Page 3...you know, if you wait for a bit before reading, you might have something to do in the john.

Well there was a missed opportunity. If I had told her the truth, then she probably would’ve dumped me. But, because I didn’t tell her the truth, does that mean that I want to stay with her? Man, I do not have time for this sort of existential philosophizing. I have a bag of chips I need to eat.

 

We watch television for a while. Lyndsey tells me about her day. For Lyndsey, her eternity is spent shopping, or sitting in a park, praying at church. But everybody’s eternity is different. I’ve dealt with one dead guy, who’s eternity was spent in a coffee shop downtown. Another who spent it in the television section of a department store. After she’s finished talking, Lyndsey kisses me good-bye. It’s a cold kiss, kind of damp. They didn’t used to be. When we started dating her kisses were hot, passionate, lingering like she was putting everything into those kisses that I wasn’t going to get otherwise. And maybe they still are, maybe they’ve never changed but they feel like it to me.

 

Ashley brought his date home last night. I know this because when I walk to the kitchen, I can see an extra set of shoes by the door. There’s also a faint, lingering odour of flowers and sandalwood, which offsets the usual smell of feet, farts, and mouthwash. I also know he brought his date home because I heard them going at it. I woke up to, “Oh my God, yes, yes!” and “harder, harder, harder!” and some other things that were pretty dirty.

 

As I’m making coffee I can tell that she just walked into the kitchen.

 

“Hi, you’re Rich?”

 

I never know what to say to Ashley’s friends. I mean, should I invest in a witty line that might make her smile, which in turn could lead to us talking, getting to know each other, me liking her as a person, only to discover that I’m never going to see her again. I can’t take that kind of emotional devastation.

 

“I’d say middle class actually. Upper-middle class tops.” I give her the warmest smile I can and she just stares at me.

“I was kidding.”

“I know you were,” she replies, “I just didn’t think it was funny.”

 

Well, I don’t think I’ll be missing this one once she leaves.

 

“I was just kidding,” she laughs and she’s got a nice laugh, it tinkles. With a laugh like that, I’m going to be able to forgive her.  

 

“Would you like some coffee?”

“Yes please.”

“We don’t have cream, is milk okay?”

 

We do have cream, but we only have enough for another cup of coffee and I don’t want to share it with her.  I’m not a horrible person, but I can’t drink coffee without cream.