CHIFOUMI

“Remember, wild cat, the Fates don't care if it's your birthday. Or maybe they do.”

Someone told me that a long time ago. No idea why it's been rattling inside my brain all day. Or maybe I do.

David sits across from me and peers out the window into the rain that keeps blurring the parking lot outside the café.

To this day, he hasn't figured out what gave him away. He always checked for lipstick marks before returning home.

What he didn't realize – and has failed to since – is that cheap perfume can be as glaring as a neon sign. As effective as DNA. And you don't need any of that expensive CSI paraphernalia to look for and analyze it. Just a nose and a keen sense of smell. David’s ex-wife had both.

The fact that she then hired me to obtain photographic evidence of David's extracurricular activities is another thing he can also go on living without ever figuring out.

“So, what do you need from me, David?”

We were never friends – just inmates who happened to sit in some of the same rooms while serving out our time in high school.

“It's about Amanda.”

“Amanda? Didn't you get divorced?”

“Amanda, my girlfriend.”

“You're dating a woman with the same name as your ex?”

David looks at me with those eyes that must have won many bulls a prize at those cattle fairs they have in the sticks and says: “She doesn't know about Amanda.”

It takes some effort not to roll my eyes. Of course Amanda 2.0 doesn't know about Amanda 1.0 – until his wife of 15 years, now happily divorced, happens to be mentioned in casual conversation by some mutual friend or acquaintance. That is going to go down well, I’m sure.

Mind you, I knew a guy who only dated women called Jessica – Jess for short – like his wife. He had a propensity for shouting out their names as he was dying and, this way, he never got it wrong. Apparently, it wasn’t that hard to find new partners either in the mid-2000s. I get it: Jessica was one of the most popular names given to baby girls born in 1980, along with Jennifer. Now that I think about it, so was Amanda.

Then, the Furies must have intervened, because he found himself smitten by the new guy at the office: a tall, handsome sales rep named Hugo.

Things went south pretty fast after that. I didn't even have to take pictures – just write down where their escapades were taking place on a piece of paper, then let the original Jess drink half the Scotch in my office and send her home in a cab afterwards. Not complaining; that's the only reason I keep that stuff in the office anyway. Never touch it myself.

Back to David and his bovine gaze still sticking to my face.

“Okay. What about Amanda-the-second?”

David presses his thick lips into a thin line before he finally mutters: “I think she might be… cheating on me.”

I try not to see the women smiling but it's hard when they insist on looking up from my coffee. Are they the Fates or the Furies? Does it even matter?

“First, the gods make you mad.” Someone told me that a long time ago, too. The same person who called me wild cat, actually. And she always won at chifoumi.

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