friend of Robert’s at one time. They had spent a lot of time together, and Michael was always at the house. He even watched Tyler on occasion to give them a rare date night. He was funny and thoughtful and always kept his word; in a lot of ways, he was the complete opposite of Robert. Life always seemed so fun when Michael was around; he often made the most mundane tasks, like painting the upstairs bedrooms, cleaning out the garage, or sweeping the basement, more enjoyable. Then he stopped coming by, and Robert never mentioned why.
He stood at the bar engaged in conversation with three other men all dressed similarly: white shirts, dangling monochromatic ties that matched their slacks, and dark polished shoes. As Amy approached, one caught sight of her and nudged his co-worker to the left. The middle one smiled, and she returned the greeting, but made it clear she was interested in talking to Michael, who had yet to turn around.
Amy was right behind him when he finally did, and his face jumped into a surprised smile as he threw his hands up. “Amy, what are you doing here?”
“Medical convention. I just flew in late last night.”
“And you’re staying here? That’s great. This is crazy. It’s so good to see you.”
Michael's smile was so warm and genuine that Amy wasn’t sure how to respond. “I—It’s good to see you too.”
“Guys, if you’ll excuse me.” Michael leaned close to Amy. “I’d introduce you, but these really aren’t three guys you’d want to know.”
His co-workers feigned offense and ribbed him under their breath as he escorted Amy to one of the last free tables.
“I’m sorry,” he said, “did you want a drink? ’Cause I’ll go back to the bar and get it. The waitstaff here isn’t the best.”
Amy hadn’t had a drink since before she was pregnant with Tyler. It was one of the points Robert had brought up in counseling—how she had changed and wasn’t fun anymore. “Uh … sure, whatever you’re having.”
Michael squinted and curled his lips. “You’ll drink beer?”
“Yeah, sure.” Amy shrugged.
“Do you want to try mine before getting one?”
Amy took the cold glass and put her lips to the rim. She allowed only a small amount of liquid to pass over her tongue. Her expression quickly soured.
“Good, huh?”
Her nose and eyebrows continued to pinch together, and she forced a nod. “Delicious.”
Michael laughed. “How about I order you something not so hoppy? Are you a minty chocolate girl?”
“I am.”
“Perfect! I’ll be right back.”
Michael had shaved his beard, which had always given him a rugged, man-of-the-wilderness appearance. Now he looked younger, closer to his real age—her age—and his smooth cheekbones and jawline revealed that he had become slimmer than she remembered. Amy was embarrassingly aware that she had put on fifteen pounds since the divorce, and close to twenty since she had last seen Michael. Though a good deal of that was in her chest—which she wasn’t altogether unhappy about—her hips suddenly felt like two shanks of ham stuffed into black stockings.
“I think you’ll find this much more to your liking.” Michael placed a tall, skinny glass on the table that was filled with brown liquid and bright-green swirls.
With the bitter taste of hops still on her tongue, Amy cautiously took a mouse of a sip. “This is … amazing. Is there any alcohol in this?”
“Uh … yeah.”
“It’s like dessert. Why would anyone drink beer when they could have this?”
“Well, it’s not exactly the manliest drink in the world,” Michael continued, doing an impression of a valley girl with a heavy lisp. “Excuse me, bartender, can I have a peppermint chocolate martini, please?”
A wide grin grew on Amy’s face; she had forgotten about Michael’s impressions. “Well, James Bond drinks martinis.”
“That’s true, he does.” Michael chuckled.
“What? No impression?”
“You remember that?”
“A girl doesn’t forget Sean Connery.”
“Oh, boy.” Michael ran his tongue over his top teeth. “I’m not sure if I’m going to be able to pull this off. The hops have messed with my tongue.”
“Wouldn’t be a problem if you drank one of these.” Amy took a long sip of her martini.
“Okay. Here it goes: Miss Moneypenny, do you prefer your martini shaken, or stirred?” Michael quickly shook his head. “Argh, that was horrible.”
“No, it was good.”
“Good? Ugh, that means it was horrible. I’m telling you it’s the hops—the bitter taste on my tongue.”
Amy smiled and took another sip of her sweet martini.
“All right, moving on from the impressions. I was thinking it’s been awhile since we’ve seen each other—”
“Yeah, like, two years,” Amy said in a more accusatory tone than she wanted. Michael didn’t flinch, but she decided to slow down on the martini, nonetheless.
“Has it been that long? I trust you. You do like to keep count.”
“Guilty,” Amy said and hoped that a few more self-effacing comments would absolve her from the negativity.
“Well, I was thinking since it’s been … two years … we could play a little get-to-know-you-slash-catch-up-on-life game.”
Amy was a sucker for word games, puzzles, and trivia. Robert rolled his eyes every time she had suggested they play a game of verbal volley, and yet somehow she was labeled the “unfun one.”
“Okay.” She tried not to sound too interested.
“Okay. Cool. Here’s how it’ll work.” Michael leaned forward and spoke emphatically with one hand while gripping the cold glass of beer with his other. “We each get three questions, but questions have a cost: when the question is asked, the person who has to answer decides how many sips it will cost that person to hear the answer to the question.”
“Wait, is this a drinking game?”
“Well, it can be if you want,” Michael said with the utmost innocence.
Amy shook her head. “Why do I get the feeling you’ve played this before?”
“I swear to you, I have never played this game before.” Michael put his right hand against his chest. “On my honor as a Boy Scout, I just made it up on the way back from the bar.”
Mr. Creative, Amy thought. The game sounded like something that would suddenly break out into a game of beer pong. However, since she never played beer pong, or a drinking game for that matter, why not give it a try? If it proved sophomoric, she would feign exhaustion, thank Michael for the drink, and go back to her room alone.
“You were a Boy Scout?” she asked.
“Is that a question?”
“We’re not playing yet.”
“Fair enough. Technically, yes, I was a Boy Scout.”
“Really, how far did you make it?”
“Oh, I’m an Eagle Scout.” Michael read her expression and answered the question everyone asked before she could speak. “And no, if we were dropped in the middle of the forest, I would not be able to tell you which plants to eat, per se.”
Amy’s shoulders sagged as she overemphasized her disappointment. “Really?”
“But I could build a tent and start a fire.”
“Which would come in handy.”
“I think so, but we’re getting ahead of ourselves. I’m guessing you still want to play.”
“Of course.”
“Okay. Then there’s one last rule: anything can be asked, nothing is off the table, but the question doesn’t have to be answered.”
“Fair enough.”
“However, the cost for not answering a question is you have to finish your drink.”
Though Amy knew that wouldn’t be a problem, as her drink was better than ice cream, she wondered just how woozy and blunt it would make her. She decided it would be better to just answer any question Michael asked no matter how embarrassing and hoped that he would be the gentleman she remembered him to be.
“All rig
ht, let the game begin. Ladies first.”
“Oh, um …” Amy hadn’t even had time to think of a question, and there was so much she wanted to know. “Er …”
“I’m sorry, I kind of threw that at you. If you want, I can go first—”
“That would be great.”
“But passing your turn will cost a sip.”
“You can’t add rules once we’ve started.”
Michael squinted as he considered a retort. “All right, all right, that’s fair.”
“And quit stalling and ask your question.” Amy flushed at her sudden bravado.
Michael chuckled. “All right, here it comes. I hope you’re ready for this …”
He paused and stared into her eyes from across the table. She tried to read his expression and guess what he would ask so she would be prepared, but it was mixed, and she couldn’t discern it.
“How’s Tyler doing?”
“My little man? He’s doing okay.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. He’s with Robert this week, which is”—she took a deep breath—“okay, I guess.”
“Yeah, boys need their dad time.”
Girls needed their dad time too. Amy thought of her father for the second time that evening.
“I miss that little guy,” Michael said. “I think about when I watched him, while you and Robert had some alone time, and I’ll admit, I was scared at a first, ’cause I didn’t know what the heck I was going to do for four hours. I wondered, is it okay if we play video games for four hours? Is Amy going to kill me for this?”
“No, no, no.” Amy laughed. “And it wouldn’t be any worse than how Robert spends time with him.”
After the words had left her mouth, she realized how awful they sounded and did her best to recover. “Besides, you were so great to watch him for us. As you