Textual Encounters: 2 (10 page)

Or
all those other times when you refused to see me. You’ve left me feeling abandoned and unloved, Katie.

9:19pm:

But
Rachel, she was always there for me. Even though she’s married, I know she loves me.

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9:19pm:

You love her, don’t you? And fuck her, too. You motherfucking pig, you still fuck her
!?

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Jake

9:20pm

Yes I love her – THERE, are you happy? But it’s not a romance. It’s just sex. And holding. And someone who understands me and my fucked up head.

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9:21pm:

Jake, you don’t fuck your friends. And you can pay a psychiatrist to understand your fucked up head.
Even I can understand your fucked up head, it’s not that fucked up. What’s wrong with you?

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Jake

9:22pm:

Trust me when I say I DO NOT LOVE Rachel like that. She’s a good piece of ass when nothing else is there, when YOU are not there. Because that’s all I want, Katie. YOU. But Rachel beats jerking off. She’s a warm body when I need it the most. Rachel is my fuck-buddy when I hit rock-bottom.

9:28pm:

You think
I’d still be fucking her if she weren’t married? If I didn’t know her husband takes good care of her? Good enough care that leaving him mean be sacrificing the life and lifestyle she has grown accustomed to? Hell no. I KNOW that I’m just as much a piece of ass for her as she is for me. There is NO love there. None.

9:29pm:

My love is reserved for you, Katie. If you’d only accept it…

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9:31pm:

And Michelle?

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Jake

9:33pm:

Like I said, she’s a girl that used to work with Christine. I met her at a bar about six months ago, maybe less. We text occasionally, have lunch. She’s married. She joined my company about a month ago and she’s the most professional and honest accountant I know. She’s probably going to be running the bank someday.

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9:34pm:

So
she keeps tabs on Christine for you?

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Jake

9:35pm:

I promised honesty, right? So I’ll admit that if anyone knows where she is, I figure it could be Michelle. So yes we talk about Christine.

9:35pm:

But even Michelle hasn’t heard from her. Christine has literally disappeared. Vanished.

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9:46pm:

And now for the biggest fish of them all. Christine. Tell me about her. About your textual encounters with this woman you can’t let go of.

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Jake

9:47pm:

Clever, Katie. But there haven’t been any. Not since she disappeared.

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9:52pm:

I thought we were being honest here, Jake. What kind of shit do
you write to her while she’s been ignoring your texts and messages?

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Jake

9:54pm:

Relax, I AM being honest. I’m telling you everything. I send her the occasional text to see if she’s around. To see if she’s alive.

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9:55pm:

And
that’s the truth? If so, when’s the last time you texted her?

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Jake

9:56pm:

What’s really going on here, Katie? Why does it feel like my world is falling apart? And like I have no control over it?

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9:57pm:

You’ve made your bed, Jake. Now it’s time to sleep in it.

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Jake

9:57pm:

What does that mean?
Will you rub my back to help me fall asleep?

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9:57pm:

Tell me about Christine
, Funny Man.

10:07pm:

That’s what I thought.

10:08pm:

Ass. Hole.

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The scent of Will’s fancy soap wafts over me and I tense up immediately. By now sunlight fills the room and I can’t rely on a reflection in the large window overlooking the early city. But I can tell that he’s standing behind me, I can hear his breaths and almost feel his body heat. And I can tell that he notices my uneasiness because he steps back, his polished shoes clacking on the floor and his freshly pressed custom suit rippling like paper.

“Are you okay?” he asks.

I don’t turn around because the tears in my eyes have no reason to be there. Except to me, they do. They burn from the words I just read about how Jake feels about me.
I DO NOT LOVE Rachel like that. She’s a good piece of ass when nothing else is there…

Will retreats to the kitchen and I wonder if Maria has arrived for the day already. If so, I didn’t hear her sneak in.

“Rachel?” Will calls from the kitchen. “You okay?”

At last, I breathe.

“Yes, I’m fine.” I wipe my eyes.
She’s a warm body when I need it the most. Rachel is my fuck-buddy when I hit rock-bottom.
“Have a nice day.”

His footsteps creep back into the living room where I’m sitting. I slip my trembling hands underneath my thighs to hide them from Will.

“Goodbye, Rachel.” He kisses the top of my head and lets his lips linger a lot longer than they should for a normal
Have a nice day
kiss. And then there’s the matter of his choice of words – Goodbye.

What does that mean? Or in text-speak, WTF?

He touches my shoulder one last time before leaving the Penthouse for his day, which is linked to my iPhone’s calendar so I’ll know just how late he will be tonight. And if something slipped through the cracks and didn’t make the calendar, Maria will know. There’s no reason for us to be out of sync.

But I also know that I have an early lunch date this morning. With Katie. The woman that Jake loves. More than he loves me, according to his texts.

* * *

Sitting at the table where I brought Jake for dinner that Friday night so long ago, my stomach sinks at the memory of him sitting him across from me. Even though Will and I have eaten at this restaurant a gazillion times since Jake and I reconnected, it’s only Jake that I think about whenever I’m here.

All I think about is Jake.

Still.

Even after he broke my heart by texting those horrible things about me to Katie.

I wonder how I will respond to this younger woman once she shows up. Will I hate her immediately and want to rip her eyes out? Or will I give her a chance to say her piece, to tell me why she wanted to meet to me – although I have a fairly strong suspicion that she will ask me to disappear from Jake’s life forever. At this point, I can’t say he is worth fighting for, not after what he said about me…

A waitress appears and asks if I would like to order something to drink while waiting for my guest. I ask for a Perrier with lime and she walks off at a leisurely pace. There is nothing hurried about this restaurant at all. That Friday night, right before my wedding to Will, Jake and I spent hours here after we finished our meal. We chatted, laughed, flirted without the pressure of having to vacate our seats so that someone waiting in line could take them and order the expensive entrees and overpriced cocktails. That night, I felt like the world belonged to us.

By the time the Perrier arrives, Katie is now five minutes late. I reach for the Samsung Galaxy for something to do, a nervous habit of mine whenever I’m stuck waiting for someone else to show up. And although I decided earlier that I wouldn’t read anymore of these texts until
after
talking to Katie, I find myself swiping the screen and accessing jAppe anyway. I’m not addicted; I just want to know what else happens between Katie and Jake.

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Jake

4:23am:

I’m sorry, Katie. I couldn’t stand to deal with this anymore, so I went to bed. My head hurt and I couldn’t breathe. My body’s reaction to the threat of losing you was devastating. I completely shut down. And this morning, I’m still not fully recovered.

4:24am:

You want to know about Christine,
so I’ll tell you. I’ll tell you everything because I LOVE you. I don’t want any secrets between us. I don’t expect you to speak with me after this, but if it’s the truth you want, it’s the truth I’ll give you. OK? So here goes…

4:26am:

I already told you about her crazy husband, right?
And you know that Christine and I were supposed to meet the day that I met you. So the worry is always that something has happened to her. Something bad. I keep looking for stories about missing people who match her description and age.

4:28am:

And then across the street, this Eduard
Moreno guy gets beaten to death and stuffed in the garbage chute of his building. I know there’s probably no relationship, but it was a week or so before this murder that I swore I heard Christine’s ex’s voice in the lobby of my building. So it’s a little messed up, that’s all.

4:30am:

After you left the other night, I took another stab at trying to connect with her. I know she’s getting my messages
and reading them on her iPhone, but for some reason she stood me up that day and still isn’t responding. I don’t know what it all means so – and this is the part that you will NOT like – I took a different approach than the usual “I’m thinking of you and worrying about you, please write back soon” that I normally send.

4:32am:

This time around, I decided to tell her that I love her and
still think of her and that my life has not been the same or even worthwhile without her. I borrowed some sappy shit from that book by Oliver Weaver that I’m reading, and just poured it on.

4:33am:

Something isn’t quite right. I can feel it and although I am completely in love with YOU, I’m still worried about Christine. I know that you’ll say
she left me. I’ve come to grips with that reality – maybe she didn’t want to hurt my feelings with a long and drawn-out break-up, maybe she fell in love with someone else, maybe she just went back to her crazy husband. I’ve accepted all of the possibilities. But the reality is that I KNOW something’s wrong.

4:34am:

I am not in love with her anymore. Every ounce of my heart and mind tell me that Christine is a bad idea. She will ruin me.

4:35am:

But you? Katie, you have a huge capacity to love me. You’re independent, smart, funny and beautiful. Just as I know the sun will go down tonight and come up tomorrow morning, I know more than anything else I have ever known that you can love me the way that I want to be loved. To me, you are everything. You are everything that makes me happy. You are my happy.

4:36am:

You will always be
everything to me. Get it? I can’t breathe without you, Katie. Please write back so I can continue breathing.

3:12pm:

I thought I’d take a shot
and write to you. One of the VP’s at the office has a summer home in Cape Cod. A few of the senior guys and their wives are heading up for a party and overnight stay this weekend. There’s something like 12 bedrooms at this place. If you’re up for some time away, I would love for you to come as my guest.