The Blessings of the Animals_A Novel

CHAPTER Seven

OLIVE

OLIVE SIPPED HER MOCHA AND WONDERED HOW SHE’D DO it. How she’d break up with Nick. They were speeding along I-75 toward Cincinnati, and she dreaded another gathering of his friends with every muscle in her body. His goddamn married friends. There wasn’t a single one of them not married.
Nick hummed and tapped his fingers on the steering wheel. Why was he so damn happy today?
Olive tried not to hear her mother’s grating voice in her head: “Well, why shouldn’t he be happy? He’s sitting pretty, isn’t he? Why should he buy the cow when he gets all his goddamn milk for free?”
Cow? F*ck you, Ma.
Olive had shut her up once with, “Why should I buy the whole pig when all I want is the sausage?”
Ma had scowled. Then she’d slapped Olive on the shoulder: “The sausage. That’s good.”
But it wasn’t true. Olive had to pretend it was. Just like she’d have to pretend she was okay with not being engaged at yet another gathering of Nick’s smug married friends. Did they pity her, showing up year after year, still with a bare left hand?
She looked at him, driving along, singing now—off key—and hated him. She didn’t even want to marry him. If he asked her now, right this second, she’d say no.
“You’re quiet today,” he said. He put his right hand on her left knee and squeezed it.
Olive did the right thing. She put both her hands on his and smiled at him. “Just thinking,” she said, making sure her tone was light, her voice pleasant.
“About?”
Should she just tell him the truth? Should she just say, I was sitting here wondering if you’re ever going to f*cking marry me or if you think I’m the biggest goddamn patsy you ever met. But she didn’t. She made her voice all flirty and said, “You.”
“Unpure?” Nick teased. “Your thoughts about me?”
“Always.”
He laughed. She couldn’t tell the truth because that went against the rules. Women had to be chosen. Men got to do the choosing, but women had to wait for someone to want them.
At a Girl’s Night Out, Aurora had asked her once, “Why don’t you propose to Nick?”
But the idea was preposterous. That wasn’t how it was supposed to happen.
Sometimes Aurora and Helen got on her nerves. Like Helen had any room to talk, since she was married. Helen asked, “What difference does it make? You love Nick, right?”
“Of course I do,” Olive had said.
“You’re happy, you’re having fun. How do you think marriage is going to change that?”
Olive hated questions like that, especially from a married woman, for Christ’s sake. Marriage changed everything. It would say to the world that Olive was worthy, that she was partnered in a life that expected every grownup to be partnered. It said she was a success. Complete.
And yes, yes, yes, of course she could agree with Aurora, who’d said, “There are many paths to committed and satisfying relationships. Not just marriage.” But deep in Olive’s guts, there was something about the public, societal declaration of permanence she needed in order to consider a relationship “real.” Not being married—or at least engaged—made her feel fundamentally unloved, unworthy, and unnecessary. No matter how great the sex was.
Really, did Nick think she would just keep on dating him indefinitely? She wanted to be married. She wanted to have children. If that’s not what he wanted, it was time to move on. She’d tell him on the way home.
She leaned her forehead against the glass and watched the shopping malls zipping by. Christ, that would be awful. Starting again. Dating. There was nothing so demeaning as being a single woman over forty. She’d read desperation was a turnoff, but here she’d invested nearly three years acting as laid-back as she could—and for what?
Nick was grinning. Just pleased as f*cking punch. Not a care in the world. Did she even like him? They had nothing in common. She didn’t speak Latin. Or any foreign language, except a bit of Italian. He spoke Italian better than she did. He spoke five languages. He liked grammar and golfing and the goddamn opera. She liked sudoku and yoga and jazz clubs.
But she also liked having someone. She liked holding his hand when they went for coffee. She liked being in a pair.
Even if they weren’t a match.