Free The Idea of Him by Holly Peterson Page A

digest.”
    â€œWhat the hell? What did you see back then?”
    â€œHis hand on my bridesmaid’s rear end for starters.” I laughed slightly; somehow it seemed ridiculous in that instant of lucidity. Every few days during that spring I felt something click, like those lenses eye doctors roll down over eyes to test and then sharpen the patient’s vision. With each slow click, everything comes into focus a notch better.
    â€œNo!” Caitlin walked over to my desk and crossed her arms. “Really? Back then? You never told me that.”
    â€œWell, I was putting on my veil in an anteroom and I saw him ushering Kathy Vincent down the hall and his hand was practically on her butt and I just thought, ‘Oh, gee.’ But then I just plowed forward into unholy matrimony. I couldn’t begin to process that.”
    â€œAnd you think the girl from the party and he are . . . and you should be suspicious always after the cheating with the photo assistant during the breast-feeding moment?” Hard to fool Caitlin, not that the dots would be that difficult to connect for a sixth grader. Maybe I just hadn’t wanted to.
    â€œWell, kind of like maybe I’ve been in a blur with work and kids and now he’s just distracted and not that focused on me and . . .” Click.
    â€œListen, Allie, when you marry an ego like Wade, there’s a limit to the intimacy you are going to feel. You weren’t overlooking that one. It’s all about him. You had to know that going in.”
    â€œIt’s like I don’t rock his world the way I used to.”
    â€œDoes he rock yours?” Caitlin sounded weirdly like she hoped he didn’t.
    This was the seminal question of the day I wasn’t ready for. It literally stung. I felt an acidic chemical shoot up my body, tighten my heart, and give me an instant headache. Caitlin laid it all on the line right then and there in a way I’d never really let myself fully consider.
    How and when did he rock my world?
    What did this guy actually give to me? For a horrible, terrifying, very honest moment, I thought to myself: Was I just wanting and needing to rock his so much I don’t even know the answer?
    â€œCaitlin, I don’t know about rocking my world. Of course he has or did or does at times,” I blurted out to convince both her and myself. “I’m so distracted by catering to his man-baby needs and getting the kids fed while I’m handling every Murray explosion to be able to answer that honestly right this second.”
    â€œHe’s fucking around again, isn’t he?” she asked. “I will literally chop off his dick if he is.”
    â€œJesus, Caitlin! You didn’t listen to what I just said!”
    â€œI certainly did, but I’m not so sure that you did. How can you say one day you love his magic touch and the next that it’s so hard to be with someone like him?” She perched on the desk’s edge and looked straight at me. “Are you fucking around?”
    â€œDon’t be crazy,” I answered, rubbing the pain out of my forehead and wishing she would leave.
    â€œThere is definitely something that you’re hiding from me.” She looked at me long and hard. “You have to tell me. I live for this stuff, you know that. There’s none in my life, God knows.”
    I smiled at her. “It’ll happen soon for you when you’re not expecting it, Caitlin. He’ll just pop out of nowhere.”
    â€œWouldn’t know it if it happened, haven’t had a guy even look at me in a year,” she said.
    â€œWhat are you talking about? Guys like you; you just don’t see it.”
    â€œNo, Allie. You don’t get it: guys don’t like me. I’m the fun best friend, not the one they want to take home.”
    â€œWell, then we’ll work on it.” I glanced at her bulky shoes and thick, muscle-y thighs peeking through her