel like I’ve betrayed Quinn a second time. I’ve only seen Penny, maybe two minutes, and we’ve already kissed twice and I’m feeling something for her again.
Penny reads my face. “It’s just a kiss, Judd,” she says sweetly and pays for her things. They could be ice skating tools, but I wouldn’t know what they looked like. I’m an owner of this place now, and I don’t even know what they sell. Phillip is grinning like a fool as she leaves and I shake my head at him reprovingly.
She’s gone out into the carpark now.
My brother can’t help himself. “You slept with her, you dirty dog!”
I shake my head at him again, not to deny it but in disbelief. The last time I was here in this town three of us slept with people we shouldn’t have: Penny and me; Chelsea and him; Wendy and Horey.
“I’ll be back in a minute,” I tell them and chase after Penny.
She’s already at her car. She’s loaded her goods in the back. I call her name and she turns to me. Her face is lovely and neutral and unreadable.
“I’m an ass,” I tell her.
“No you’re not. And you know you’re not.”
“I said that I’d call you. I said that we could have a future together.”
“Yes. But things change, Judd. I know that. You’re not an ass for doing the right thing when you have to make a choice. I just want you to have a happy life. If that’s with Quinn, then I’m happy for you.”
I sigh. “Quinn and me...” I begin. “That’s a long, hard road.”
“That’s just life, Judd.”
“It is?” I was hoping that at some point my life would not be hard, at least for a while.
“We all walk that road. It doesn’t matter who you are or where you’re from. What we can hope for is that we’ll have someone to walk with us from time to time, maybe carry our bag for a while and make it easier. People join us and they leave. And if we’re lucky, really lucky, we’ll find someone to walk with us all the way to the end. I hope that person for you is Quinn.”
“Me too.”
“And I’m one of the other ones. I came, carried a little of your load, and now I’m starting to slow down and let you go on ahead. That’s all. And I’m good with it, I am.”
I’m nodding.
“It was just sex after all,” she says with the kind of fond smile that a friend gives another.
Now I’m smiling. “And friendship.”
“Sex and friendship then.”
We hug again for ten, maybe fifteen, seconds. I’m not ashamed now and I don’t feel like I’ve let Quinn down.
“I’m holding you to your promise, though.”
“What?”
“You’re still calling me in four months. I’m counting down the days.”
“I don’t think Quinn would approve.”
“It could be our little secret.”
I laugh, because we both know where secrets got me and that I’m not keeping them anymore and I want Quinn to be an open book too.
Penny is not a fan of goodbyes. “Judd Altman,” she says, shaking her head. Then she gets into her car and drives away. This will probably be the last time I see her, but I’m glad I did.
I start walking back to the store, but Phillip is watching me from the door, but he’s not grinning like a fool now. He walks up to me, and we stand behind his Porsche.
“You look older, brother,” he says.
“Thanks,” I tell him sarcastically.
“Not the face. That hasn’t changed. No, the way you talk, the way you do things.”
“Well, I’m learning stuff.”
“You want to talk about it?” He sounds serious, but I know he’s not. Tracy has taught him a thing or two but mostly she’s given him a greater range of topics to annoy his family. I don’t have any hobbies but I think irritating the people that love him is Phillip’s. He starts to laugh and I shake my head at him again.
“You’ve looked after the Porsche,” he says a moment later.
I look pointedly at my Jeep but I don’t say anything. We swap the contents of the two cars and the keys and then head back into the store.
“I can’t believe you’re here,” he yells and grabs me again, this time around the neck. He pulls me down and starts to knuckle my head until Horey gets him off.
“You seen your mother?” Horey asks.
“Not yet.”
“So she doesn’t know about Quinn?”
“No.”
“Bet she’ll have something to say about that.”
“I’ve always liked her,” Phillip adds and I laugh at the suggestion.
“You weren’t that nice to her last time you saw each other.”
“Was I? I don’t remember. But then, that does sound like me.”
“Why you back?” Horey asks.
“Couple of things,” I say evasively.
We really don’t talk about anything of consequence. The store starts to get busy and so I leave them. I drive down to the carwash. I’m instantly sorry to see the Porsche go. It turned heads. Now I was just another tired thirty something guy in a boring old car.
While I was surrounded by water and soap and bubbles I checked my phone. Quinn hadn’t called, she hadn’t texted. I was beginning to worry, but then she said she would and I’m once again learning to trust her. It is an everyday lesson.
I call Wade instead. I know, it sounds like I don’t trust Quinn, but I still need to talk to him.
It rings a few times and finally his phone is answered by a woman. My stomach knots and then releases when I realise it’s not Quinn after all.
“It’s Judd,” I say, hoping that the woman at the other end has some idea who I am.
“It’s your friend,” she says to someone, Wade presumably. He said that I was probably one of his only friends before, and he’s back to believing the lie.
“Hey, bud,” he says.
“Hey,” he replies over loud music somewhere in his vicinity.
“What’s up?”
I don’t ask who he’s with. I’ve learnt not to become attached to his women, Quinn the exception.
“Hey, Chloe, turn that down.”
“I just wanted to let you know I’ll be away for a couple of days,” I tell him. “I’ve checked in with Kenny and he’s good to cover me.”
“Don’t worry man. Take the week off if you like. I’m in Mexico. We’re replaying some old stuff this week. Kenny’s all over it.”
“What are you doing in Mexico?” I ask him.
“Honeymoon, man. Got married.”
“To the gymnast?”
“Of course to the gymnast.”
“Damn,” I say.
“Damn,” he says back. I guess he takes that as my congratulations.
I can hear Chloe call him in the background and she’s laughing. Wade says his goodbyes and hangs up.
“Damn,” I say again. “Married, huh? Wonder what Quinn will say?”
I head home with my car cleaned but still dented and scratched. I wanted to yell at Phillip but then he refrained from yelling at me for stealing his Porsche and so I can hardly complain. The house is still empty when I get back, and so I get out the family address book and call up the local doctors and make an appointment.
This was something that I was not looking forward to, and I didn’t want to get this attended to back at home. I didn’t want my doctor to know about what had happened between Quinn and me and I didn’t want him to look at me with sympathy. I had an appointment for the next
day, so the humiliation would have to wait until tomorrow.
I climb back onto the roof and sit, thinking about how my life had changed radically since I had been here last. It was astounding that I may be on track to turning things right around. My life would not be the same – it was irrevocably changed in so many ways – but I hoped that I would be better and stronger at the end. I hoped Quinn would be with me then, but I was prepared to accept that we were too damaged to be put back together again, despite the best efforts of Grant and Mary. I’m feeling a little melancholy and it’s because she hasn’t called and it’s triggered in me when things don’t go completely well with her. It’s stupid I know, but that’s how I feel.
My mother pulls up in her car and climbs out and sees me. She waves and I wave back, head into the house to meet her downstairs.
I don’t tell mom about Quinn and me. I don’t hide the ring either and she knows something’s going on because she sees everything. She calls Paul and asks him over for dinner with his expecting wife. We’re almost all together again. Wendy lives too far away to join us for a casual meal.
There we are, Mom and Paul and me and Phillip. Alice sits where Wendy would have been and Dad’s chair is empty.
They’re all looking at me. They’re all looking at my ring and saying nothing. Phillip knows but he’s holding his tongue, but I can see that it’s killing him.
“Okay,” I say after ten minutes of looks and glances and unspoken words. “Let’s just get this out in the open,” I tell them. I don’t want a repeat of last time when I told them all, and a room full of visitors, that I was divorcing my unfaithful wife. “Quinn and I are working though our problems. We’re seeing some people and it seems to be working. Yes, I’m wearing my ring. No. I’m not getting divorced. Yet.”
“I already know,” Phillip adds.
“Good for you,”