The Man Who Can't Be Moved

“This is absolutely ridiculous,” I grumble, as I pause in the middle of the massive rubber mat between the first and second set of doors leading into Wal-Mart and stomp snow off of my pale pink Uggs. “Remind my why we’re here again? At ten thirty in the morning nonetheless?”

“Because I’ve had Wednesday’s off for the past year and a half and we always go out to breakfast at Denny’s every Wednesday,” Peyton replies, as she pounds the heel of one boot against the floor, followed by the other. “Until you had to go and screw things up by going on a sabbatical to Montreal.”

“Totally not my fault,” I protest, as I snatch the black, pink and white chenille toque from my head and stuff into one of the pockets on my pea coat before peeling off my mitts and dropping them into my purse. “Blame my brain; it decided to go haywire on me and it needed a seriously thorough cleansing.”

“Did you have to do the same thing to your body the first time you slept with Max?” Peyton chides, as she pulls off her own hat -a rather classy aubergine beret sits slightly off kilter on the top of her head and perfectly matches her leather gloves, cashmere scarf and accents her charcoal grey coat- and shakes out her long blond tresses.

I swear the woman looks like a million bucks the second she wakes up in the morning; she doesn’t need a stitch of makeup, owns the most fabulous wardrobe I’ve ever laid eyes on and doesn’t even seem to realize she’s so damn gorgeous. Even in just a simple pair of skinny jeans -I’m constantly riding her that because of her inability to keep her legs closed she won’t be able to wear them for very much longer and that she’s going to gain fifty pounds and be forever plagued by muffin tops-, a Henley shirt poached from Kris’ side of the closet and her favourite knee high black leather boots -that I’ve told her I’m staking claim on once she’s too pregnant to wear heels- she’s off the charts stunning.

If I didn’t love her so much, I’d fucking hate her guts. It’s simply not fair to have to be relegated to the role of dumpy, plain Jane best friend all the time.

“Did you have to disinfect yourself afterwards?” Peyton continues. “Or did you just make him bathe in boiling water before hand?”

“That is way harsh Blondie,” I complain with a dramatic pout. “I’ll have you know that he is not that bad. I know he has quite the reputation and he’s been with his fair share of women, but…”

“More ass than a toilet seat,” my best friend quips, tousling my hair playfully before snagging a shopping cart from the neatly arranged ‘corral’ alongside of the last of ten cash registers.

“…but he was a smart boy and always practiced safety first. All those women yet no STD’s or illegitimate children? I think he deserves some sort of credit for protecting himself.”

“Same way you deserve credit for being so open minded of the whole thing,” she praises, as we shed our coats and drape them over the side of the metal buggy. “You’re awfully accepting when it comes to his history, Em. Not a lot of women would be able to overlook it. Or crack jokes about it.”

“Well what am I supposed to do? Dwell on it? Ask to see a detailed list of names and dates? Force him to provide in depth medical history for all of them?” I inquire, as Goldilocks takes possession of the cart, I snag a flier from the greeter and we journey further into the massive, jammed packed store. “He had a life long before I ever came along. And it’s not that I overlook it or I pretend like it never happened. I just accept him and his past. Emphasis on the word past. He’s a changed man, P. Max isn’t the Max he was a year ago.”

“Doesn’t make the amount of conquests any less,” she points out.

“But that’s all in his past,” I stress. “And it’s pretty hard to pretend it never happened when it seems like I can’t go anywhere in Pittsburgh without someone telling me that either they or someone they know have seen my husband naked and have vivid recollections of his sexual prowess. Which, I may add, is completely off the hook.”

“Can we not get into a detailed discussion about Max’s abilities in the bedroom? I mean, he’s a certified hottie and I totally understand why women fall under the spell of those eyes and that accent and it doesn’t surprise me in the slightest that he’s as popular or as talented as he is, but…”

“Or as hung as he is,” I casually toss out. “Because he is, you know. Hung. Like a horse. It’s certainly a thing of beauty. And it’s one thing to imagine sleeping with a man who’s equipped like a porn star, but it’s something completely different when you actually do it.”

“Imagine sleeping with a lot of porn stars, Lee-Lee? Watch a lot of dirty movies? Is that your deep, dark secret? You get a kick out of anything x-rated? The more x’s the better?”

“I do not watch them,” I argue, and then feel the corners of my mouth twitching as a grin begins to form. “Star in them, maybe. Did I tell you that Max went on this huge ass shopping spree on QVC last night? He even bought this really expensive Sony Handicam. He says he’s going to ‘make me a star’.”

“I find it somewhat unsettling that it neither surprises nor alarms me that the two of you would make a sex tape. And the only reason I don’t want to indulge in the dirty details about the two of you is because hearing you vividly talk about your sex life is like…I don’t know…it’s like listening to your little sister discuss it. I just can’t stomach it.”

“Baby Lepretty is turning you into such a prude,” I complain. “And don’t you find this a little strange? Don’t you find us being in Wal-Mart a little odd? Especially being here when all the sales are on?”

“I love to shop,” Peyton reasons. “And when the word ‘sale’ is involved…”

“But this is Wal-Mart! It’s cheap here to begin with! And I know this is usual Emma-Leigh Kennedy stomping grounds and I’m a cheap bitch by nature, but…”

“Talbot,” she corrects. “Emma-Leigh Talbot.”

“…but this place is so not you! Why are you slumming? I mean, those jeans and boots alone are worth more than my whole outfit! I bet you’re even wearing hundred dollar underwear.”

“I got these jeans on sale for eighty bucks and the boots were on for half price and I bought them for two hundred. And as far as my La Perla underwear goes…”

“Oh my mistake!” I cry. “You’re wearing four hundred dollar underwear! Matching bra too?”

She nods.

“So you’re wearing eight hundred bucks in unmentionables alone. I buy my cute little days of the week undies featuring Little Miss Naughty and Little Miss Sunshine in a package of seven for twenty-five dollars. You know that Gretchen Wilson song ‘Redneck Woman’? That’s me. To a tee. And you…well you’re prime rib to my chopped liver.”

“You are way too hard on yourself,” she scolds. “If you’re as hideous as you claim to be, how’d you ever manage to land Max Talbot? He may have been a manwhore, but I don’t think he’s ever slept with a woman that wasn’t beautiful.”

“He fucked gorgeous women and then married a dowdy one,” I reason. “Perfectly sound logic, sneaky bastard. Don’t you think it makes a lot of sense? The beautiful ones he used for purely sexual purposes and the ugly one he married because he knew no other man would look at her. There’s no threat, no competition…”

“No, what he did was find a beautiful, respectful woman with morals to marry,” Peyton sternly corrects, as we pause briefly in the book section -always our first stop- and we survey the racks of neatly arranged glossy magazines. “He found someone that wasn’t solely interested in partying and boinking every guy that showed even the remotest interest. Someone he could bring home to mom and be completely proud of and adore to the ends of the earth. And besides….” she scoops up the newest copy of Vanity Fair as I reach for the latest National Enquirer. Even when it comes to interests and reading material, we’re as different as night and day. “…from what I heard, Max not only has some pretty serious competition breathing down his neck, but he’s feeling pretty threatened.”

“Where do you hear all of this? I swear, if I found out that he’s telling you things behind my back…”

“Word gets around, Em You know what the Penguins rumour mill is like. Those guys gossip worse than women. Are you going to deny it? Are you going to try and tell me that the talk isn’t true?”

“Did you know that Britney Spears is into both men and women?” I ignore her completely and rely the ‘news’ printed on the inside cover of my magazine. “Apparently she likes both the jock and the…”

“You go and bury your head in the sand all you want,” Peyton heaves an exasperated sigh. “You can keep on pretending that Sid isn’t still in love with you and you can keep on fooling yourself that you feel absolutely nothing for him. I don’t know why you’re in so much damn denial. Why you can’t just be totally open and honest about all of this with me. Why you can’t…”

“There’s nothing to be totally open and honest about,” I irritably inform her. “I’m not still in love with my ex boyfriend.”

“I never said you were in love with him. I said that you still have feelings for him. You wouldn’t be so damn defensive if you didn’t have a bit of a guilty conscience. If I wasn’t touching a nerve.”

“I feel nothing for Sid,” I state with a disinterested shrug. “Absolutely nothing.”

“You’re such a shit liar, Emma-Leigh. I don’t know who you think you’re fooling, but…”

“I’m not fooling anyone. I am telling the truth. I don’t have any feelings for him. Nada. Zilch. Nothing.”

“Classic case of someone insisting on something until they manage to convince themselves it’s the truth,” she concludes. “Look…” she snaps the magazine closed and drops it into its rightful place on the rack. “…it’s perfectly normal to love two people. There’s nothing wrong with you because you still feel something for Sid. It doesn’t make you a bad person just because…”

“It’s not normal,” I object. “There’s nothing normal about. It’s infidelity, Peyton. Emotional infidelity is just as bad as physical infidelity and…”

“Who says? Some overpriced, crack pot shrink? Some woman in her fifties that’s never loved or had someone love her? Someone who buries herself in her work and finds companionship in her fifty cats? I don’t care how many degrees that woman has or if she has a PhD after her name. All she knows is what she’s learned. Not what she’s felt. So who the hell is she to tell you what is and isn’t normal when it comes to your own heart?”

“I’m a married woman,” I remain firm. “I’m a married woman and I have an amazing husband that I love to the ends of the earth and who loves me and would do anything for me. Max is my everything, Peyton. He’s my entire heart and my whole world and…”

“And less than eight months ago, you were pretty damn insistent that you felt the exact same way about Sid. I’m not saying that you love Max any less; I’m just saying that there was a time when Sid was your be all and end all and you wanted nothing more than to spend the rest of your life with him. I know things went wrong, Lee-Lee. Horribly wrong. And neither of you deserved that. But before any of that happened, you and Sidney had something incredible and you were planning on a future together. You were the couple that every other couple wanted to be like. We were all jealous of you guys because every time you looked at one another or every time you smiled at each other all of that love and adoration was just written all over your faces. And that’s not something that just disappears. It takes weeks, months, years even. Sometimes it never leaves. So if you’re still having feelings for him, it’s totally natural and you have to stop fighting it and just accept it. I’m not saying leave your husband to see if you and Sid work things out, because while you two still have feelings for each other, I definitely don’t think you belong together. I just think that you need to realize that you’re not a terrible person for feeling this way.”

“Well thank you for your stunning words of wisdom,” I mutter, and angrily flip through my magazine. “I never realized you’d earned a degree in psychology as well as public relations. Maybe we should take this to the furniture section so I can lie down on a couch and you can analyze me some more.”

“I’m not saying any of this to ‘analyze’ you,” Peyton informs me. “I’m saying it because it’s what you need to hear. Because I love you and I want nothing but the best for you and that includes you having a clear conscious and being able to battle all your demons. I know you love Max; I know you made the right decision when you picked him and that he’s the perfect choice for you. As much as you and Sid loved each other and still love each other in some sense, neither of you were healthy for each other. And you know what? There’s no shame in that. Neither of you should feel bad because you couldn’t make things work. Just like neither of you have to defend yourselves to anyone when it comes to still owning pieces of each other’s hearts.”

“Max seems to think I have to defend myself,” I struggle to hold back a flood of threatening tears. “He seems to think that I’m doing something wrong. That I’m suddenly going to decide I made a mistake and that I want to really be with Sidney. He seems to think that I’m in the wrong for still feeling things. He even wants to go to couples counselling. Can you believe that? He already thinks we need therapy and we’ve only been married since Christmas.”

“What he wants is for things to be perfect between the two of you and he thinks that talking to someone about how you’re both feeling about everything and everyone in your lives is the right way to go. And you know what? I have to agree with him. And I never normally agree with a man about anything. It’s just therapy, Lee-Lee. He’s not saying he wants a divorce or anything like that.”

“I just want him to believe me when I tell him that I love him,” I lament. “I just want him to believe me when I say that I only want to be with him. I don’t want anyone else, P. Just him. And I don’t know what more I can say or do to convince him.”

“Therapy would be a start,” she reaches out and runs a soothing hand over the top of my head and down my hair. “That would show him that you’re willing to do anything to make things right. And while it’s okay that you still have feelings for Sid, maybe it’s time that you bottle that up and just let the past go. Let it stay in the past, Em. Stop comparing the two of them, stop throwing Sid in Max’s face when the going gets tough, stop dwelling on what you had and start concentrating on what you have right in front of you. Talk to Sid. Get everything out in the opening and get some closure and…”

“I already did. I already talked to him. I already told him last night that I couldn’t do it anymore. That I had to let him go and that he needed to do the same thing.”

“And?” she tenderly loops a piece of hair behind my ear. “What did he say?”

“I didn’t give him a chance to say anything,” I admit. “I hung up on him before he could.”

“You need closure. Both of you do. You can’t go on with your life if you don’t get that.”

“I know…” I sniffle noisily and use the back of my hand to frantically clear tears off of my cheeks. “Oh, look…” I give a derisive snort, place the Enquirer back on the rack and then grab a copy of Wedding Bells magazine with one hand and a copy of Vogue with the other. “…I can’t escape the ghosts of girlfriends past no matter what I do…” I hold them against my chest for Peyton to see. “Abercrombie and Bitch playing Barbie bride dress up and Snooty Noot in nothing but her undies.”

“Neither of them have anything up on you,” Peyton declares, then snatches both magazines out of my hands and tosses them aside. “Come on…” she drapes an arm around my shoulders and presses a kiss to my temple. “Let’s get you some chocolate. And a pregnancy test. Better to be safe than sorry, right?”

“You’re starting to sound more like Max every day,” I mumble.

“Good,” she declares. “I’m in good company. ’Cause we’re the two people in this world that love you the most.”

*******

“This is a horrific waste of twenty dollars,” I declare, as I find myself hunkering down in one of the bathroom stalls in the Starbuck’s two blocks from Peyton and LePretty’s apartment.

She’d insisted we do the pregnancy test in public in order to avoid leaving any evidence behind that Kris may stumble upon. After all, the test wouldn’t be her own when she’s already knocked up to begin with and he knows full well that I’m practically the only female friend she has. Peyton doesn’t normally trust women; she doesn’t like their typical catty natures and certainly doesn’t like them and their greedy, slutty claws getting hooked into her man. I’ve never been a threat; she’d dated my brother and naturally there was never a worry about me going after him and no matter how exceptionally hot Lepretty is, he’s just not my type. Not to mention I’d never, ever hurt her even if he was.

“Better to be safe than sorry,” Peyton sing-songs, from where she sits on the edge of the sink, swinging her legs back and forth as she sips a French vanilla/mint decaf latte.

“We couldn’t be safer instead of sorry and a little cheaper?” I huff, as I peel the protective covering off the Clear Blue digital pregnancy test. “I mean, twenty bucks plus tax to tell me something I already know? I could have just gone into Planned Parenthood and had them do it for free. It’s only going to tell me ‘not pregnant’.”

“Quit bitching so much and just piss on the stick already,” my best friend sighs. “Sooner you do it, sooner it’s over, right? It’s nearly instantaneous with these digital ones. Did you follow the instructions? Did you…?”

“I’ve done this before, remember?” I mumble. “Old pro in here, P.”

“Once doesn’t make you a pro. It makes you a little careless maybe….”

“No more yapping from the peanut gallery. I can’t pee when there’s running commentary.”

“I’ll be quiet,” she promises, and through the crack in the stall door I can see her making a zipping motion across her lips with the tips of her thumb and forefinger.

“This is just such shit…” I mutter, as I hold the plastic stick underneath what little urine I can muster up, count to fifteen and then remove it from between my legs. “I don’t know why everyone’s got their undies in a twist about this…” I say, as I lay the test on the corresponding cardboard box as it lies across the top of the toilet paper dispenser and do the customary wiping and cleaning before standing up, flushing and pulling my undies and jeans back up. “I mean, I’ve been having PMS,” I add, as I zip and button my pants. “I wouldn’t be having PMS if I was pregnant.”

“Stranger things have happened,” Peyton points out. “Personally I think it would pretty cool if we had babies so close together.”

“You’re already having a baby close to Vero,” I point out.

“Vero’s an acquaintance. Not a friend. There’s a huge different. Besides, you’re my best friend. My sister, practically. Think about how close our kids would be. They could play together, go to school together…”

“Date if they’re of the opposite sex,” I add. “Although Lepretty might have a problem if you have a girl and I have a boy. Do you really want your daughter dating a mini Max Talbot?”

“Good point,” Peyton laughs. “So you have a girl and I’ll have a boy. That way, Kris doesn’t run the risk of having a stroke. What does it say? Have you checked it yet? I think enough time has passed. What…?”

“You’re getting on my nerves,” I declare, and reach for the plastic stick. I feel neither nervous, excited nor frightened. Instead I feel remarkable emotionally detached. After all, I already know what the answer is going to be. “I already told you that there’s no way I’m…”

And just like that my entire world spins out of control. With two words the ground opens up beneath me and threatens to swallow me whole. My heart pounds, my stomach twists and contorts painfully and I lose all ability to think or speak.

“Are you okay?” Peyton asks, and I’m suddenly aware that she’s standing right outside the door. “Em? Are you alright? What’s…?”

“I’m…” my voice comes out in a tiny, pitiful squeak and it takes all the strength I have to unlock the stall door and shove the test under Peyton’s nose. “I’m…”

She glances down at the words printed on the small screen and suddenly it appears as if she’s unsure of whether to laugh or cry. As if she has to debate on what the reaction should be considering the situation and Max’s steadfast beliefs and opinions on having children so soon into our marriage.

And finally she says the words that have so far managed to elude me:

“You’re pregnant.”