Free Between Husbands and Friends by Nancy Thayer

critiquing each other’s work. We scrutinize photos, go over the copy one more time for redundancies.
    “By George, I think we’ve got it,” I say after a while. “Do you want to run it by Mrs. Mackey?”
    “You do it. She likes you better.”
    “All right.” I look at my calendar. “I’ll call and set up an appointment with her tomorrow. Then I’m giving it all to you, right?” I put my arms behind my head and give my back a good stretch. It’s a little after noon. We drift out of my study. “Want some iced tea?”
    “Sure. So you guys leave for Nantucket August first?”
    “Absolutely. We’ve had our ferry reservations since January.”
    In the kitchen I take down two tall narrow glasses, fill them with ice, take a pitcher from the refrigerator. The ice cracks and snaps as the amber liquid surrounds it.
    “What about the posters for the church fair?”
    “You don’t need me for that.” I hand him a glass. “I’ve got fresh mint in the backyard.”
    We step outside. I’m surprised at how dense the heat is. Stan sits on the back step. I pick some mint, murmuring, “Thank you, Mrs. McIntyre,” rinse the pungent green leaves under the outside faucet, slip them into our glasses, then settle down next to Stan. I’m wearing a T-shirt and shorts and I stretch out my legs in the sun.
    “Aren’t you hot in those jeans?”
    “No. They’re really cool, I mean temperature-wise. Sort of like a protective bell of air.”
    I doubt this. Stan is just less aware of things like heat and cold. And wouldn’t all that metal on his face attract the heat?
    “Has Ciara found a job?”
    “Yeah, out in the Berkshires. She’s threatening to go there.”
    “Unless?”
    “Unless we get engaged or something.” He sounds dismal, a doomed man.
    “Max and I got married at twenty-three.”
    “Yeah, well, it’s all right for some people.”
    “Honestly, Stan! Ciara’s a beautiful, intelligent, wonderful young woman. She’s got a great sense of humor and she adores you.”
    “It just seems like it would be
The End.
”
    “Well, it would be, of part of your life. But it would be
The Beginning
of a new phase of life.”
    “I like things the way they are.”
    “Don’t you want children?”
    “God, not yet.” He sips his tea. “I’m having too much fun. I’m just barely an adult.” He sighs. “You probably always wanted kids.”
    “I did. But Max did, too, Stan. It’s not just a woman’s thing. Max loves his kids.”
    “I know he’s a great father. Coaching sports and all that stuff. I just don’t think I could do it. Would want to do it.”
    “Hey, there are all kinds of fathers. You wouldn’t have to coach sports. But you could play awesome computer games with your children.”
    Stan thinks about this. “Maybe so. Kids have faster reflexes than adults.”
    “Think how smart any child of yours and Ciara’s would be,” I say, and then my heart explodes in my chest. It’s like a bomb going off. It knocks against my rib cage so loudly I’m sure Stan can hear it. The blue sky, the hot day, the green grass, Stan’s baggy denims all seem to contract and recede into a kind of halo around me.
    My iced tea lies on the ground, a curling worm of spilled liquid staining the grass a darker green, the ice cubes glittering in the sunlight. My hands push against my chest. I’m trying to squeeze air out, I’m trying to hold my heart in.
    “Lucy?”
    Stan’s face looms up close to mine.
    “Can’t breathe,” I say.
    “I’ll call an ambulance.”
    “No!” I grab his arm. “Just sit here with me.” His arm is pleasantly unfamiliar to my palm, longer and wider than my children’s, narrower than my husband’s, and furry, almostgorillalike.
    “Your hand is freezing,” Stan says.
    “I was holding a glass of iced tea,” I reply reasonably, and my heart slows and the rhythm of my breath becomes more regular. I take my hand from Stan’s arm. “I’m okay now.”
    “What happened?”
    Bending over, I