All right, then he wasn't having a nervous breakdown. He hadn't become a spooky, shadowy, Howard Hughes-type reclusive figure.

I might have known. James was far too practical to bother with nervous breakdowns. If they couldn't be justified in financial terms he wasn't inter- ested.

At least that meant that he hadn't been away on vacation with fatso Denise that time I called him.

What a waste of all that angst and misery.

And then the curiosity started burning a hole in me.

What had happened with James and Denise?

I knew I shouldn't ask questions, but I just couldn't help myself.

"So did she kick you out?" I asked. I tried to say it lightly but it just sounded bitter. "Gone back to Mario or Sergio or whatever his name is."

"Actually, no, Claire," said James, looking at me carefully. "I left her."

"Gosh." Bitterness seeped out through my pores. "You're making quite a habit of it. Leaving women, that is," I added viciously, just in case he hadn't understood.

"Yes, Claire, I know what you meant." His tone of voice implied that somehow he felt he was above all this. But that he was a decent guy who was prepared to indulge me.

I carried on regardless. "And, anyway, I thought a gentleman would never say that he'd left a woman. I thought it was mannerly to say that she had left you even if she hadn't."

Even I was amazed at how illogical I was being. I was aware of the edge of hysteria in my voice. But I was powerless to stop. I had no control over my runaway emotions.

"I'm not telling the whole world that I left her," he said tightly, "I'm telling you. You asked me, remember?"

"Well, why aren't you telling the whole world that you left

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her? I want you to tell the whole world that you left her," I said, a dangerous wobble in my voice. "Why should everyone know that you just dumped me--and Kate--and then think that she kicked you out? Why should she be spared the humiliation?"

"Fine, then, Claire," he said, sighing loudly at my unreasonable and irra- tional demands. "If it makes you happy I will tell everyone what happened with Denise."

"Good," I said, my bottom lip trembling like jelly.

This was awful! Where had the recovered poised Claire gone? I had tried so hard to stay completely in control with James, not to let him see how much he had hurt me, how devastated I was. But all the pain was so close to the surface. I was on the verge of cracking.

It was all so embarrassing. I was very upset and he was in control. The contrast was mortifying.

"I'm going to the ladies room," I said. Maybe I could get a grip of myself there.

"No, Claire, wait," said James as I started to stand up. He tried to grab my hand across the table.

I shook his hand away angrily. "Don't touch me," I said tearfully.

Next I'd be saying something like "You lost the right to touch me when you left me."

"You lost the right to touch me when you left me," I found myself saying.

I knew it, I just knew it! The person who had the job of writing my life's dialogue used to work on a very low budget soap opera.

But I meant it.

I wanted to hurt him badly. I wanted him to feel the same loss that I had felt. To want someone so much that it aches. And to realize that you can't have them. And most of all I wanted him to feel that it was his fault.

Who made it happen?

You did.

"Claire, please sit down," he said, letting go of my hand slowly. He was doing a good impression of looking pale and upset. For a moment I felt guilty. God, I couldn't win.

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"Relax, James," I said coldly. "I'm not going to make a scene."

He had the grace to look ashamed.

"That's not what I'm worried about," he said.

"Oh really," I sneered at him.

"Yes, really," he said, sounding a bit more patient. "Look Claire, we've got to talk."

"There's nothing left to say," I responded automatically.

Whoops! There I went again. More bloody clich�s! Honestly, I could have died. It was so embarrassing.

And I wouldn't mind but it wasn't even true. There was lots to say.

Whoa, whoa, steady, easy, hold on, hold on, I told myself. "Isn't calm and civilized discussion the game plan?" the reasonable part of my brain sweetly asked the argumentative part. "Well, isn't it?"

"I suppose so," the argumentative part grudgingly conceded. Like a surly teenager.

"Can we at least try to be in control?" asked the reasonable part.

"I must stop," I told myself, taking a deep breath. "I will stop."

"Claire," he said, trying to sound gentle--as he pawed for my hand again. "I know I've treated you badly."

"Badly!" I exploded before I could stop myself. "Ha! Badly! That's one way of putting it."

Well, so much for being reasonable and in control! In spite of my pathetic efforts to keep a lid on my emotions the gloves were well and truly off now. All pretense of being calm and grown-up and civilized had gone by the board. Well, all pretense of my being calm and grown-up and civil- ized had. He still maintained a huge amount of equilibrium.

Equilibrium was one of the things he did best.

"Appallingly, then," he conceded.

He didn't sound very contrite. He sounded as if he was humoring me.

The unfeeling bastard! How could he be so self-contained? It wasn't human.

"How could you have been so irresponsible?" I burst out. I knew that would hurt him more than anything. He could

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take accusations of unkindness, cruelty, hardheartedness on the chin. But to call him irresponsible was a low blow.

"How could you just have abandoned us? I needed you."

I ended on a high impassioned note.

A silence followed.

He sat very still--ominously still--for a moment and some kind of emotion, although not one I was familiar with, flickered across his face.

When he spoke again it became clear that a change had come over him. Something had snapped. The patience well had run dry. He had gone to fetch a packet of tolerance and the cupboard was bare.

No more Mr. Nice Guy. Not that he had been much in evidence anyway.

When he spoke it wasn't in his normal voice. But in a nasty singsong flippant tone. "Yeah," he said with a long pause between each word. "You. Certainly. Did."