This isn't weird.

Infinity Points

  "Shit. I'm sorry, I'm so fucking sorry. I would never have—"

"Stop apologizing, Paul," Millie said, giving his shoulder a half-hearted swat. "You couldn't have known. It was a really sweet gesture." They were seated next to one another on the edge of the bed in her motel room, but now she stood up and walked to the window, peering through the blinds at nothing in particular as a feeble excuse to avoid eye contact for a moment or two. The stormy evening had morphed into a clear, chilly night, and she found herself wondering what Rebecca was doing at that moment. Was she with Noah, play-acting happy family for their daughters? Or was she all on her own for the night in some expensive hotel room? She imagined her standing alone on a balcony, smoking cigarettes in a silk dressing gown, her elbows resting on the railing as she stared listlessly down over the city below.

The scene struck Millie as rather depressing, so she erased it, instead painting over it with Rebecca perched demurely on a stool in a swanky hotel bar, spine straight, ankles crossed, a martini glass resting in her lithe, perfectly manicured fingers, courtesy of some flirtatious stranger. Millie tried to picture him, a man worthy of Rebecca's company for the night, but no matter how many details she added (tall, well dressed, educated, English accent—feminist James Bond, maybe?) her mind couldn't seem to conjure an image suitable for the job.

"That guy fucking sucks," Paul said, distracting Millie from her reverie. "I can't believe I wasted my time reading three hundred pages of his shitty book."

Millie turned back toward him with a sigh. "He was twenty-two," she replied, realizing as she said it that the excuse couldn't possibly carry the same weight to a nineteen-year-old. "I mean, he still sucks, but he's not a bad person, and it's not a shitty book. You should finish it."

"Oh, please. Maybe it starts off seeming like it might be interesting, but by chapter eight the female lead just kind of forgets her own arc? And everything just revolves around that smarmy bard character. And once he's gone, it's like, what's the point? She's not doing anything. She basically only existed to distract the hero from his quest for a few chapters, and once he ditches her she's just this passive observer wandering around so he has an excuse to tell short stories about more interesting characters. She hasn't even had any dialogue for the last, like, sixty pages—"

"You're an active reader, huh?" Millie said with a rueful smile. "Just finish it. Trust me."

Paul crossed his arms with an ambiguous grunt. "So... are you going to go through with it?"

"I don't know. I mean, I said I would, but I thought she meant we'd get it over with tonight." She folded her hands together behind her neck and began to pace. "I don't even know where she's planning to take me. And why does it matter what I wear? What are we gonna do, have brunch? This is fucked up. His wife picking me up at my fucking motel. It's fucked up, right?"

"Pretty fucked up," Paul agreed.

"But I did say I would do it. Do you think I should do it?"

Paul looked down, tugging mindlessly at a loose thread in the fringe in his scarf as he considered his answer. "If I were in your situation, I would say... Tonight would have me fucked up for a long time, regardless of what happens next. So, if it were me, knowing I was going to be fucked up by it for the forseeable future, anyway, I would do it. At least then there's a chance to get some kind of closure out of it. And if she's serious about the money... Thirty thousand dollars? I'd do a lot worse for a lot less."

"Thirty thousand dollars," Millie repeated. "For one conversation. Why would she offer that much? It feels... off."

"Isn't it obvious?"