The wife goes on a work trip. The husband sometimes whines a little bit when the wife goes on work trips, sweet complaints of missing her. The wife always tells him to go out with friends, make plans. Or you know, come with me. He’s done that once in the ten years she’s had the job. Wait, maybe twice? On the one or two visits, they cover what’s to be done in Palm Springs to his satisfaction, a gallery or two, a hike in Joshua Tree, Noah Purifoy’s outdoor museum, though in her view maybe what’s actually to be done in Palm Springs is to hang out and relax with a book by the pool while she’s in class and then hang out with the wife and her friends at the end of her workday, for a few days. We can’t afford it, I can’t take off work, someone has to stay with the dog, whatever. These things are true. So once in a while he’ll go to a movie with a friend during those ten-day trips while she’s away, maybe a gallery show, otherwise he mostly goes to work and comes home and stays up late watching TV until she gets home. Anyway, this last time she’s away, the client and two other newer friends take the husband out for a belated birthday dinner.
What do you think about my friendship with her? the husband asks the wife.
I’m glad you have a friend. I think she likes you, she says.
The wife is glad the husband is going out. She jokes with her coworkers that her husband is out with his girlfriends. One of them is seventy-five. One of them is married. One of them has a crush on the husband. She isn’t worried. Her husband loves only her.