What We Talk About When We Talk About Lunch (or: There's Been Too Much Carver Around Here)

“I’m done with him,” she says, rearranging her cigarette lighter on the table so the sun catches its’ surface and spikes into her empty glass. “It’s tiring, and I want to be free to do other things; he’s getting in the way.”

Crossing to the fridge for more ice, all I can muster is “mm hmm.” I have the creeping feeling she is waiting for me to defend him. He and I were friends, after all, in the way back. Classmates in primary school and the like.

“He wants me to be there for him, but when is he ever there for me?” She holds her glass out for the ice offered, swirls it around.

“Like last week when he changed your tire,” I suggest, adding whiskey to our glasses and stretching my legs out onto the empty chair. “Wasn’t that him doing something for you?”

“Yeah, but that was practical, that wasn’t something I wanted, it was something I needed.” She sighs and takes a pull off her glass. “Plus, the sex just isn’t that good.”

“It’s apparently good enough that you keep ending up together. He’s a good man; so what if he isn’t sweet? You can’t have it all.” It doesn’t feel like the right thing to say, but it’s the best I can do. I know she can do better, but she isn’t so sure. It’s going to take time to convince her, if she can even be convinced.

She’s pushing the toast crumbs on the table in front of her into parallel lines, first one way, then the other. “I just don’t have the energy for it anymore. I’m starting to hate him.”

This strikes me as odd, and I sip from my glass to keep from saying so. She spent three whole years pining for him, during which I spent endless conversations listening to his virtues extolled, his actions analyzed, his movements detailed. If she hates him, it’s only that they hate each other, and that’s what keeps them together. The whiskey burns my throat as I light one of her cigarettes, waiting. The smoke curls blue in the sunlight, sweeping in unexpected arcs with the draft from the open window.

“I’m done with him. I’m not doing this anymore.” She sighs again and gulps her drink, chewing the ice as she looks questioningly at me.

I sit and wait, knowing that she will not leave him, knowing that she will speak first.