Page 71 of My Dead Wife's Ex Will Do
Kelsey puts a hand on his back, and when he turns around, she drags us into a three-way hug, with her squashed in between us. We stand like that for a few minutes, then Kelsey extricates herself and steers Victor and me toward each other, closing the gap between us.
The noise around us disappears, conversation fading into low murmurs, and all I can hear is Victor breathing next to my ear.
All I can feel is his heart beating against mine.
Thirty-Five
Victor
I step back first, even though there’s nothing I want more than to be in Jason’s arms the rest of the night. “You probably need a drink,” I tell him. I gesture at the glass on the bar with nothing but melting ice in it. “Sorry, but I drank the rest of yours.”
He smiles. “It’s fine.”
We both switch to beer and when we rejoin the party, Silas approaches us. “You have such a great voice,” he says to Jason. “Do you sing professionally?”
“I’m the music director and choral conductor at a Catholic Church in Brooklyn,” he replies.
“He’s being modest,” I put in. “He also sings in a sextet that he founded and you’ve sung in how many venues since you started it?”
Jason ducks his head. “Well, most of our concerts are at Saint Sebastian. The church has great acoustics.”
Silas cocks his head to the side. “Wait, the Saint Sebastian Six? That’s you?”
Jason nods.
“You’ve heard them?” I ask. “They’re amazing, aren’t they?”
Silas looks a little starstruck, like he’s just realized he’s spent the week with Beyoncé or Taylor Swift. “I follow you guys on Instagram and I’m pretty sure I’ve listened to all the snippets of concerts you’ve posted.”
So have I, though I don’t admit that I’m that much of a stalker out loud.
“That’s all Kevin Bartholomew, who sings bass and is our social media manager. If it were left up to me, we’d have a dozen followers, max, and they’d all be related to one or the other of us.”
“I also attended the concert of Victoria’s Officium Defunctorum in Green-Wood Cemetery last year,” Silas says. “How did I not know that was you?”
Jason shrugs. “All I did for that production was arrange the vocals and conduct the Six. Well, and sing. But the concept of combining the music with theatre and performing in the cemetery’s catacombs was William Clay’s idea. You know his work with Theatrical Music Partners?”
Silas apparently does. The two of them launch into an animated discussion of the Green-Wood Cemetery concert and more about music and theatre, the details of which I don’t really follow.
I settle back in my chair and watch Jason. He’s animated, waving his hands in the air, and talking with more excitement than I’ve seen him talk about almost anything else this week.
I’m still thrown by what the photographer said to me after she took our photos. How can a complete stranger see something that’s not remotely obvious to me? I’ve known Jason for years. Okay, we haven’t spent much time together since Leah died, but that doesn’t erase the years over which I got to know him as my best friend’s husband.
And yet, he’s been a goddamn mystery to me ever since the night of Leah’s funeral. What I do know is that there are three things he cares about more than anything else: our daughter, his dead wife, and music.
Even if he were in love with me like the photographer says, he couldn’t be in a relationship with me. He’d lose his job. The one thing, other than Kelsey, that kept him going before and after Leah died. There’s no way he should give that up for me.
I would never ask him to.
Silas and Jason’s conversation winds down, with promises from both of them that they’ll stay in touch after the wedding. “And now,” Silas says, “I’m going to detach my boyfriend from his work wife and take him off to bed.”
I look over at the small space before the band we’re using as a dance floor, and Logan is dancing with Adrienne. Well, they’re on the dance floor, anyway, Adrienne’s got a hand on Logan’s shoulder and he’s holding her waist. They’re moving while music is playing, but the band is playing a slightly slower, significantly less punk version of Ever Fallen In Love (With Someone You Shouldn’t’ve) and they seem to be talking more than actually dancing. I wouldn’t have clocked a Buzzcocks song as one you’d dance with a partner to, but Kelsey and her maid of honor are also out there, twirling each other around and laughing.
Silas cuts in on Adrienne, the band switches to Can’t Help Falling In Love, and Adrienne and Kelsey practically fall into each other’s arms. I suspect this will be the last song and I’m content to watch my daughter and her new wife slow dance to one of the most iconic wedding songs ever, but a shadow looms next to me.
I look up at Jason’s outstretched hand. “I’m a pretty terrible dancer and I’ve never danced with a man before.”
“How can I resist, then?” I say. The joke covers my shock, much the same way Jason’s self-deprecation probably hides his nervousness. His hand is a little damp when I take it. He pulls it away as we head to the dance floor and wipes it on his pants. “Sorry.”
