Decameron: 0m Away [V/10]
“Can you believe Eric’s wife actually thought she could cheat on him in quarantine?” Pietro asked Mary between bites.
“Ridiculous,” Mary agreed.
“Like where was she going to hide him? Their house is like three rooms.”
“Unbelievable,” said Mary.
“Apparently they met on Tinder, or something. She must have thought Eric would be on the phone with me in the living room long enough for her to get him in and out.” Pietro paused in his recounting and took a long, reflective sip of wine. Was it his imagination, or was Mary sweating slightly…?
“He wouldn’t have ever known, either, if the guy hadn’t sneezed so loud,” he went on. “There was cat fur or something under the bed where he was hiding.” Yes, she was definitely sweating over something, Pietro decided. “Anyway, that’s why I came back from my call with him so much earlier than expected.”
“It’s just outrageous,” Mary announced, stabbing her potato a little too vigorously with her fork. “That woman should be ashamed of herself. What a thing to--”
From the other room, muffled slightly, came a yelp.
“You didn’t tell me you had a turtle!” came a disgruntled whine a beat later.
Pietro stood fluidly and stalked into the bedroom while Mary hurried after him, arms abuzz, rushing out explanations.
“Look, it’s not what you think-- he’s just a friend, I would have told you--”
Pietro paused in the bedroom door. Woefully poking out from under the bed was a-- there was no other word for it-- himbo, with a tragic expression on his face. He was clutching his finger and eyeing their turtle, Lucifer, with a wary expression. Lucifer looked unaffected.
Wordlessly, Pietro turned to Mary and put his hands on his hips.
“So, I-- ” she started, gave up, tried again. “You see-- uh…. Cheryl, told me about her app--”
Pietro raised an eyebrow and looked down at the himbo. There was something about him....
“It was just-- uh… I… I mean, we have talked about something like this before--”
Pietro held up a single finger to silence her. His attention was fully directed at the himbo now. He knew him.
“I know you,” he said. Wordlessly, he pulled out his phone and flicked open Grindr. Sure enough, he was there. 0 meters away.
Awareness dawned on the himbo’s face, too.
“Beard guy,” he said, slowly. Then, excited: “Beard guy!” He pointed at Pietro with a happy smile.
“Beard guy?” asked Mary cooly, suddenly composed again.
“We have talked about something like this before,” Pietro said back smoothly. “Looks like you beat me to actually doing something about it.”
The himbo turned to Mary. “You know him, Red-Haired lady?”
“We’re married,” Mary shot back at him. She paused, but only for a second. “But we know how to have a good time.”
She looked at Pietro. He looked at her. The himbo looked at both of them, head turning to each of them one at a time, then smiled in a perfect, adorable, totally empty-headed way.
It turned out, wonderfully, that he knew how to have a good time, too.
Decameron is a newsletter recounting the 14th Century set of quarantine tales for 2020. Read the original story.
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