Todd drove back to the motel, the divorce papers on the seat beside him. For a moment he considered pitching the envelope out the window, but then thought, Nah. Call ’em a souvenir of unhappier times. Besides, you never knew with lawyers. Coughlan might try and trip him up on some fine detail of law, and it would be good to have the facts at his fingertips.

Nobody gets to push Todd Milstead around, he thought as he pulled into the motel parking lot.

*  *  *

The bedside light had given up the ghost completely, and the toilet apparently needed to take the morning off to refill its cistern, but other than that, the motel room was a home away from home. Todd dropped the divorce papers on the floor and flopped onto the bed.

The phone rang.

“Todd?”

“Janis?”

“I just wanted to thank you,” said Janis, hesitantly.

“Hey, there’s no need,” said Todd.

“No, really. You didn’t have to agree to everything.”

“I—excuse me?” Todd could feel a knot beginning in his guts. “I didn’t agree to everything.”

“Coughlan called me,” Janis said, not listening. “He said you came in, signed the papers, didn’t even want to read them.”

Todd leaned over to grab the envelope from the floor and fumbled it open.

“I just wanted—” he said, trying to turn the papers with his free hand, “—to, you know…”

“It’s so generous,” said Janis. “We thought you’d fight the alimony, what with your, you know, success, but—”

Now it was Todd’s turn not to listen. Whereas the aforesaid Todd Milstead agrees to pay the agreed portion of his income to the aforesaid Janis Milstead… said portion not to exceed… for the period of…

Todd let the papers fall.

“Oh God,” he said out loud.

“Are you okay?” said Janis.

“Yeah,” said Todd. “Never better.”

A thought occurred to him.

“Janis,” he said. “When you said ‘we’ just then…”

“Yes?” said Janis, for the first time wary.

“Who did you mean?”

Janis exhaled. “I suppose there’s no harm in telling you now,” she said. “I kind of think you guessed anyway.”

Todd, thought Todd, I’m shacking up with the Dyke with the Bike.

“Todd,” said Janis, “Joe asked me to marry him.”

Todd felt like he’d been hit in the head with a brick.

“Joe?” he said.

“Joe Hines,” said Janis.

“Joe Hines? Joe my old pal Hines?”

“The very same,” said Janis, and laughed. “God, he was so nervous about asking me out. He kept saying, I hope Todd doesn’t find out, and what do you think Todd is going to say?”

“Joe,” said Todd. He was all out of anything now.

“So, Todd,” said Janis, a note of playfulness in her voice. “What do you say?”

A thousand replies went through Todd’s mind. Most of them had the word fuck in them. Todd knew when he was beaten.

“I hope you’ll both be very happy together,” he said.

*  *  *