A LOUD NOISErattles me awake. It seemed like a boom or a blast, something that my whole body felt. I sit up, check the clock on the wall. Two forty-five. Fuck, fuck, fuck!
I peer in my bag, claw around for my phone. No texts from Graham, thank god. Hopefully he’s asleep. My tongue is thick in my mouth, and my pulse jitters through my body. I’m both hungover and still drunk. I fish in my purse for my bottle of water, slug half of it.
I stand. A mistake. My stomach lurches and I feel like I’m going to be sick. But I’ve got to get out of here.
I’ve got to get home to my stable and truly good Graham, my center of gravity.
I’ve got to get home to my honey-skinned Jack, who deserves far better than this.
I’ve got to stop this thing with Margot: Anything else will lead to madness.
I stand again and the room wavers, but I walk the few steps up into the kitchen. I’m filling my water bottle at the tap when I hear a loud banging at the front door.
I go to the door and wrench it open. It’s Callie, wild haired and sweaty, a searing look in her eyes.
“Have you seen Margot?” she asks, her words slurring as if she, too, continued to drink this whole time.
“She’s not here,” I simply say. “I just woke up.”
Callie narrows her eyes at me and sighs before pushing the rest of the door open, stepping around me.
She scans the kitchen and great room, then heads down the darkened hall. She’s obviously been somewhere stewing this whole time about me staying behind with Margot alone; she can’t handle it.
I remain standing in the doorway, unsure of what to do with myself. After an apparent sweep of the back rooms, Callie weaves her way through the great room, eyes cutting me before she slides past me again.
She bolts back to her car, which I notice is the only one in the driveway other than mine. Her tires grate against the gravel as she tears away.
I shut the front door behind me, not bothering to lock it, and climb inside theHighlander.
35
IT’S WELL AFTERthree a.m. by the time I turn down our street. It’s still pitch-black out, dark as an unlit hallway, but instead of heading straight home, I park at the entrance to the jogging trail.
I know it’s not the smartest move, my being alone on the trail at this hour, but I’ve got to clear my mind. I need to sort myself out before I face Graham and Jack.
I change out of my dress and boots in the front seat and into some jogging clothes and sneakers I always keep stashed in the back.
The night has cooled away the dank heat from earlier and it feels refreshing to be out here with puffs of sharp air pinging my face as I run.
Fingers of moonlight leak through the pines, and as I jog up a steep incline, I see a pool of fog beneath me, hovering over the dips in the trail. I run. I run and drift through the fog like a plane dipping into low-hanging clouds. I run until the sweat leaches out of every pore, until my whole body smells like it’s been bathed in booze, until my calf muscles burn as though they’ve been zapped by cattle brands.
I run farther on the trail than I ever have, until it dead-ends on a quietstreet. My lungs are stinging as I take in huge breaths of early-morning air, but my body is flooded with endorphins, and for the first time in what seems like weeks, I can step outside of Margot’s hold and think clearly.
I crossed a line tonight. I know I did, and it was so stupid of me. And more than that, dangerous. What if Graham were to ever find out? I can’t even hold that thought in my head because if I were to lose him, I’d lose everything. I’m disgusted with myself, but at least things didn’t go any further with Jamie or Margot. They certainly could have.
I turn and head back to the house, and it seems as if I can’t run fast enough. Even though I’m hoping Graham’s asleep, I can’t get home quickly enough.
And when I step through the back door, I know what I’ll do.
I’ll leave the boys asleep while I shower in the guest bath, so as not to wake them. I’ll turn on the waffle iron and make batches of cinnamon waffles with berries and a heaping side of bacon. I’ll make Jack’s favorite drink—strawberry milk—and I’ll somehow slip out of Margot’s narcotic grip over me and be a part of their lives once more. It will be as if this whole thing never happened.
36
Saturday, April 14, 2018
IT’S AFTERNOON. SUNLIGHTbeams through the kitchen window, warming the square of countertop where I stand smashing garlic heads with the blunt back of a kitchen knife.
I’m making one of Graham’s favorite pasta dishes: toasted garlic tossed with cherry tomatoes and a coating of lemon zest on top.
