Are you in an open marriage? Brad Pitt can help you determine the answer to that question.
“Is that Brad Pitt?” I heard his booming voice over my shoulder.
“Gosh, Gerry, you scared me,” I exhaled. Walking from the plane’s galley, he came up behind my chair while I was looking at Pinterest on my laptop. He’s sneaking up on me now? He walked past me and sat across from me, in the seat facing me.
“You wait until I leave and you look up pictures of Brad Pitt?” he asked.
“No, I look at Brad Pitt whenever he comes into my timeline, your proximity is irrelevant,” I responded.
“Irrelevant?” Gerry asked, not really believing what he was hearing. “Wasn’t he involved in a threesome?” he asked with a disgusted smirk on his face.
“Technically, he was dating a woman in an open marriage. If Brad Pitt hit on your wife, you’d find out you were in an open marriage, too,” I said, scrolling and not looking at my husband. It was so hard not to laugh but I just had to look up and see his face. I’m glad I looked because Gerry was mouthing the words ‘Oh my gosh’. I smiled at him and he picked up his phone.
“The Lord knows when you’re looking at Sports Illustrated, Gerry,” I said, biting my lip. He grunted without looking up and I laughed right out loud as a little smile overtook his mouth.
"Babe, those models have nothing on you,” he responded without looking up.
“You are such a pretty liar, Mr. Frey. Anyway, my assets are too Rubenesque for me to be a swimsuit model.” Gerry stopped scrolling and looked up, no doubt wondering if he should say anything. Then he looked down at my assets and shook his head.
“No, they’re just right.”
“My eyes are up here, Gerry.”
He looked me in the eyes then. “I know where your eyes are but that’s not what I’m looking at.” A serious demeanor overtook him then, as if he were estimating a new building project or scoping out a movie scene that he was about to shoot.
“I’d like to take a picture of you on the beach, Wife.”
“Why don’t we just make a home movie?” Gerry shifted in his seat, thinking. And then he did it again, mouthed the words ‘Oh my gosh’ and I laughed. Then he remembered how this conversation started.
"Brad Pitt, huh?" he asked again.
"You know why it's funny, Gerry?" I asked and he shook his head, not seeing the humor. "Because Brad Pitt isn't real."
"I happen to know he is real," he informed me.
"Not to me. To me, he's just a picture on a movie screen, in the abstract. I'm also not visualizing having sex with him or anyone besides you. Maybe that's what you do with Sports Illustrated, but it's not what I do."
"Mare," he said, his voice growing soft. "I have no need of Sports Illustrated or any other visual. I have you. How could an image on a piece of paper be better than the real thing?"
"Same, my love," I said, smiling at him.
Copyright Mare Loch 2022 © Excerpt from Orange Grove: The Reformation of a Midlife Wife by Mare Loch. All rights reserved.
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