“Maybe it’s just my imagination.”

Maybe it was. Weren’t olfactory hallucinations the first sign of severe mental disturbance?

He sniffed again, shifted his weight, prepared to take a stance. “I think it is your imagination. The fish is fine. I’m going to serve it.”

I shrugged. “Okay.”

I couldn’t have cared less. Let them all eat rotten fish and get salmonella poisoning. Let them all eat perfectly good fish and fall in love with each other. I myself was too obese to ever eat again anyway.

Now that his main dinner entrée was salvaged, he untied his apron, lifted it over his head, flung it toward the table (it hit the side, slid down the leg, and settled into a poufy pile on the floor), and finally addressed the pink elephant in the room: my day with Adrienne.

“So?” he asked.

“So, what?”

“How was it?”

“How was what?”

“It.”

“It?” I was going to make him work for this.

“Adrienne.”

I stared blankly, fell mute. There were no words to describe her, really.

“Great.”

“Really.” He sounded surprised, and fascinated; then looked nervous. Very nervous. There was a long silence—long for Donald and me. Finally, with his eyes lowered, he asked: “Did you talk about me?”

“No.” Well, I wasn’t going to bring up the subject of the wedding date. Not yet.

“Why was it so great then?”

“It wasn’t great. I was being sarcastic.”

Donald blinked. Uh-oh.

“In the pantheon of bad experiences I’ve had during the course of my lifetime—and, as you know, I’ve had many many experiences I’d classify as bad—I’d have to say it was, without comparison, the worst day I’ve ever had.”

Donald nodded vigorously, completely rapt. “Why?”

“Why? Well,” I said slowly, “for starters, she’s gorgeous.”

“So are you!”

“Ha!” I laughed. What a lame attempt to defuse me!

“You are! Why do you think I’m marrying you?”

“Shut up.”

“I mean, of course, that’s not the only reason I’m marrying you. . . .”

“Please shut up.”

“I’m serious,” he insisted.

“We’re not talking about me now. We’re talking about her.”

He flapped his hands in frustration. “I wouldn’t say she’s gorgeous—”

“Oh really? What would you say?”

He scratched his head, suddenly speechless.

“How about ‘stacked’?” I offered. I had no idea where that word, a relic of Playboy magazine–speak, had come from, but I embraced it, then raged past it. “I mean, she was dressed like a— like a”—I searched for the words and while I did I could see Donald bracing himself, as if he were watching the fuse of a piece of dynamite burn dangerously close to the end on a Road Runner and Wile E. Coyote cartoon—“a fucking teenager!”

He paused, attempting to envision that.

“Yes,” I poked him in the stomach. “Like a teenager! A slutty teenager! A slutty teenager trying to seduce her French teacher! Or her lacrosse coach! Or her field hockey coach! Or whatever she played in high school, or boarding school. I’m sure she was a real ace.”