The Starter Wife by Gigi Levangie Grazer Read Free Book Online Page B

himself as, say, a monarchy. Gracie had resisted; it had been so tough for her to get pregnant. And then her pregnancy was not a time of spiritual enlightenment, of glowing skin and glossy hair and swelling bosoms, a time of feeling connected to the world; Gracie’s pregnancy was a time of elephant ankles, of hips that mushroomed into buildings overnight, of strange medical terms that required shots several times a week, of a nausea that lasted 238 days. The nausea, Gracie thought, when she envisioned another baby in her life. Imagine being seasick for thirty-four weeks, with no sign of land or medication. Now double that feeling. You’re almost there.
    She had brought up adoption; Kenny was adamant about passing on his genes. “What if we got a faulty one?” he’d say. “Didn’t you see that movie?”
    Gracie heard Joan’s voice, through the memory muck.
    “Okay, I know you’re not ready to hear this,” Joan said, “but I think you’ve got to ask yourself. Is it another—”
    “Don’t say it—”
    “Eighty percent of couples deal with infidelity at one point or another in their marriage,” Joan said, “which is why I married an older man. That and the fact that he was the first man I’d dated in five years who had his own transportation. Now, back to Kenny’s insensitivity and big head and infidelity.” Joanand Gracie’s friendship had no artificial flavors or colors. Sometimes this was a good thing; sometimes, Gracie could do with some fake vanilla.
    “I said,
do not say it!”
Gracie wasn’t ready to think about any other women just yet. Other younger women with pouty smiles and dewy skin and liquid eyes and dimples on their faces, where they should be, as opposed to where hers were starting to congregate—from the waist down, despite the hours of cellulite massage.
    Gracie started to gag like a dog who’s eaten too much front lawn. She decided to take solace in the fact that there was a one percent chance Kenny could be gay.Wasn’t every man in L.A.?
    “Can I be blamed for not having a penis?” Gracie asked.
    “What? You’re feeling guilty for not having a penis? I’m coming over right now,” Joan said. “Pappy’s asleep, he’ll never know I’m gone.”
    “No.” Although Gracie really did want someone to come over and rock her in their arms and stroke her hair and make her something sweet to eat that wouldn’t make her weigh one ounce more in the morning. Kenny had bought her a Tanita fat-measuring scale for last Christmas—the romantic fool! The gift that keeps giving (her a heart attack)! Gracie knew how much each item of clothing in her closet weighed, down to the last belt buckle (four ounces), down to the last knee-high nylons (two ounces). Gracie stopped weighing herself after she noticed that she was weighing herself after every trip to the bathroom, when Gracie knew how much a typical morning bowel movement weighed (think belt buckle).
    “You sure?”
    “I’ll be fine. I’ll be fine,” Gracie said. “I’m going to kill myself.” Gracie was joking, of course. She’d never kill herself over Kenny; she’d heard the story of The Westside Widower, thehandsome, young L.A. widower (Kenny at forty-one was young; Gracie at forty-one was middle-aged—such was L.A. math). The minute his lovely wife died of cancer, leaving him with two young children to raise, he went on a dating rampage, turning up on the mattress side of Frette sheets everywhere from Silver Lake to Point Dume. He covered more area of Los Angeles than Onstar.
    The Widower’s wife’s death was like Viagra, without side effects. Gracie wondered if such a thing could be prescribed. “Take one dead wife and call me in the morning. From your new girlfriend’s futon.”
    “I’m driving over right now—”
    “What’re you talking about? You’re way out in Malibu. By the time you got here they’d be zipping up the body bag.”
    “Where is the Kenny right now?”
    “The Kenny is staying at a friend’s