Denny Rontos pulled up in his black Subaru and leaned across the console and passenger seat, flinging the door open for Brynn. She climbed in with a smile, shut the door, and they were off.
"I was about to give up on you!" he started.
Brynn doubted he was serious. "Come on, I only had you waiting, what, 10 minutes?"
"It was more like 20!"
Brynn sighed. "He was in the middle of a good story."
"It's always a 'good story,'" he mocked. "You sure you're just listening to that old man prattle on?"
Brynn wrinkled her nose. "Gross. Also, he pays well. I'd probably listen to someone talk about anything for what he's paying me."
"Yeah, I guess so," Denny said, dropping the subject. "Where do you want to eat?"
"Let's check out that place you were telling me about, with the bread."
"That doesn't narrow it down."
"You kept going on about their fresh baked bread. 'Fresh baked bread! They have fresh baked bread!' I just want to remind you, Cosimo's has fresh baked bread, too."
"Yeah, but your sandwiches suck. Sorry."
"They do," Brynn sighed. "I keep telling Jake to stop using that cheap bulk deli meat and go with a premium brand. What's the point having good bread if your meat sucks?"
"I feel like there's some kind of innuendo I could make out of that, but I'm coming up empty."
Brynn giggled. In any event, he drove them to the place with the bread: Missy's Bistro. Denny got a pastrami on rye, which he only seemed to do in order to complain that it wasn't as good as the ones he got in New York. Brynn got a BLT on sourdough. For sides, Denny got a bowl of tomato soup and Brynn went with an apple. Missy's was busy for a late afternoon, forcing the two of them to squeeze into a corner table that was just barely enough space.
"So many hipsters in here," Brynn observed. "You like this place?"
"No, I come here because I hate it," Denny retorted. "It's fine. Like I said, their bread is good. Their pastrami is just--"
"Not as good as New York. I know."
"We've reached the point in our relationship where we're finishing each other's--"
Brynn reached over and snagged the pastrami sandwich, taking a bite. "Sandwiches," she said with her mouth full.
"I can't believe I'm supposed to marry this."
"Nobody's forcing you!"
"You sure you can put up with my New York elitism?"
"If you can put up with me being a snob about Chicago pizza."
"If I can tolerate your pastrami, you can tolerate my pizza. If I can find any around here."
Brynn handed his sandwich back and pushed her own around the plate a little, picking up a crumb of bacon. "You go around asking for New York pizza, you might get your ass kicked."
"You wouldn't save me?? I thought we were in an enlightened age. Men can be in distress, too!"
"I'm sure you could use your smooth New Yorker skills to talk your way out of it," she said with a wink.
Denny eyed his food but didn't seem particularly interested in it right now. "I really do want to talk about this Maxwell guy."
Brynn rolled her eyes. "Why? He talks, I get paid. Seems like a good deal to me. I did buy you a PlayStation with that money."
"I'm sorry, so I can't talk about it unless I give the console back? You're definitely worth more to me than Kratos."
She aggressively bit her apple. "Flattering! Seriously, do you think he's going to hurt me?"
"I don't know what he's going to do. I haven't even met him. But the stuff you've told me, it just gives me the creeps."
"He's like 83 years old. He gets IV infusions twice a week. He barely leaves his apartment. I don't think he's a threat to anybody."
"See, that's what I mean. Why doesn't he have a nurse do it? If he can afford to pay you 60 an hour, he can pay for a home health aide. What business do you have running his IVs? Like, isn't that illegal or something? Doing medicine without a license?"
Brynn shrugged. "I don't know. But he's asking me to do it. I'm actually not bad at it by now."
"Yeah, but... I mean, come on, B. He's demented."
"He's lucid enough," she countered.
"But the stories, they're insane. Aliens, time travel, global conspiracies. Guy's read too many pulp sci fi books and his brain is melted."
"Look, I don't think any of it is real. But it's real enough to him and he wants someone to hear it. That's all I'm there for. If it ever seems like he can't take care of himself, I'll call senior services or whatever. But he feeds and dresses himself. He keeps his place tidy. He apparently cooks. I don't know if he ever actually does any locksmithing anymore--he claims he does--but he's obviously got the money to keep himself afloat."
"The thing is, you don't know that for sure. He could be giving you his Social Security checks and falling behind on his rent and you'd have no idea."
"I actually would have an idea, because Jake owns the building, remember? I'm sure he wouldn't have me taking the guy coffee every day if he wasn't paying his rent."
Denny gave a defeated sigh. "I just don't see what's in it for you, other than the money."
"Is the money not enough for some reason?"
He leaned back in his seat. "It's just. You're spending all this time with some weird old guy. Your friends think it's weird. I think it's weird. If I told your parents about it, they'd probably think it's weird, too."
"You're not going to tell them, are you?" she asked in a threatening tone.
"See, you sound like an addict, the way you get defensive like that. Why wouldn't you want them to know?"
"I just don't think it's any of their business? I'm an adult. Jesus, Denny. There are a lot more dangerous things I could be doing than this, and you're fixated. Are you jealous, or what?"
"I'm not jealous," he hissed quite jealously. "It's just. For fuck's sake, B, it's embarrassing that you spend more time with him than you do with me."
"And if I worked 10 hours a day flipping burgers would you be jealous of my spatula? Listen to yourself."
"I'm saying, you think you're the one getting an advantage with all this. What if he's the one taking advantage? You don't know what he's doing. Maybe he's filming you the whole time so he can jack off to it later."
Brynn shook her head. "All you're proving is you have a gross imagination, dude."
By this point, people had been staring for a little while, their attention drawn by the raised voices. Brynn finally noticed, then Denny. Brynn got up and stormed out.
Denny chased after her, continuing their conversation on the sidewalk. "I just want you to acknowledge I've got real concerns here," he pleaded.
She stopped and looked him in the eye. "Denny, I get that you have concerns, but I can't run my life based on that. I'm my own person and I'm going to stay my own person, even when we're married. You're never going to have the right to make my decisions for me, get it? I will listen to you and sometimes I'll ask for your advice but I'm not going to change my life around because you don't like something."
His anger fell as he started to realize how his behavior seemed. He took a deep breath. "I'm sorry, B. You're right. I am concerned but I'm also probably overreacting. I just don't want this guy to do anything weird to you."
"I promise you, he's harmless. And if anything about that ever changed, I'd hope you would have enough faith in me to know I'd remove myself from that situation. If I felt like I couldn't, then I would ask for your help."
"OK, that's a deal, then."
They shook on it quite professionally. "Happy now?" she smirked. "Also, we totally left our food back there."
"I know," Denny said. "I kinda wanna go back for it?"
"I don't!" Brynn blurted, nearly laughing. "The bread wasn't as good as Cosimo's, by the way."
"You know they don't actually bake it there, right? It's delivered."
"I'm well aware," Brynn said, rolling her eyes. "Maybe you should tell Missy to get her bread from the same place Jake does. Is there actually a Missy?"
"I think it's some international conglomerate brand, not an actual person. Probably owned by a private equity firm or whatever."
"Mmmm, corporate bread."
"That's fucking weird, B."
"You're going to have to get used to that if you wanna live with me."
"Starting to have second thoughts, now!"
Brynn gently elbowed him in the stomach. "I'm not nearly as obnoxious as you are with the 'New York this' and 'New York that'!"
"Wow, I didn't know you found it obnoxious. Have you secretly hated me all this time??"
"I don't think it's been secret, Denny."
"Ouch! I don't know if I'm going to survive this malicious wounding. I think I need an IV..."
"I think you need an injection of shut the fuck up!"
They continued their banter as they walked toward Denny's car that was around the next corner.
Denny didn't see the delivery truck going well over the speed limit and too tightly hugging the curb. The driver didn't see him, either.
Poor Brynn saw everything.