WHEN WE GOT home from the store, Amanda started cooking this kale dish, putting all sorts of spices in it. The house smelled awful, like someone was trying to fertilize the lawn with a bunch of ginger. I had to hide in the basement until dinner was ready just to avoid the smell. I told Amanda I was going to watch some TV. Really, I wanted to see if Jennifer had messaged me. She hadn’t, but then again, I hadn’t messaged her since we were at the store, when she suggested we video chat.

I sat on the couch, a million thoughts racing through my head. I’d never had this problem before. I realize saying that makes me sound like the type of guy who lacked the ability to reflect on things, but up until then, I hadn’t had much to reflect on. Normally, I’d have a couple of drinks, plop down on the couch, and relax to SportsCenter, but that night, I couldn’t stop thinking about stuff—namely Amanda, Jennifer, and the choices I’d made in my life. It made me want a beer or a large whiskey, anything to silence the endless questions.

It’d only been a couple of hours since I stopped drinking, and the basement was a dangerous place for me. A few years back, I’d built a bar down there for entertaining—that’s what I told Amanda, but really it was so I could get drunk in peace. At the time, I stocked it with all sorts of stuff. I could have made whatever drink I wanted. I gripped my phone, knowing I had to keep it together. But that didn’t stop the bar from calling to me. I felt this pull toward it. My head would turn toward the bar every few seconds, and a voice inside me would say something like It’s just one drink or It’s all right, you deserve it. Stuff like that. And I did deserve it. I’d worked hard as shit that day.

I’d like to say I was strong, that the thought of wanting to look as good as possible when I finally video chatted with Jennifer gave me the strength to stay seated. But the truth is, I stood up and walked over to the bar. I didn’t get behind it or anything. I just stood in front of it and leaned in, as though the slab of marble was the only thing keeping me from drinking.

As I stood there, I realized I had a choice: I could go back to the way things were, drinking all the time, or I could ride out this urge I was feeling in hopes that it would pass. And that’s what I did. I rode it out. I should have put all the booze in a box and taken it straight to the garage, but I told myself having it nearby and resisting the urge to drink would make me stronger in the long run. But that was a lie. Secretly, I was hoping I’d get this thing under control and be able to drink again eventually. I knew it was a foolish thought, but that’s where my head was at the time.

I went back to the couch and flipped through the channels. I was still agitated, and each show was just a bunch of noise that pissed me off further. But my other option was to leave the basement and risk Amanda saying something to piss me off. I was better off where I was.

My dad used to spend time in his basement. He had his own room where he watched all the Indiana games and drank beer by himself. He said he needed some personal time after working so hard to put food on the table. After my folks split up, he told me the real reason he had spent so much time in the basement was to get away from my mom.

My mom used to yell at him all the time, usually about stuff that seemed random to me. One night, we were eating dinner—this was shortly before they split up—and she was talking about a trip my dad had planned for his staff, an employee appreciation day of sorts.

“So am I invited?” my mom asked.

“Staff only,” my dad said between bites of pepperoni pizza.

“Your accountant, Lisa—is she going?”

“She’s staff.”

“And you’re going to be at the water park all day?”

“It’s a staff outing. That’s the idea.”

“What about the hotel across the street?”

“Jesus.” My dad threw up his hands. “We just had a banner year. You know how many Dakotas we sold? All I want to do is do something nice for my staff, and you assume I’m going to do something, I don’t know—”

“Something nice for your staff?” my mom said, jabbing her pizza crust at my dad.

I started laughing. I thought it was supposed to be a joke, even though I wasn’t sure what the joke was. My mom wasn’t laughing, I knew that much.

“You think I want to do this?” my dad asked. “You think I want to spend this money? Hell no! But these guys have been working their tails off, and not just for me, but for you too. How do you think I keep the lights on?”

“And Lisa in accounting?”

“There are bills that need to be paid, payroll, bonuses. Someone’s gotta keep the IRS off our backs.”

“Don’t you need a degree in accounting to actually do accounting?”

“Lisa has a degree.”

“I seem to remember Phyllis telling me Lisa got her degree in manicuring nails from the adult education center.”

“There’s nothing wrong with wanting to educate yourself. Maybe you should try it sometime.”

When my dad said this, he knew he’d made a mistake. He didn’t look at my mom. Instead, he just stared at the grease pooling on a piece of pepperoni.

My mom stood up and went into the living room. She pulled a receipt out of her purse. When she walked back into the kitchen, she slapped it down next to my dad. I leaned over and tried to read it. All I could see was the logo for a cheap motel out on I-45.

“Your nails look really nice, by the way,” my mom said to him.

My dad canceled the trip to the water park and took his staff and their families to Marengo Cave. My mom made sure to hold his hand the entire time we were stumbling through pitch-black darkness.

My folks split up shortly after that. I went to live with my mom and had to hear her complain about my dad the whole time. And on my weekends with my dad, he stayed in the basement while I hung out by myself watching TV. They found him in his basement when he died, sitting in his chair with an open beer on the side table next to him. Years later, I realized my dad had been having an affair, and I swore I’d never cheat. I saw how it hurt my mom, and I didn’t want to do that to anyone.

I checked my phone again, thinking about what I’d do if things worked out between me and Jennifer. I’d have to break up with Amanda, of course, and I could never tell her I found someone else. I’d have to make up an excuse, like “we’re growing apart” or “we’re just becoming two different people” or “you’re trying to change me into something I’m not.” Then I’d have to find a way to get Jennifer to move back to Indiana. It wouldn’t be too hard. Her parents lived here. I was sure she’d want to be closer to them. And she could get a job at a hospital here.

I could never leave Bloomington. I had too much going on here with the car dealerships and everything. Plus, I was a small-town guy. I liked that I could go into a grocery store and connect with a client and help them out. I wouldn’t have that luxury in a big city.

Amanda called down from upstairs to tell me dinner was ready. I pretended not to hear her at first, but on the third time, I had to go up and eat some overcooked lettuce. I chewed and chewed and chewed the kale. It was stringy and bland and wet. It was like Amanda had picked it out of a creek before frying it up, then mixed it with some tempeh, those tasteless little cubes. I made a plan to go out to Burt’s Big Beef and hit up their value menu. I’d just have to think up an excuse.

“You seem to be enjoying your garlic kale.” Amanda smiled, proud at not poisoning me.

“It’s interesting,” I said. The thought of eating another bite made me want to fling a chunk of it at the window. But I didn’t. I put it in my mouth and chewed it a thousand times.

“Thanks for doing this,” Amanda said.

“Doing what?”

“Agreeing to go on this diet with me. I’ve been thinking about the future a lot—our future—and I just want us to be healthy and grow old together.”

“Sure. Sounds good.” What else could I have said at that point? Something like, I’ve been thinking about the future too, and it doesn’t involve you or dinosaur kale? I couldn’t have said that. It would have broken her heart.

“You want to hear something funny?” Amanda asked.

“Sure.”

“You know how they’re building that new community out on Cypress Lane?”

“I guess.”

“Well, I was out there yesterday doing a tour of the homes, and some construction worker whistled at me.” She blushed as she said this.

“I didn’t think catcalling was a thing anymore.”

“He said, ‘Hey, momma, looking good.’”

“You gonna leave me for a construction worker?” I smirked.

“Dennis Drysdale!”

“You liked it, didn’t you?”

“Having someone objectify me like that? Of course not.”

“You did,” I said. “Look at you; your face is getting all red.”

“If anything, I’m offended that men still feel they can call out to women like that.”

“You want me to catcall you like that?” I raised my eyebrows suggestively a couple of times.

“What?”

“Hey, baby. You’re making that kale look good.”

“Dennis, stop it.”

“How’s about you come over here and let me Swiss your chard?”

“Now you’re not even making sense.”

“I thought this is what you liked.”

“Stop it. You ruined a perfectly innocent moment.” She got up and went to the sink and poured herself some more water. I could tell she was frustrated. She’d been feeling good because some random guy found her attractive, and I made a joke of it. But, whatever. I didn’t really care how she felt at that point.

“Can I ask you something?” she said.

“What’s up?” Amanda never asked me for anything, so when she did, I got the feeling I was in for it.

“What’s going on with you? It’s like you’re not here right now.”

“What do you mean? I’m sitting here at the table, aren’t I?”

“I mean in general. Are you sure you’re not mad about anything?”

“What do I have to be mad about?”

“I don’t know. It seems like you’ve been cranky all day. Every time I try to talk to you, you’re checking your phone.”

Shit. She’d noticed.

“Sometimes I need to check my phone.”

“But you’ve been checking it a lot lately, more than normal.”

“I get emails. We got these holiday sales coming up.” This was at the beginning of February, just before our big President’s Day sale. “Just because I’m not in the office doesn’t mean I’m off the clock.”

“If there’s something you need to talk about, you know you can talk to me.”

What was there to talk about? That I’d rather talk to someone else? Is that what she wanted to hear?

“What’s there to talk about?” I asked.

“I don’t know. You tell me.” She was getting upset now. I felt like I had to give her something.

“It’s all this Harry business,” I said. “I just don’t see why you have to get involved with everything.”

“Are you jealous?” Amanda grinned. “Dennis Drysdale, you’re jealous of Harry.”

“That’s not it.”

“It is. You think I still love him, don’t you?” Amanda laughed a little, then got all serious and put her hand on top of mine. “You know you have nothing to worry about.”

“Then why are you still getting involved in his business?” I asked, happy to shift the focus of the conversation, even if it was bullshit and would make Amanda think I was insecure.

“You know how Sarah gets. She’s so protective. I’d never hear the end of it if something happened to him and I could have stopped it. But you have nothing to worry about. You know I love you.”

“I just see the way he looks at you, like you’re still his wife.”

“He’s stuck in the past,” Amanda said. “One day, he’ll move on.”

“Did you ever think, maybe the reason he acts the way he does is to get your attention?”

“If he wanted my attention when we were married, he wouldn’t have spent all his time in the basement.”

It hit me then. She was worried I was turning into Harry, but instead of distancing myself by hiding in the basement working on science stuff, I was doing it by being on my phone.

“Baby,” I said, “you know you got nothing to worry about.”

“I know,” she said. “You’re a completely different person than Harry. You’re dependable.”

I felt guilty for a second. I was thinking about leaving Amanda for someone I hadn’t spoken to in almost twenty years, and here she was worried about me, loving me. I gave her a hug and put the dishes away.

“I’m glad someone around here sees me for who I am,” I said.

“Can you help me with something?” she asked, standing by the freezer. “This ice cream is too frozen. I can’t scoop it out.”

“Let me see what I can do.” I scooped out two large scoops of vegan cookie dough ice cream Amanda must have bought without me realizing it. We ate dessert in front of the TV, watching a cooking show where all the contestants undercooked their entrées.