This Is Where I Leave You

against her breasts, which seem to be drawing all of the light in the dim basement. “Please, Judd,” she whispers. Then, never taking her eyes from mine, she shimmies her way down the bed, dragging the waistband of my boxers down to my knees. Her tears are warm against my thighs.
    “Please.”
    She pulls up her dress, and I catch a glimpse of a dark thatch of pubic hair just before she grabs hold of my shamefully hard cock like a stick shift and straddles me.
    “Alice. No.”
    And then she slides me into her, and she is drenched in there, probably from all that estrogen she’s taking, and I haven’t had sex in a very long time and as soon as her weight settles on me and she starts to move, I explode inside of her. She squeezes me between her thighs, rocking gently on me, her hand pressed down on my chest for support. After a moment, she tucks her breasts back into her dress and then leans forward to plant a quick, soft kiss on my lips. “Thank you,” she says. “Our little secret.”
    Down below, I slide out of her with a soft, guilty plop.

    2:00 p.m.
    I fall in love twice on the way to meeting Jen over at the Marriott for a drink. The first time it’s a girl walking her dog. She’s wearing white shorts and a tank top that hangs just high enough to reveal a tan swatch of flat belly, and she’s got mussed blond hair and great skin, but beyond that, she just seems cool and laid-back; a dog person, but not one of those intense dog people who French-kiss their dogs and have their pictures in their wallets and buy them birthday cards. Her dog is some kind of terrier, and if I asked her, she would tell me that he’s a mutt, and how the minute she saw him at the shelter, she knew she would be taking him home. She’s laughing into her cell phone, nice white teeth, and even though I can’t hear the laugh, I know if I did, I’d like it. She looks like someone who doesn’t sweat the small stuff, who would be happy going for pizza and a movie or just taking a long walk before going home and climbing into bed. The dog will not sleep with us, because the noise of our lovemaking riles him up - she may be just this side of reserved in a crowd, but in bed her sexuality flows uninhibited. And when we’re done, lying sweaty and spent on the damp, twisted wreckage of our sheets, she entertains me with stories of her experimental lesbian phase in college, before padding naked into her studio to work on the latest book cover she’s been commissioned to design, because she’s a much sought-after graphic artist and she has deadlines to meet. The second woman is in the car next to mine at a traffic light. She’s dark-skinned, with long black hair and eyes the color of coal, and she’s drumming on her steering wheel and singing along to whatever’s on her radio. When she sees me watching, her sheepish grin is warm and direct, and I can tell that she’s one of the nicest people you’ll ever meet, fun and approachable and never a bad word to say about anyone. In fact, the only times we’ll argue is when I’m trying to convince her that someone is a real asshole and she just won’t see it. It will frustrate me, 206but then she’ll smile and I’ll remember why I’m with her, what a good and generous soul she has, and how she makes me a better person and how all of my friends are in love with her, and how good she is to my child, how she sings off -key in the shower, making up silly lyrics when she doesn’t know the real ones, and how, when I’m feeling down, she wraps her arms around me from behind in bed and runs her lips over my shoulders, humming lightly into my skin until I’ve decompressed. Then the light changes and she’s gone, just like the dog-loving graphic artist before her, both of them headed back to sexy, softly lit, uncomplicated lives. And me? I’m mourning my father and having sex with my sister-in-law and falling in love with strangers on the way to see the wife who slept with my boss and is now simultaneously divorcing me and having my baby. I feel like the driver who spends that extra second fussing with his cell phone and looks up just in time to see the front of his car crash through the guardrail and drive off the cliff . 2:17 p.m.
    There are dark shadows under Jen’s bloodshot eyes, and she nervously stirs her glass of ginger ale in the Clubhouse Grille, situated in a recessed portion of the hotel lobby. The only other patrons are a group of flight attendants a few tables over,