Nevertheless, the presumption gets under my skin, leaving me itchy, my muscles tensed. Some small rational part of me knows I shouldn’t give in to irritation. “I said I would do it, and I did,” I say instead, matching her spite for spite.
Katrina looks up.
I meet her gaze. Undoubtedly, she caught the bite in my tone. She narrows her eyes.
The heat is getting to us, warping our rapport into unpleasant shapes. There’s something combustible in the room. Our responses have grown clipped, irritation creeping into every glance shared over the computer. It happens from time to time, when we’re feeling deadline pressure, or when something’s not working in the book, or even just when one of us hasn’t slept well. There are a hundred little reasons that can add up to tension like this. Combined with living every minute of every day with each other, it’s a test some marriages can’t pass. Which, ultimately, isn’t a bad comparison. What Katrina and I have is not far off from a marriage. Cooped up in this hot house, we’re starting to sound like squabbling spouses.
I try to refocus on my screen. It doesn’t work. Irritated, I unstick my shirt from the sweat of my back, hating the sensation. In moments like this, even mundane irritations—the sensation of damp fabric, the clock innocently displaying 3:29 p.m. in the corner of my screen—become monstrously frustrating.
I know the effect my words will have before I say them. I can’t help myself, though. I’ve heard people compare fights to fire. It’s the wrong metaphor. Flames flourish with space, openness, room to breathe, kindling to feed them. Fights come from the opposite—from pressure, restraint, deprivation. What I need is to open a release valve and vent some of this pressure.
“I did want to make one more change, though,” I say.
Katrina’s eyes swivel to me, suspicious. Rightly so, with how I didn’t even try to sound casual. Katrina and I write layered dialogue every day. She knows subtext when she hears it. “Oh?” she shoots back.
“I cut the opening conversation.”
Her hands fall from her laptop, her expression slackening with displeasure. “You’re joking,” she says humorlessly.
I’m morbidly glad to have caused this reaction. There’s something grimly fulfilling in pushing us in exactly the wrong direction. I rarely feel this way with Melissa—it’s hard to imagine how I could, when our infrequent “fights” consist pretty much only of spats over who loaded the dishwasher the wrong way or who forgot to buy more milk. It’s something to be grateful for, I know. “It’s dragging,” I insist, prodding Katrina on purpose. “I told you already.”
To paraphrase Tolstoy, every writing partnership clashes in its own way. One of Katrina’s and my persistent disagreements is on pace. While my cowriter likes to paint in the details of life, I prefer to begin where things really begin. In reopening the discussion, I’m playing hopscotch in a minefield.
Kat shifts her laptop to the floor. The glare she sends me is deadly. “And we discussed keeping it if we made other changes. We agreed. What the hell was our entire conversation for yesterday if you can just change your mind?”
Distantly, I know her point isn’t unreasonable. I just know I’m right, which fuels me past whatever remorse I might feel for overriding our decision. Now, while we’re on edge with each other, is as good an opportunity as any to have this out.
“It doesn’t work,” I say. “I’m sorry, Katrina. We’re cutting it.”
“You’re not sorry,” she snaps. “You didn’t even ask. You just made the decision on your own, again, and I’m supposed to, what? Accept it? I have opinions, too, you know.”
“Oh, I know.” The comment slips out of me. It’s uselessly unkind enough to make me pause, recomposing myself. “Can we please cut it?” I ask, gentler.
Her eyes linger on me a moment longer, her mouth hard set. Finally, she shakes her head. “Whatever. Whatever you want, Nathan,” she says. She picks up her computer, but I know we’re far from finished.
Moments pass, the temperature in the room shifting up a degree. I never know which is worse, war or a stalemate. Right now, I can’t distract myself from the unpleasantries we haven’t yet said. I can only wait, reading the same lines on my computer over and over.
It’s perverse relief when Katrina speaks. “By the way”—her voice is cold—“your metaphor at the bottom of twenty-five is forced.”