A friend of mine named Hal Pressman called and said, “Hey, Walt! You gotta come over here and see this!” He hung up with a chuckle, not even giving me a chance to say I was working in the garden with Marci.
She noticed the perturbed expression on my face.
“Who was that?” She asked, rising from the ground and dusting dirt from her bare knees.
“Hal,” I rolled my eyes, put my phone back in my jean pocket.
“Good grief,” Marci said, exasperated. “What does he want?”
“He wants me to come over to his cottage.”
“You were just there yesterday.” Fuming, Marci added, “Watching Porky Pig cartoons for twelve hours, I might add.”
“Popeye,” I corrected her.
“What’s the difference?”
There was no arguing a point when a person has no interest in the subject of their outrage.
Marci continued. “When the University job starts you won’t have as much time for Hal. Because what little time you will have will belong to me.”
“I know,” I whined.
Marci had hammered home that statement since Coleman University hired me to teach Film studies last month.
“Why is he obsessed over cartoons?”
“Animation,” I corrected.
“Whatever it’s called, Walter, a grown man shouldn’t be watching that stuff as much as he does.”
I shrugged. “He’s writing a book.”
“So he says. I think he’s just lazy. Weird to quit a good job managing one of the biggest resorts in the country,” Marci said. “He does know you have a wife, doesn’t he?”
“Marci, what can I do?”
“You can say no. That you are spending the day with your beautiful, charming wife.”
“I could.”
Marci sighed, rubbed my back affectionately.
“But you won’t.”
