Free The Walkaway by Scott Phillips

thing was the deep, gnawing suspicion she had that she knew where he was headed, and the impossibility of telling anyone about it, even Sidney. Especially Sidney.
    Eric was roused from a deep but unsatisfying sleep by a hand on his shoulder and an angry voice an inch from his ear.
    “Get up . Goddamn it. Come on, I have to get to work. Now get up or I’ll call your wife.”
    It was the woman from the night before, wearing a slip and nothing underneath, and he reached his hand up between her thighs, warm blood beginning to lengthen his sticky organ. She slapped her hand around his wrist.
    “ Don’t. I’m late as it is.”
    “You got time for a quick one.”
    “Not even as quick as last night. Come on, out of bed. Get your clothes on.”
    Pretending he hadn’t caught the insult he lay back on the pillow, hands behind his head, and beamed at her as she ran around the room putting on her clothes.
    “Listen, asshole, this is how fucking late I am. I am not taking a shower. I have never, in eight years at this job, gone to work without taking a shower.”
    She had on her underwear and was buttoning her blouse at this point, and he grabbed her by the wrist as she passed by on the way to her dresser and tried to pull her back down onto the bed. She yanked the hand away effortlessly and with the other gave him a very solid slap across the cheek.
    “It’s seven-thirty. I have a shitload of stuff to do today and a bitch of a hangover.”
    He looked her up and down in wonderment as she adjusted her skirt, the left side of his face still hot from the impact of her open palm. She didn’t look hung over, looked in fact far better than anybody had any business looking at this hour of the morning with or without a hangover.
    “Where’re my clothes?” he asked, beginning to sense defeat. He saw his jockeys lying in the corner of the room.
    “They’re in a path from the front door to here.”
    “Look. Why don’t you take a sick day, we’ll knock around and have a few laughs?”
    She glared at him like a drill sergeant. “If you ever want to fuck me again, Eric Gandy, you will put your clothes on right now and march out the front door with me. Understand?”
    He put on his shorts and started down the stairs. On the upstairs landing were his socks and on the bottom two steps lay his shirt, twisted into a spiral as if by a whirlwind. He had a vague recollection of whipping it around over his head like a lasso the night before, and he unfurled it to find it wrinkled like an immense golden raisin. His pants were nowhere in sight, but he saw his shoes next to the door.
    “Where’re my pants?” he asked as he pulled the shirt on.
    “You took them off at the top of the stairs and threw them down into the living room somewhere,” she said, standing in the bedroom door looking like she was heading for a job interview; makeup immaculate, clothes pressed and perfectly coordinated, hair tussled in a way that looked not only deliberate but carefully worked at. “Over by the fireplace, maybe,” she said, adjusting an earring.
    He found the pants between an expensive, low-slung coffee table and the hearth. He put them on, then grabbed his shoes and they walked out into the morning. Stopping on her front step for a second he tied his shoelaces, then followed her to a black BMW vaguely familiar from the night before. When he stepped around to the passenger door she looked at him like he was crazy.
    “What do you think you’re doing?”
    “I thought you could drop me off at my car. At Ruby’s.”
    “You’ve got to be kidding. I’m late, and that’s the wrong direction.”
    “I thought you worked downtown.”
    “You thought wrong.” She got in and backed out, rolling down her window as she waited for a space in the morning traffic. “Talk to you soon,” she called out, suddenly and surprisingly cheery.
    He started down the sidewalk, heading east toward downtown. From his shirt pocket he pulled a five-dollar bill along with a