Page 112 of The Wedding Forecast

‘I’m not in the best mind to have this conversation, I’m sorry, but just listen.’ He sounds more tired and drunk than he did at the beginning of our call.

‘I’m listening.’

‘She wanted me to go back to her apartment.’

‘Okay. Thank you for that extra detail.’

‘I didn’t go.’

‘Why not?’

‘Because.’

‘Because why?’

‘Because I was thinking about you.’

I don’t really know what to say to this.

‘What does that mean?’ I ask.

‘I think about you all of the time.’ He says it roughly, almost hopelessly.

‘I think about you too.’

There’s another long silence. I’m waiting for him to—to what? Offer me something. More than this scrap. Say something magical that will solve our problems. There’s no magic bullet of a solution that he could say, but I want him to give me more than this. More than thinking and missing. Which is selfish and desperate, and what have I given him? Nothing. He didn’t sleep with Rebecca tonight, but there’ll be more Rebeccas, more women. I want to know it all, and I don’t want to know a thing.

‘How many people have you slept with, since me?’ I ask.

‘Three.’

It’s been over four months. So less than one a month. That’s, well, normal I suppose. Probably very contained for him. I don’t know. It’s not like I wanted him to take a vow of celibacy. It’s not like we’re together. There were no promises made. We explicitly made sure of that. We made anti-promises. We were supposed to never talk again.

‘How many people have you been with since me?’ he asks.

I hesitate.

‘Well, I guess it depends,’ I say.

‘On what?’ he says.

‘On what you’ll read into my answer.’

‘I won’t read anything into it.’

‘You will.’

‘What do you read into mine?’

‘That you churn through women.’

He laughs.

‘Hey now. That word is off limits.’

‘Fine. I read nothing into your answer. It sounds fine.’

‘I slept with all three in the weeks after you left.’