Brent smiled—almost laughed—when he turned and saw Jeremiah, still in his underwear, with the headgear on and controller at the ready.

“Practicing?” he asked.

“Yeah, well, I’m sick and tired of you whipping my ass every single time we play this stupid thing.” He switched the system off, discarded his gear and went to the kitchen to make coffee. He’d wait until they were actually in battle before introducing Brent to Clyde. He wanted more practice, too. It wouldn’t matter how fierce his avatar looked if he kept shooting himself in the foot.

“Yeah, well, I’ve been practicing, too,” Brent said. “Still gonna whip your ass. Every single time.”

Chapter 15

Day 89

“Why do you get so bent out of shape when your wife works late?” Brent was attempting egg-white omelets for a late lunch. “I mean, Mel’s out three or four nights a week, either working or out somewhere with her girlfriends. Doesn’t faze me. She was out last night until all hours.”

“It’s different when you’re married,” Jeremiah told him. “Especially when you have a kid. And it doesn’t help that I can’t even ask her about it.”

Jeremiah got up from the table and grabbed the orange juice from the fridge. They had a viewing scheduled for four o’clock and they still had almost an hour to kill. He was glad for the chance to get out of his own head for a while, so he didn’t mind that Brent had decided to tread on what he considered personal territory.

“I don’t know,” Brent told him. “I just can’t imagine me and Mel ever being that way, not even when we’re married. I guess I just think two people don’t necessarily need to be together every minute to be together.”

“Like I said, it’s all different when you’re married. You’ll see. We have an arrangement—I work, and she takes care of the family side. When she starts missing that, it’s like she’s not holding up her end of the deal.”

“But she’s working, too, right?”

“It was supposed to be a part-time job,” he said. “You know, just something to keep her head in the game. And I make enough money. She doesn’t have to work.”

“Still,” Brent said, shaking his head, “seems you’re mad over nothing. I’m not going to be like that with Mel. I don’t care what you say.”

“You have any pictures of Mel?” Brent talked about her so often, working her into every other conversation, that Jeremiah felt he needed some point of reference.

Brent took out his phone, fingered the screen deftly and handed it to Jeremiah with a grin.

She was every bit as beautiful as Brent had built her up to be. Long waves of caramel-colored hair fell around light brown eyes and bright pink lipstick. She had four earrings in her left ear and the photo caught her in midlaugh so that even her personality seemed perfectly captured in still life—vibrant and confident and totally sure of her place in the world. She looked like the sort of person everyone else gravitated to in a crowded room. He could practically hear her laugh.