Coda Books 04 - Strawberries for Dessert (MM)

my third bite, I realized I was starving. I finished the entire bowl and went into the kitchen for seconds. Julia was there, working on the dishes.
    “You really don’t need to do that,” I said as she put more of the casserole in my bowl.
    “I won’t be making a habit of it,” she said as she handed it to me.
    “I’m just here to get you back on your feet.”
    She emerged from the kitchen as I was finishing the second helping of chicken-mush. “Come on,” she said, handing me a beer, and I followed her into the living room. She opened a beer for herself and put the rest of the six-pack on the coffee table in between us. “Tell me what happened,” she said as she sat down in the armchair opposite from my spot on the couch.
    Having to say the words made a lump form in my throat, and I had to count to five three times before I could myself say, “He left me.”
    “What did you do?” she asked.
    “Why do you assume it was my fault?” I asked defensively.
    “Because he’s the one who left.”
    Fair point. I opened the beer and downed half of it at once. It wasn’t even a micro-brew. It was some kind of weak mass-produced crap, and I wondered if a six-pack was enough to help me forget again.
    Just for one more night.
    “Well?” she said, and I sighed.
    “I honestly don’t know. We didn’t fight. Everything was fine.
    More than fine. It was…. It was….” And I had to stop before I started to cry again. I finished the beer while I got myself under control again.
    “He had to leave town,” I finally said, as I opened a second one.
    “So he’s coming back?” she asked in confusion.
    “No. At least, not to me.”
    “I don’t understand.”
    “Neither do I.”
    “Bullshit, Jon. Tell me.”
    I finished the second beer too. I was starting to regret having eaten so much. On an empty stomach, two piss-poor beers might have at least been enough to give me a buzz. “He’s too restless to stay in one place, but he assumes that if he’s traveling, and I’m here, it will end.
    He says I’ll get tired of waiting or that I’ll doubt him.”
    “And so he left?” she asked in disbelief.
    “Yes.” I opened a third beer, telling myself I would make this one last. “I guess he decided it was better to end it now than to stick around and watch it all fall apart.”
    “And there aren’t other options?”
    I almost laughed. “That’s exactly what I asked him.”
    “And?”
    “And he said the only other option was for me to go with him.”
    “Well,” she said with obvious indignation, “why the hell didn’t you?”
    “I can’t afford to live the way he does, Julia.”
    “And what was his answer to that?”
    “He said he would support me.”
    “So what exactly is the problem, Jon?”
    “The problem,” I said in annoyance, “is that it’s absurd! Just because he has money, I’m supposed to swallow my pride and follow him around like some kind of pet?”
    “So let me get this straight. He loves you so much that he offered to support you, just so the two of you could be together.”
    “I guess so. But—”
    “But you’re too proud to say yes.”
    “How could I even face myself in the mirror every morning?”
    “Is it really so disgraceful,” she asked with a surprising amount of venom in her voice, “to be supported by somebody who loves you?”
    “To be unwilling to support yourself when you’re perfectly capable? Yes, it’s disgraceful. And absolutely humiliating.”
    She slammed her beer down on the coffee table and stood up.
    “Fine!” She started looking around on the floor for her shoes.
    “Why are you mad?”
    “I had no idea you thought so little of me, Jon!” she said, not looking at me. Her sandals had somehow ended up under her chair, and she bent down to retrieve them.
    “You? I thought we were talking about me!”
    “My husband chooses to support me financially. Does that make me a disgrace, too, Jon? Should I feel humiliated?”
    Oh shit. I couldn’t believe it hadn’t occurred to me that she would take my words personally. I felt like there was a giant cliff right beneath my feet and I was wobbling, trying to figure out which way I had to lean to avoid falling off. The problem was she wasn’t giving me enough time. “That’s different, Julia.”
    She turned to face me. She had one sandal on, and the second one in her hand. “Why?”
    “Because you’re a woman.”
    I knew immediately, based on the look on her face, that that was the way wrong