Stained Glass Eyes and Colorful Tears

2

Duke glances over at me, and upon seeing the look on my face, can clearly tell that Tony is telling the truth. He takes a step back from both Tony and I as if marriage is a disease that he's not willing to catch.

"I didn't know she was married." Duke says as he puts his hands out in front of him in a don't-hurt-me gesture.

Tony's eyes drop down to my left hand where he can clearly see my wedding ring missing from my finger. "Yeah, well, how could you?" he says to Duke, his eyes still on me. "Not like she's wearing her wedding ring."

"And why would I?" I say to Tony, trying to make myself sound as confident as I can, but we both know he's thrown me off.

Tony doesn't miss a beat. "Because we took a vow and wearing your ring comes with the territory."

"Other things come with the territory too." I retort. "Or at least were supposed to."

Tony doesn't say anything in return, he knows he has nothing to reply with, so instead of talking, Tony and I stare each other down, neither of us saying anything. I can see all the fury and conflict behind his eyes, as I'm sure my own eyes are holding too. We stare at one another with so much tension that we get lost in it for a couple of seconds. Neither of us even notice Duke slinking off.

"What the hell are you doing here?" I ask after a couple more seconds of silence.

Tony narrows his eyes at me. "What the hell are you doing here? Texas? Really? Why the hell are you in Texas?"

I can't believe he's here in front of me. When I first moved to Texas I was so paranoid, thinking I would see him. I thought that every single person who walked into the bar would be Tony until about two months in when I realized that even if he knew where I was, he probably didn't care enough to come find me. Clearly, I was wrong, because here he is standing in front of me looking pissed off.

I pull myself together, holding my head high. "Thought it was far enough from you, but I guess not."

"That's mature."

I glare at Tony. There's no way he came here all the way from San Diego just to call me immature and fight with me, right?

"If you came all the way here just to say that then you can go now."

"Alia-"

"No, don't." I snap at him. "You don't get to just show up in my life and think you can say whatever you want."

Tony scoffs at me looking offended. "Show up in your life?" he says, quoting me. "I'm your fucking husband, I'm in your life whether you like it or not."

"Well, I don't like it." I retort.

"Then you should've thought of that before you married me." he says. He sighs and runs a hand through his hair and I see the anger he's holding dissolve, his eyes softening. I realize then that he looks tired. "Can we please talk?"

I can't talk to him now. He's thrown me off so much by showing up here completely out of the blue. I can't concentrate on talking to him until I have some time to think everything through, and even then, I don't know if I want to talk to him. So, I use my best excuse.

"I'm working." I say. I take a quick glance behind me to see if anyone's at the bar, which unfortunately for me, there isn't. 

Tony notices this too. "There's hardly anyone here."

I cross my arms across my chest. "Still, I can't just leave the bar to go talk to you."

"Fine. What time are you done at?"