‘You’re lying!’ I got up – a eureka moment. I brandished my sudoku accusingly at her. ‘You don’t fantasise about me. You’re just trying to distract me while you pocket pieces of my fruit!’
‘Ha, ha!’ Anna lunged toward me, ripped the sudoku away. ‘Give me a tomato!’
‘You’re mad!’ We scuffled.
‘Gimme that back! Give me my sudoku!’
‘It’s the reason she doesn’t love you,’ sang Anna. She flung the magazine out a window. ‘It’s your sudoku!’
I threw a tomato at her. ‘There’s a reason you won gold at the tosser Olympics!’
She pegged an orange. ‘You’d win too if you weren’t such a slave to your wife!’
We stopped, breathless, on the carpet.
‘Do you want to kiss me?’ she said.
‘Anna, hand me back that fucking tomato or I’m going to tear your eyes out.’
‘You do want to kiss me, don’t you?’
She had me by the throat, literally and otherwise.
‘Anna … nothing will ever happen between us. I’ll make you a deal: I’ll pay you the attention you deserve if you stop interfering with my relationship.’
Her head froze, eyes widening a fraction. She got up, paused dramatically. ‘Remember that time I was suspended from school?’
‘They caught you in home ec stealing rice bubbles,’ I said drily.
‘You’d dobbed on me to old Montague.’
‘Yes, and my legs still hurt from that detention.’
‘That’s why the stealing. Payback.’
I frowned, did a double take. ‘That’s not …’ A pause. ‘Oh my god,’ I said. ‘You’re right.’
‘The bicycle, the food, the Vanity Fairs…’ she counted off.
‘You what?’ I blenched.
‘I secretly hold it against you.’ She was covered in sweat from our struggling. She went to the sink and poured a glass of water. ‘Ivan, I’m glad we worked it out.’
‘You’re binning my Vanity Fairs! Those cost thirty dollars!’
‘I trade them with the neighbour,’ she declared proudly, ‘for lingerie.’
I index-fingered her face. From the chaos emerged one distinct fact. ‘You are fucking my uncle.’
‘He wants you to call.’