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question is rhetorical, but then when Rita says, “ Do you?” Mary Alice dutifully responds, “No. How long has it been?”
    “Well, it’s been seven months ,” Rita says. “Isn’t that ridiculous?”
    Mary Alice does not find this ridiculous. But, “ Wow! ” she says. And then, “I’m sure he’ll call you.”
    “Oh, I hope so. And if he does, promise me you’ll stay with Einer? I don’t want to turn him down on the first date; I want to say yes to any night he proposes. Will you promise?”
    “I promise,” Mary Alice says. It’s a pretty safe bet she won’t have any other plans.

FOUR
    P ETE D ECKER HAS JUST CHEATED ON HIS MISTRESS WITH HIS wife, Nora. Now he sits at her kitchen table, watching her scramble eggs for him. Her ass shakes in that unattractive way that used to practically nauseate him, but now he sees it as comforting. And this woman knows how to scramble eggs, as opposed to Sandy, the woman he’s been living with for the last three and a half months. That one makes scrambled eggs that come out like hard little yellow balls. He dropped Sandy off at the day spa this morning so that she could have her stress relieved. Though what she has to be stressed about, he has no idea. All she does is read magazines and natter on to her girlfriends and watch The Housewives this and The Housewives that and shop. On his dime. What a terrible mistake he has made. His kids will hardly speak to him, his office mates talk behind his back, and he’s having an increasingly hard time getting it up. Never thought it would happen to him. Never! Not so young, anyway—he’s only fifty-nine! (Though he’s told Sandy he’s fifty.) His dad was sticking it to them when he was eighty— he got laid the day before he died !
    Well, Pete’s not taking those damn boner pills. One reason is, he heard those things don’t always work; two, they can cause vision and hearing loss. Wouldn’t that just be perfect: he’d take a pill to amp up his sex life and end up with the trifecta of turnoffs. He’d be a limp-dicked guy, squinting into somebody’s face and yelling, “ WHAT’s that? ”
    Another reason he’s not taking those pills is that it turns out Sandy’s not worth it. If only he’d known that she drew on her eyebrows and wore false eyelashes, that she went to bed with purple crap on her face every night, that the vacuousness he had initially found so charming—such a relief !—would so soon wear thin. He’d only been living with her for two weeks when she got lazy about her appearance. The truth is, Sandy is a slob and a slacker. If you suffer under the illusion that all women are natural-born housekeepers, well, just come over and have a look at their place. They’d probably get evicted if anyone ever saw the kitchen or the bathroom. Sandy is great-looking, no one can deny that. Built, too, oh, sweet Jesus, built! But a slob and a slacker and a bore. What a terrible mistake he has made.
    Nora puts the eggs down in front of him, perfect, fluffy eggs accompanied by the kind of bread that’s good for you but tastes good anyway, and a little bowl of fresh fruit all cut up nice. “Thanks,” he says. “Sandy mostly gives me Pop-Tarts.”
    “Well,” Nora says. “Her cooking is not why you moved in with her. And you know, you could try cooking yourself sometimes.”
    It frustrates Pete, the way Nora defends Sandy, frustrates and mystifies him. He supposes it’s really a way of getting back at him, a way of saying You made your bed . But still, shouldn’t a wife be bitter and outraged about a mistress? Nothing’s working out the way he thought it would!
    “How are the kids?” he asks. He can’t look at her when he asks this. It hurts too much.
    “Didn’t Katie call you?”
    “She might have; I haven’t looked yet today to see if I have any cellphone messages.” This is a lie; he has looked, he’s always looking, but his kids never call. If he wants to talk to them, he has to be the one to place