“Where do you normally go as a family?”
I laughed. “Boring places. My husband would make a horrible travel agent. And he’s afraid of flying, so we always end up in the car for days.”
Mike’s flight phobia was a long-standing joke, one that was extremely inconvenient, especially when he wanted to go to the Corn Palace in South Dakota or the Sierra Blanca Peak in New Mexico. We’d tried to make the best of it, renting giant RVs and spreading the trips out over two weeks, as we visited every small town and college friend along the way, but I was green with envy over social media friends who just jumped on a plane and were (ta-da!) in Florida that afternoon.
“Boring?” David asked. “Like what?”
“You don’t want to know.” I dangled one leg in the water and wondered if a passing shark might bite it off. We had taken his boat four miles out, to a sandbar dotted with a single palm tree. I pulled my legback onto the board. “It’s embarrassingly basic.”Basic, a term I’d heard one of Jacob’s friends use, was apparently cool and Taylor-worthy.
“I want to know.” He squeezed my hand and turned his head toward mine, arresting me with his moss-colored eyes. “I want to know everything about you.”
It was true. He listened without getting distracted or changing the subject to himself. And he absorbed everything he heard. While I couldn’t get Mike to remember our anniversary each year, David remembered that I like sunflower seeds on my salad and that I had a dentist appointment Tuesday at three.
So I told him. I told him about the annual trips we took to Winnemucca, Nevada. I told him about the time the car broke down and we stayed on an Indian reservation, and the time that Jacob got food poisoning during an overnight hike up Mexican Hat plateau, and even about how Mike sings folk songs as he drives. He laughed, and asked all the right questions, and I loved that he respected my marriage and acknowledged Mike’s presence and history in my life.
In between the true stories, I tried to inject Taylor-likely events, but surprisingly enough, David was always more interested and responsive to the normal parts of my marriage and life. Maybe, I—as Lillian—was more interesting than I knew.
Sharing the true stories made our affair feel less dirty, but maybe it shouldn’t have. I closed my eyes and tried to picture Mike, floating out in the ocean and talking about me to a younger, fitter woman, one who probably laughed at the story of when I got diarrhea while we were in Cabo, or when I embarrassed him and Jacob with a drunk karaoke rendition of “Hips Don’t Lie” by Shakira.
Dammit. The truth of the matter was, I hated the idea of Mike talking about me to her. I preferred the idea of her being clueless, with no idea that he had a child and wife. I pinned my lips together and vowed not to mention him again to David.
My chest cramped with guilt, and I rolled onto my stomach on the warm fiberglass. “Want to paddle over to the island?” I nodded toward the single palm tree, which David had already vowed to climb bare-handed.
“Let’s do it.” He shook his head and water droplets flew outward. Pulling my board toward him, he leaned over and pressed a kiss on my shoulder before pushing off toward the sandbar. I dipped my hands into the water to paddle, and I didn’t love him but I’d be lying if I said I didn’t love this new version of my life.
TWO WEEKS BEFORE THE DEATH
CHAPTER 29
MIKE
Either my wife was lying or someone else was.
I wasted three days at that damn coffee shop, stopping in at various intervals and shifts until I spoke to all of the management and barista staff. All denied knowledge of any sort of giveaway, and I got skeptical looks at the mention of a calendar. I considered bringing the actual item in, but I already looked senile. Holding a plastic bag with a partially disassembled desk calendar wouldn’t have helped.
It’s possible that the employee in question didn’t work there anymore or—and more likely—that the calendar came from somewhere else. I needed to follow Lillian more, find out if she had any new “friends,” but this was not a time when I could slack on work—not right now, not when the major players were in town and my ass was on the grill.
So I took other steps, starting with bugs in her car, at her desk, and in our bedroom. Each morning, on my way to work, I listened to the prior day’s recordings. Each evening, I looked over her phone records. So far, it was a lot of shuffling sounds and boring conversations.
Whatever it was, whoever it was, I’d find out. I always did.
CHAPTER 30
LILLIAN
David gave me a necklace with a pendant of a small golden fish. I fastened it around my neck and mentally swore to never take it off. My tan turned golden and I stopped dyeing my gray hairs, letting the sun bleach the surrounding strands.
Unlike the calendar, the necklace didn’t catch Mike’s attention. His contrite behavior continued, though there were moments when I could sense his growing annoyance with my newfound independence.
Good. I was glad he was frustrated. I’d spent the last year clinging to him while he went on “business trips” and secretly dated someone else. Just because he had been caught and supposedly ended it, that didn’t mean I had to instantly forgive him.
I liked his new pursuit and courtship of me. Was it wrong for me to allow it? Sam thought so. There were times I agreed with him and times I didn’t care. So what if I was also guilty? Unlike him, I had never spent the night with David, or spent money on him, or lied for months on end. I’d had only six weeks with David. Six weeks and sex twice.
The sex wasn’t satisfying. That was the only missing piece of our equation. It was awkward, being naked with a new person. Mike knew my body, each button and how I liked it pressed. We’d learned those buttons together, over years and countless experiences. David had a veryrough, caveman style that was filled with vocal declarations, sweat, and his version of passion—which was very different from Mike’s. The night David gave me the fish necklace, I pulled Mike to me in bed, and he moved on top without hesitation, my underwear dragged down, our bodies meeting in quiet harmony. His hands had rested on either side of my head as he thrust, and then I’d rolled over and he lay on top of me, his breath huffing in my ear. There had been another minute of thrusts, and then he was done.
Not a word between us.
I’d rolled back to my side of the bed, and he’d returned to his, and it had been exactly what I’d needed. Not an Olympic event, not even longer than six or seven minutes. Perfect.