Me, Rich, Buck, and Jane were sitting at the tiny table where Rich and I eat dinner every night. Dishes in the sink. Third bottle of wine. At some point, we started playing a game: most memorable sight, go around the table, most memorable sound, repeat. All five senses. If an answer was interesting enough, an explanation was extracted.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We shared things.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Rich had accidentally glimpsed his grandparents making love, Buck had touched a dead elephant\u2019s trunk, I\u2019d smelled my childhood house burn down to ash, and Rich had heard his Gram-Gram talk dirty.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Nothing noteworthy from Jane.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We ended on taste.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Buck went first. He\u2019d sampled a barroom floor in Pensacola. Got cold cocked by a local.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThe floor tasted strange,\u201d Buck admitted. \u201cCame to with lips and tongue on floorboard\u2014beer, bloodrust, urine, faint traces of Florida Man.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Rich and I went next.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Then it was Jane\u2019s turn.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Her last chance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Me, Rich, and Buck had known each other for years. Jane was new. She\u2019d been dating Buck for about a month. Rich and I had never spent time with her before. Jane was attractive and quiet and seemed utterly unremarkable\u2014another one of Buck\u2019s pretty young things.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We waited.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Jane\u2019s eyes were misty. She was toying with the edge of the tablecloth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Rich\u2019s hand was resting on my thigh, his fingers lightly tapping time to a beat.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
When Jane said what she\u2019d tasted, Rich\u2019s fingers stopped tapping.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
No one spoke.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Finally, Buck said, \u201cDetails.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Jane kept toying with the tablecloth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThe doctors thought it might be his last night,\u201d she said, \u201cwhich turned out to be true, and they suggested that we say goodbye. My mother went into his room first, came out pale. Then I went in.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Jane let go of the tablecloth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThey\u2019d been giving him morphine for the pain. Lots. He was lying in bed, and I went up to him, and he stared at me. His eyes were cloudy, and scared, like he knew, and before I could start speaking, he called me Audrey.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Buck sniffed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cHe called me Audrey and said he was sorry and asked for a kiss.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Rich shifted in his seat.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201c\u2018One last kiss,\u2019 he said. And then he started crying.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Jane\u2019s eyes were downtilted.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI was seventeen and confused and had never seen my father cry.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I was looking at Jane across the table.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cAudrey was your mother?\u201d I said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
She met my eyes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cAudrey was my father\u2019s assistant. She was over almost every day. My mother and I, we loved Audrey, and worshiped my father. We had no idea.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Rich reached for his wineglass.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We were briefly silent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Then Buck brought us back.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cSo,\u201d he said, \u201cwhat did it taste like?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Jane turned. She looked at Buck, full on. Then she looked at me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Then, a surprise: she smiled.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The three of us were leaning forward. We were hers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
She was staring at me but smiling to herself, then she opened her mouth and said the word.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Me, Rich, Buck, and Jane were sitting at the tiny table where Rich and I eat dinner every night. Dishes in the sink. Third bottle of wine. At some point, we started playing a game: most memorable sight, go around the table, most memorable sound, repeat. All five senses. If an answer was interesting enough, … Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3540","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pa867U-V6","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/underwoodpress.com\/ruescribe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3540","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/underwoodpress.com\/ruescribe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/underwoodpress.com\/ruescribe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/underwoodpress.com\/ruescribe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/underwoodpress.com\/ruescribe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3540"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/underwoodpress.com\/ruescribe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3540\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3541,"href":"https:\/\/underwoodpress.com\/ruescribe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3540\/revisions\/3541"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/underwoodpress.com\/ruescribe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3540"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/underwoodpress.com\/ruescribe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3540"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/underwoodpress.com\/ruescribe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3540"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
Nick Simon lives and works in Arlington, VA. A New Jersey native, he aspires to meet Snooki one day. Nick doesn’t own any cats or dogs.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"