Tom Perrotta - Nine Inches

“Wow,” he said. “You look great.”

“Thanks.” She studied him for a moment, her eyes narrowing with maternal concern. “You, too.”

He knew she was lying. Bachelor life had been hard on him. He’d put on fifteen pounds — too many burritos, too much beer — and hadn’t spent nearly enough time outdoors. His skin was pasty, and he’d grown a salt-and-pepper soul patch that Mike liked a lot, but that had earned him a lot of good-natured ribbing at the Health Plan. His colleagues called him Jazzman and Dr. Beatnik and asked if they could borrow his bongo drum.

“I gotta lose some weight,” he said. “I eat too much junk.”

“You should hire a personal trainer,” she suggested. “That’s the only thing that worked for me.”

“Trainers are pretty expensive. I don’t think I can afford one.”

If Jackie heard the implicit criticism — after all, it was Sims’s money that had paid for her newly toned physique, not to mention the haircut and the pretty dress — she chose to ignore it.

“It’s worth it, Rick. Not just for your appearance, you know? Just for the way you feel about yourself. About the whole world. It’s makes such a difference if you feel good about yourself.”

Sims couldn’t stop staring at her lips. They seemed so much fuller and more sensual than he remembered. Maybe it was the lipstick, he thought. She hadn’t worn lipstick for years.

“I’ve been playing a lot of guitar,” he said. “Getting pretty good, actually. I practice every night. It’s kinda what’s keeping me sane.”

“That’s great,” she said, opening her menu. “It’s good to have a hobby.”

Sims hated that word — hobby. Music wasn’t a hobby . It was a basic human activity, as essential as language or religion, though he didn’t imagine that Jackie saw it like that. Music had never meant much to her, not even when she was young. As far as Sims knew, she’d never had a favorite band, only went to concerts when she was dragged along by school friends or guys she was dating. It had been a rift between them, the fact that he had a musical life and she didn’t.

“How are the kids?” he asked. “Everything okay at school?”

“Jason’s doing fine, but Trevor’s struggling with the math, as usual. I think he’s gonna need a tutor.”

Sims nodded grimly, adding another fifty or a hundred bucks a week to his mental tally. But what could you do? If the kid needed a tutor, he needed a tutor.

“What about you?” he said. “Anything new?”

“Well…” She hesitated for moment. “I think I’m gonna start studying for my real estate license.”

“Really?”

“I probably won’t make a lot of money at first, but there’s a lot of potential in the long run. Especially if the market picks up.”

“Hey, that’s great. I bet you’ll be good at that.”

The waitress came and took their orders. Sims kept staring at Jackie as she pored over the menu. She reminded him of someone, though he wasn’t exactly sure of whom. But then she smiled and said she’d like the scallops, and suddenly it was clear: the new Jackie reminded him of the Jackie he’d met ten years ago, the woman he’d fallen in love with and proposed to on the Staten Island Ferry. It was like she’d gone up to the attic and taken her old self out of storage, not just the face and the body, but that glow, that fresh, lovely glow that a woman gets when she knows she’s loved and desired. Sims hadn’t seen that glow for a long time.

She must have been reading his mind because she smiled sadly when the waitress left and said there was something else she needed to tell him, a pretty big thing, actually: she’d been seeing someone for the past three months, a high school assistant principal named Paul Gutierrez, and they’d just gotten engaged over the weekend. She held up her left hand so he could see the diamond ring, right there where Sims’s bigger diamond had once glittered.

“Paul’s a sweet guy,” she told him. “And the boys really like him.”

“Wow.” Sims kept his eyes on her finger. It was a lot easier than looking at her face. “That was quick.”

“When you’re our age, there’s not much reason to wait.”

“Wow,” he said again. “How the fuck did that happen?”

SIMS TOOK the news pretty hard. It was bad enough to think about Jackie sleeping with another man, but what killed him was the idea of this Paul guy living in his house, raising his kids. It was a weird, demoralizing feeling, knowing that this stranger would be helping Jason and Trevor with their homework, dropping them off at school, picking them up from soccer practice. Paul would play catch with them in the yard and take them on beach vacations, where they’d body surf and collect shells and little pieces of colored glass, and in the evening he’d take them out for pizza and ice cream. Maybe he’d take them on a day trip to the amusement park, where he’d ride the roller coaster, screaming along with the boys, and years later they’d all think back to that vacation and remember how great it was, how much they’d felt like a real family.

Mike’s ex-wife had a boyfriend of her own, so he knew exactly what Sims was going through.

“His name is Denny .” Mike shook his head, as if the name were too much to bear. “The kids talk about him all the time. Denny this, Denny that. Denny drives a Honda Element. That’s his big claim to fame.”

“This guy Paul, I’m sure he’s perfectly nice. But I just want to beat the crap out of him, you know? Just on principle.”

Mike scowled approvingly, as if watching a mental movie of the beatdown.

“Denny’s a graphic designer. But he plays rugby for fun. Who the fuck plays rugby ?”

The only consolation for Sims was financial. He wasn’t sure how much money an assistant principal made, but he figured it had to be a pretty decent amount, which meant that Jackie and the boys would be able to maintain the standard of living they were accustomed to without relying solely on Sims. And who knew? Maybe Jackie would get her real estate career off the ground one of these days. That would give him even more breathing room if he ever decided to make a career change. It was just too stressful being a pediatrician, his stomach clenching up every time he examined a sick kid, not knowing which of his patients was the next Kayla Ferguson, the one holding the unlucky ticket. He just wanted to do something else for a while, a job that didn’t involve telling a mother that her child was going to die.

What he really wanted to do was start a blues band with Mike, find a drummer and a bassist, play a few local gigs, and see where it led. They’d been talking about it for a while, and Mike had been putting out feelers, checking around with some of his musician buddies to see if anyone was available. In the meantime, they’d been working hard on some songs, mostly covers, but a couple of originals, too, music by Mike, lyrics by Sims.

When they knew they were ready, they went into the Inner Sanctum, plugged in their guitars, and made a cell-phone video of “Born Under a Bad Sign,” playing along with a backing track Mike had recorded on his laptop. They did six takes before they nailed it, Sims holding down the rhythm without a hitch, Mike singing with bitter conviction and adding some sizzling lead guitar. When they were finished, they bumped fists and uploaded their file to YouTube. After that, there was nothing to do but sit back, crack open a cold one, and wait for someone to notice. On the whole, Sims was proud and hopeful — he thought they’d done an excellent job with the song — but there was a faint current of dread running beneath his optimism, because good things turned to shit all the time, and you couldn’t always see it coming.