Free Wit's End by Karen Joy Fowler Page A

really, Am I a high-status female? so much as, Do you, my so-called boyfriend, do you see me as a high-status female?”
    â€œDude.” Martin turned to Cody. “I’m surprised you could get that one wrong.”
    â€œI didn’t,” Cody said.
    â€œThat’s what he says now. That he said yes. That he said definitely, definitely yes. But first he laughed. That was his very first answer, that was his real answer, spontaneous laughing.”
    Cody seemed to Rima to be the sort that, in a fight, outlasted rather than overwhelmed. “You’re so far above me, baby,” Cody said. “I can’t even see you from where I am.”
    Scorch set her drink down and turned to Rima. “You want to go dance?”
    â€œAlliance-building with a high-status female,” Cody said. He put a hand over his mouth. “Whoa. That just slipped out.”
    â€œRima?” Scorch’s voice was hitting the high notes now. “Rima is a high-status female?”
    â€œLook how she has the only seat,” Martin said.

(3)
    Two songs later, still drink three:
    Rima had given Scorch her chair and taken the place next to Martin. He leaned into her. “You think Addison will leave you her money?” he asked.
    Rima was so startled she spilled some of her wine onto her pants. She could feel the dampness spreading down her thigh, and sometime during the last set, she’d torn her cocktail napkin into tiny strips for no reason at all. Someone at the table on the left was being told to go fuck himself.
    Martin reached across her to grab a napkin. There was the brush of corduroy on Rima’s cheek, the smell of him, smoke and eucalyptus and fabric softener, and his hand pressing on her leg, soaking up the wine. “My mother can get that out,” he said. He spoke directly into her ear, his breath warm. “She has something for red wine stains, something for white. She’s just a wiz at all your pill-and booze-related laundry disasters.”
    If Rima turned to him, her mouth would be an inch from his. “Why would Addison leave me anything?” she asked.
    â€œWhy is, who else does she have? You and my mother.”
    â€œFriends. Dogs. Causes. I hardly know her.” Rima took another sip, slow this time and careful. Martin’s hand had remained on her knee. She shook it off and he straightened up, grinning at her.
    â€œSo when did you start listening to me?” the vocalist sang. “Something, something, something me.”
    â€œI already have an inheritance,” she told him. Control Your Dog was beginning another song, apparently a favorite; the opening lines were greeted with applause. Even with their heads so close together, Rima had to repeat herself twice. She had to shout it before he heard.
    â€œYou are so fucking lucky,” Martin said.
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    D rink four or maybe five or maybe, in a better world, still the end of three:
    The singer was getting hoarse, but in a good way. “Something something something,” she sang, all raw emotion, all open wound. “Something, something.” Rima’s head was light, and her ears hurt from the loud music. Her throat hurt from all the shouting after talking to almost no one for weeks, or else she was catching Scorch’s cold. The night continued in disconnected bursts. Apparently Cody had gone outside to get some air, though Rima hadn’t noticed he was gone, and apparently someone he didn’t know, someone who hadn’t said a word, had shoved him and then taken a swing as he was going down. He hadn’t been hit hard, but there’d been a fist with a ring on one finger. Cody’s chin was bleeding just slightly. Scorch wiped it with a napkin and disinfected it with vodka and Red Bull.
    â€œWhy?” Rima asked. Apparently the question had already been answered, and surely with a longer explanation, because the only parts Scorch was willing to revisit made no