Mag & Ricca

I don’t get it man, I mean, what the fuck?

Ricca’s low, harsh voice rumbles across the table. Her hand claims a smouldering cigarette and stuffs its filter into lips licked by Revlon’s Wine with Everything.

I mean, like, he’s single now. Right?

Mag says nothing. She watches her friend French inhale a cigarette, watches the smoke as it rolls into and back out of her mouth, then up her nostrils. She shakes her head when a waitress stops by to refill their coffee cups.

Think he’d be in’erested? I mean, you know, in you I mean. She slurps from her coffee cup. You know, I heard that Chuck did it, too,  just to get back at Kate. Can you imagine that?! Screwing your husband’s mistress?! Man what a sordid deal. I love it. So, you in’erested or what?

Mag flattens a napkin, presses it into the table.

Are you listening or what?

I heard you Mag whispers, but her eyes never leave the table top.

Smoke escapes Ricca’s mouth and twirls to the ceiling. You are really beginning to piss me off.

Eyelashes downcast to fingers shredding a napkin to pieces.

What the hell is wrong with you?

People will do the math, thinks Mag, but doesn’t say.

Mag looks across the table at Ricca who is holding a cigarette in one hand and wiping a French fry across a puddle of gravy with the other, smoothes fabric over her slightly rounded belly, and considers how much she will miss them both.

A Writers' Union of Canada (WUC) 2004 Postcard Story Competition wash-out.