Pro and Con

Connotation Press 2013

Twice she tried the same con and both times I parried with a laugh and a “Nice try”, but I knew Maggie would keep coming at me with ways to con me. It was her nature, in her DNA, but I believed I had what she didn’t—street smarts.

Understand, it wasn’t always gifts or money she wanted and she knew all she had to do was ask but that gave her no satisfaction. Conning me and others gave in to her cravings.

It’s true that I was addicted to her and it’s most likely also true that she cared for me but not to the same extent. I considered letting her pull off a con but I realized that she would know and that would end “us” as a couple so I wasn’t willing to try to run a con on her.

We were having a good run, coming up to our year anniversary together when she told me she was going to take off for a week and go look at the fall colors in Vermont. “Our colors here in Connecticutare just as vibrant,” I said. “Yes,” she said. “But I need a fall color fix now andVermontis ahead ofConnecticutby two weeks.”

She turned down my suggestion that we go together. “That would defeat the purpose,” she said.

“And what purpose might that be,” I asked.

“My needs,” she said.

And so Maggie packed her duffel and prepared to drive off leaving a chill floating between us by my feelings and not her actions. She did her best to be extra loving the last couple of days but I was hurt and petulant and couldn’t pull off acting as if this were no big thing. I imagined so many scenarios of her going off;  picking up her lover on the way, meeting a new lover in Vermont and the scenario of her not going to Vermont at all but shacking up in town for a week that I didn’t, not for one second, think that she might be trying to run a con on me.

I carried the duffel out to her car and just before she got in I told her that I loved her and asked why don’t we get married and both go toVermonton our honeymoon. I showed her the ring I’d purchased several days earlier and she held out her ring finger and I slid it on. She smiled and gave me a peck on the lips.

And before I could say another word she walked back to the house and up to the front door, all the time looking at the light bouncing off her new diamond. She closed and locked the front door and I popped the trunk to put her bag in and saw my carry-on, nestled nicely, waiting for its honeymoon trip to Vermont.