Chapter 1

“Parsnips?” Greg asked me.

I looked over at him from the living room couch as he in turn poked his head out from the kitchen. “Um, huh?” I said, wondering if this was some new pet name he’d thought of for me, as he was forever coming up with new ones. Last I checked, I was being referred to as Professor. FYI, I teach business at a local college. My students call me Jack or Mister Nelson. Professor makes me sound a.) old and b.) like a character in a television show. Also FYI, I am neither, though if he had to come up with anything from the latter category, I was rooting for Pepper, a la Angie Dickinson in Police Woman.

“Parsnips,” he repeated, already looking peeved with me, which was, sad to say, par for the course as of late. Par, bogie and eagle, in fact. Heck, let’s just toss in the entire golfing green and call it a day.

In any case, it wasn’t a question or a comment anyone had ever thrown my way. I squinted my eyes as I pondered this. In truth, I hadn’t a clue what a parsnip even was. Had I ever eaten one before? Would I still seem professorial if I asked what the hell one was? Did I even want to ask and risk his wrath, which consisted of him ignoring me the rest of the evening? Greg, you see, hated confrontation―though he loved being a world-class bitch.

“Just to be clear,” I asked, forcing a smile so as to divert the inevitable kerfuffle, “are you asking me if I want some with dinner?”

He matched my squint with a scowl. He started to say something, realized a fight of some kind would probably ensue, took his nine-iron and golf ball, and promptly left that aforementioned course. In other words, Professor zero, kerfuffle one. And yes, we had parsnips with our entirely silent dinner. Yuck.

***

To backtrack just a bit, Greg and I had been dating for six months. He lived down the hall from me in our high-rise, somewhat-luxury condo in San Francisco. Though for what you pay in the city by the bay, they’re all luxury. In any case, you know that expression, don’t eat where you shit? Well yeah, I knew it, too, except I’d sadly never paid it much heed. Meaning, while I would’ve loved to have broken up with Greg, I would still have to see him all too often, mainly because luxury didn’t equate to more than one elevator.

To be fair, my boyfriend hadn’t cornered the market in nonconfrontational skills. Which is to say, no, I didn’t break up with him, much as I would’ve liked to. Then again, I didn’t really have to, seeing as he finally broke up with me a mere three nights later.

“Why are we always fighting?” he asked, just before it all fell down like a giant house of cards. And yes, in San Francisco, even that would’ve gone for a small fortune.

“I’d call it silently simmering more than fighting,” I replied, uneager to provoke him―and okay, perhaps just a bit eager as well. It was an odd dichotomy. Then again, so were we.

“You know what I mean.”

I did. Fine. “Thin line between love and hate?”

“But you don’t love me and I don’t love you, so what does that leave?”

I shrugged. “Parsnips?” Sorry, it was the best I could come up with. Largely because I didn’t necessarily hate him, though that aforesaid root vegetable I could’ve forever lived without.

He sighed and tossed me his spare set of keys. “Good luck, Jack.”

He was gone before I could object. Not that I had any intention of doing just that, but it would’ve been nice to be given the option. I looked at the keys as they sat on the kitchen table. I looked at the door. I listened to the peaceful silence.

“Thank God,” I murmured, then sat their sobbing.

Call me a foolish sentimental―or just a plain, old fool―but I had invested six good months into the relationship. And I did like Greg. You know, at first. Besides, I wasn’t necessarily crying over him so much as the fact that I was once again single. That and, at thirty-five, couldn’t for the life of me find Mister Right. Mister Right Down the Hall, okay, but that’s not the same thing, is it? That’s barely a consolation prize. That’s choosing the box with the year’s worth of Spam hidden inside when you were hoping for the Mercedes behind curtain number two.

I awoke from my reverie when I heard a knock on the door. I hopped up, thinking Greg had changed his mind. I flung the door open, ready for either a good fight or a better fuck, but instead got my best friend, Monroe.

“Oh, it’s you,” I said, allowing him entrance.

“Nice to see you, too, Jack,” he said. He gazed my way as he closed the door behind him. “What’s with the waterworks? Someone die on one of your soaps?”

“Greg,” I replied.

“Greg died?!” he asked/shouted. “That mean his condo is available?!”

I laughed. “Greg did not die,” I told him. “Greg broke up with me.”

He nodded and shrugged and found himself a Coke in the fridge. “Thank God.”

“Yeah,” I said. “Been there, done that.”

He turned back my way as he downed half the can. “Then what’s with the tears? Is Greg even tear-worthy? I mean, at least you made it through Christmas, and that sweater he bought you must’ve cost a pretty penny.”