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grimaced at the mascara smeared across her eyes and cheeks. God, she looked like Tammy Faye Baker. She dug into her purse and found a wad of not-too-damp tissue, and after a few dabs at her ruined makeup, began ferrying her things into the house.
    The first time Tony set foot in her home, he made a wisecrack about how the bookshelves in the living room made the place look like a library. As if having more than three books in one place was weird. Then again, the only reading material Tony had in his apartment was Car & Driver , Entertainment Weekly, and Maxim.
    She lugged the suitcase into the kitchen and dumped its contents onto the table. At least she wouldn’t have to wash his goddamned clothes anymore. She began sorting the pile with the same efficient single-mindedness her mother had given the laundry whenever she argued with dad. Socks go over here , blouses go over there . She stopped when she realized she was holding the bathrobe. The other woman’s cigarette smoke and perfume now permeated the material.
    The tears started again, and she heard the cloth rip before she realized what she was doing. After she tore the bathrobe into three large, ragged pieces, she found a pair of shears and began to frantically scissor the material into even smaller fragments. When the sobs finally died down, there were hundreds of scraps, none bigger than her thumb, scattered across the kitchen floor. She stared at the tatters for a long moment then began to gather them up, placing them in a plastic bag from the grocery store. When she picked up the last piece of robe, she stuffed the bag deep into the kitchen trash can, weighing it down with the Sunday edition of the Times-Picayune .
    After she dumped the laundry into the washer, she retrieved the bottle of Jagermeister from the freezer and retired upstairs. She needed a good long soak in the tub. And a drink. At the same time. Her bathtub was ideally suited for soaking and drinking. It dated from the 1920s, with lion’s feet and a basin deep enough to drown a platoon of Marines. As she bent over to stuff the rubber stopper into the drain, a pair of yellowish eyes greeted her.
    “Pluto! So, there you are, you good-for-nothing cat!”
    A tabby tom with a stainless white bib and socks lay curled at the bottom of the tub. The cat liked to spend warm days lounging against the smooth enamel, vacating its cool comfort only to drink from the toilet bowl, use the litter box downstairs, and snack on his favorite Nine Lives entrée.
    “C’mon, kitty, move your butt. Mama’s in no mood to play right now.”
    Charlie lifted the tabby from his resting place, dropping him onto the linoleum with an unceremonious thud. Pluto stretched and then strolled over to the door, where he began to lazily groom himself. She turned the faucets on full and tossed a handful of bath salts into the water that blasted from the tap. As she waited for the tub to fill, she moved into the master bedroom. Pluto ran ahead of her, his tail held up like a flagpole, mewling piteously.
    “Aw, shut up, cat.” She pulled her sweatshirt over her head. Pluto jumped onto the bed, heedless of the designer coverlet. “To hear you tell it, I never feed you,” she sighed, scratching the tabby behind the ears. Pluto's diesel-powered purr kicked in, sounding like an idling motorcycle.
    Charlie skinned herself free of her pants and plopped onto the bed, cradling the cat against her breasts. She noticed the red light on the answering machine next to the bed was blinking. Probably her mothercalling long distance from Atlanta, again, to remind her she still wasn’t married. The last thing she wanted to do was to listen to her mother’s digitally recorded guilt trips.
    She checked her watch then looked at the telephone again. Jerry probably hadn’t left for his evening class yet. If there was anyone she could talk to right now, it was him. She put Pluto back down and picked up the phone, hitting Jerry’s number on the speed-dial.