8...

“And how’s Mike?” She asked with a tone that betrayed her disdain.
“He’s fine,” Frank said with a sigh and a cloud of smoke. “What did you need Mary?”
“Nothing really. I ran into Lou Deeds the other day. Remember he was that really nice guy with the Dalmatian puppy who lived downstairs from me?”
“Uh-huh.”
“And remember his girlfriend Alexis?”
“Uh-huh.”
“Lou said she just up and left one day. Got in her car and never came back.”
Frank closed his eyes and tilted forward a little bit. He was dizzy with what felt like new fluid coursing through channels in his head. He was left grasping for whatever emotion would come floating by first, and wouldn’t you know it, here comes that typical feeling of annoyance.
“What does that have to do with me?” Frank asked with what felt like calm.
“Nothing. Isn’t it weird though?”
“Yeah, it’s fucking freaky.” He said with staged emotion.
Mary went silent and Frank took a surreptitious hit off of his cigarette. He remembered a time that he had walked into Mary’s room and found her standing in the center, staring at nothing and crying as Automatic For The People by R.E.M. played in her CD player. He felt bad for losing his cool.
“Alexis never really seemed too stable to me. Is Lou doing okay?”
“Yeah,” Mary sort of mumbled. “I guess it happened about five months ago, so he’s all right.”
She seemed mollified enough, and continued talking for about another forty-five minutes. Stories of shopping for clothes and what her old sorority sisters are up to issued out of the telephone receiver and Frank threw in a “yup” or a “you betcha’” when it seemed like it was needed. He went through four cigarettes and pantomimed an entire conversation with his roommate Bryan. Frank finally told her that he had to get up early tomorrow and that he needed some sleep, and after promising that he would call soon he hung up the phone.
He did sort of wonder about Alexis. She was, as he had said, not necessarily stable, but he hoped that she was at least doing okay. Frank had tried to listen to signs in Mary’s voice to see if she might know something, but he didn’t think she knew even now that about a year and a half ago Frank and Alexis had had a sordid little affair.