A Tight Leash

“I’m feeling restless, Max.”

Max was older, wiser, Danny’s go-to guy when he was feeling out of control, like he had been lately. He’d been waiting for this video chat all week.

“What do-ya mean, restless?” Max asked.

Danny looked around for Linda to make sure she wasn’t listening, then leaned in. “Crazy. Like something’s missing.”

“What’s missing?”

“I don’t know. I feel like wandering.”

“Wandering? You mean, like, a trip with no destination?”

“Maybe. Or maybe a trip with a destination.”

“Where do-ya wanna go, Kid?”

“I don’t know!” Danny answered impatiently. “Hence, the term wander. I want to roam.”

“Roam your ass over here. Linda and Jane can chat and we can wander together. Go downtown, maybe find some good street tacos.”

Street tacos did sound good, but Danny wasn’t sure they would fill the void.

“I don’t want Linda knowing about this. I’ve heard her talking lately. She doesn’t approve of my . . .” Danny trailed off.

  “Your what?” Max asked.

“My urges,” Danny whispered.

“What urges, man?” Max whispered back, something about the word urges seemed to require it. “What is it you’re after?”

“I don’t know, Max, that’s the trouble! I feel like I have too much energy and nowhere to put it. I’m needing something more, lately, more than Linda, more than this . . .”

“Dude. I know what this is.”

“What is it?”

“It’s your age. I went through the same thing when I was your age.”

“Well, don’t keep me in suspense, Max. How’d you get through it?”

“Well . . . Jane is a lot more forgiving than Linda.”

“You got that right.” Linda was always on Danny’s ass. Do this. Do that. Don’t do this. Don’t do that. She barely let him sit on his own couch. “How’d you get through it, though?”

Max leaned in. “I gave in to the urges, man.”

“What’d you do?”

“I wandered. I roamed. I strayed.”

“You went out on Jane?”

“She didn’t even know.”

Danny glanced at Linda. She was in the kitchen cooking steaks. 

“I don’t know, Max. Linda’s a good woman.”

“Jane’s a good woman! But, sometimes we need more, man. We’re a different breed. We come from different stock. They’re content with their sidewalks and their picket fences. We still have a bit of wild in us! Wild they never had. You need an adventure.”

“Time to eat, Danny,” Linda called from the kitchen. Danny sniffed. The woman sure knew her way around a steak.

“What’d she make?” Max asked.

“Steak,” Danny admitted, olfactory nerves quickly reminding him how hungry he was. 

Max let out a low whistle. “Linda’s steak’s the best, man. Not every woman can cook like that. You need an adventure, but . . . be careful, man. I wouldn’t want to fall out of Linda’s good graces.”

Danny heard Linda’s footsteps marching into the living room. She tapped the screen to disconnect the call, and he allowed himself a quick moment of irritation before bolting to the kitchen for his dinner. 

***

“How’s your restlessness?” Max asked.

“Same.”

“Have you followed my advice? Gone for an adventure?”

“She won’t let me out of her sight.”

“Man, she’s got you by the short hairs.”

“Exactly.”

“How long you been with her now?”

Nine months? Ten, maybe? “Going on a year,” he said.

“That’s nothing in the grand scheme of things. Are you sure she’s the one?”

“Definitely. She’s definitely the one. I love her with my whole heart. It’s just . . .”

“I know man. Urges.”

Danny sighed. His loyalty was divided. Linda was perfect. And yet . . .

“If I could slip out one night, you want to join me?”

“Please, Danny. You’ll never defy Linda.”

“I might.”

“You follow her every command like a well-trained dog. Sit, Danny. Stay, Danny. Come, Danny. Does she make you beg too?”

“Shut it, Max.” Danny never talked to Max this way. Max was tough, from the South Side. But Danny had been so irritable lately. He wasn’t sure if he felt defensive of Linda or his own pride.

“Aw, I’m just giving you a hard time, kid. Every relationship has strange dynamics at times.”

“Even you and Jane?”

“Jane and I are different, man, you know that.”

Danny sighed. He did know.

***

“I’ve said too much, Max.”

“You haven’t said anything at all.” The video chat had just connected.

“To Linda.”

“Oh no, man. What’d you say?”

Danny thought back to their conversation. It wasn’t so much his words as his actions afterward. He had strayed. By the time Linda found him, he was three sheets to the wind at a house across town, cozied up in the backyard with a beautiful blonde—curvy in all the right places, legs to heaven—that had been some adventure. 

“Let’s just say I made my desires known.”

“What’d she say?”

“She’s been on the phone ever since then. Consulting her mom, her sister, her friends . . . every female in the tri-state area.”

“She hasn’t called Jane.”

“That’s because she knows Jane’s opinion on it. Knows Jane actually lets you keep your balls.”

Max chewed on a stick of beef jerky like a cigar, “Yeah . . . My Jane’s a rare breed.”

“Why can’t they all be Janes?”

“So . . . what are you gonna do?”

“What can I do? Besides try to get it out of my system before it’s too late.”

“Go get 'em, Tiger.”

“Danny, dinner,” Linda interrupted from the kitchen. 

“She’s still cooking for you,” Max said. “She can’t be too mad. What’d she make tonight?”

Danny sniffed. “Lamb.”

Max chewed the jerky harder. Everyone knew how good Linda’s lamb was. “Man, I’d love some of that. I’d almost give my right nut for Linda’s lamb.”

“But would you give both of 'em?”

Linda cut off the call before Max could answer.

***

“Oh, man. She really did it, didn’t she?” Max asked.

“Did what?”

“Had you . . . I can’t even say it.”

“Had me what?” Danny was confused.

“How’re you feeling, man?”

“Great! I feel great! So good! Fantastic, really! How are you, Max?”

Max ignored the question. “What about your restlessness?”

“Restlessness?”

“Your desire to wander?”

“Where would I go? Linda’s making steak! You wanna come over? Come over, Max! Have steak with me and Linda! Bring Jane! I love Jane!”

“Jane’s my woman, Danny,” Max growled, but he knew Danny’s urges had been fixed. The giant cone around his head, which Danny didn’t even seem to notice, said it all.