Total pages in book: 68
Estimated words: 64887 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 324(@200wpm)___ 260(@250wpm)___ 216(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 64887 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 324(@200wpm)___ 260(@250wpm)___ 216(@300wpm)
“Fuck Andre,” I say. “He’s a flea on an elephant’s ass. Not even worth thinking about.”
I’m a liar. In truth, I think about Andre all the time. First off, because Drew still goes to his father’s house half the week, so I get to hear about his adventures whenever he returns home to Selena and me.
But even more than that, I find myself thinking about Andre in a totally different context, too, far more often than I’d care to admit. I hate the fact that Andre, who treated Selena like shit through twelve years of marriage, will forever hold the sacred and esteemed title of “Selena’s former husband,” while a guy who worships the ground she walks on and would take a bullet for her has so far been relegated to being introduced at parties as her “boyfriend.” I understand the situation, intellectually. The disparity between Andre and me, in terms of status. But in my own head, especially if I’ve been drinking, when I think about Andre being Selena’s ex-husband, I want to pummel the life force right out of him.
Max pops a chip into his mouth. “Ha. If you ever did marry Selena, Andre would lose his motherfucking shit. Divorced or not, he’s the kind of guy who thinks every cookie he’s ever licked eternally belongs to him.”
“Well, first off, Andre has never been a fan of licking cookies. Apparently, he’s always found that particular sex act ‘boring’ and ‘beneath him.’”
Max gasps. “What?”
I nod. “Selena said Andre was a horrible lover. Selfish as shit. Never even tried to get her off. It was always all about him.”
“What the actual fuck?”
“It makes sense, though, right? But I digress. The more important thing I want to tell you is this.” I reach into my pocket, pull out a closed ring box, and plunk it onto the table next to the basket of chips. “If me proposing to Selena will make Andre lose his motherfucking shit, then he’d better get ready to lose it. Because earlier when I said I’m going to marry Selena, it wasn’t a figure of speech.”
I flip open the box with flair to reveal the massive rock I’ve purchased for Selena, and Max’s jaw nearly clanks onto the table.
“Holy fuck!” Max whisper-shouts, his eyes like saucers. “Is that thing real?”
I nod. “Only the best for Selena.”
Max leans back in his seat, visibly flabbergasted. “Please tell me your new company is taking off like crazy and you didn’t take out a loan to buy that rock for her.”
I suppress the urge to smirk. As a matter of fact, my new company is killing it. So much so, I’m now probably making four times Max’s salary as a high-priced lawyer—and I’m just getting started. Thanks to my ownership stake in the company, my net worth will probably be in the tens of millions in five years or so—maybe even in the hundreds of millions, if we wind up getting acquired by one of the heavy hitters that’s recently been sniffing around.
But there’s no reason to tell Max any of that. Instead, I’m perfectly content to let my buddy think he’s the bigger baller at this table. He’s the one who attended years of law school and is currently in student loan hell to the tune of hundreds of thousands of dollars. He’s the one who works weekends and hasn’t had the time or bandwidth to ask anyone on a second date in years. So, why not let him think he’s winning at the game of life, in comparison to me, at least in terms of the trajectories of our bank accounts?
“Yeah, my company’s doing great,” I reply. “But we’re a start-up, you know, so most of our revenue gets reinvested back into the company.” It’s true, although my bank account is nonetheless flush beyond my wildest dreams from mere distributions alone.
Max makes a sympathetic clicking noise with his mouth. “Start-ups can be rough. Hang in there. It’s a marathon, not a sprint.”
“Thanks. That’s good advice.” I motion to the small box on the table. “Thankfully, I had some money put away for a condo when I first met Selena. But with the way things have been going, I figured I’d much rather use that money to buy a ‘condo’ for Selena’s finger.”
Max chuckles. “A ‘condo’ is right. Damn, boy. That’s the kind of rock pro athletes and moguls give to their women. She’s going to freak out when she sees that thing.”
I click the box closed when I notice the waiter approaching our table. “Let’s hope so.”
The waiter sets down our drinks—a margarita for me and a beer for Max—and we order our food. As he walks away, Max says, “Have you decided how you’re going to pop the question?”
“I’m still figuring that out. I want to pull out all the stops this time. No more fucking around.”