“It doesn’t matter.”
“Doesn’t it? If the error’s here too, we need to know. We have the same obligations. Maybe they were in the middle of dealing with it themselves.” And maybe this Mallory’s way of dealing with it was to kill Grayson. Maybe that’s what her Mallory is afraid to find out.
“Then we letthemdeal with it,” Mallory says. “We don’t belong here.”
But we are hereis all Ilena can think. And that comes with certain responsibilities. As she wraps her hands around the armsof the wheelchair they’re about to put Grayson in, she stares at the outline of the ring on her finger, grateful she left the emerald one at Felix’s. She wouldn’t want anything to happen to it. It’s how she felt about the opal from Jonah. It had been a family piece. For the first few years of their marriage, the only way she’d wear it was with tape on the back.
She’d meant to take the opal off after they agreed to the divorce, to tuck it away in the box where Jonah kept his cuff links and the old credit cards he was meaning to cut up but never got around to, but she hadn’t. It had been on her finger, just like it had been for the past thirteen years, before she woke up here.
From the purse at her feet comes the same sound that woke her that morning. She pulls out her phone. “Felix,” she says.
“You have to answer it,” Mallory says.
Ilena takes a deep breath and offers a generic “Hello,” not knowing if she and Felix share a special greeting like “hey, babe” or “hi, sweetie” or “hello, you.” She and Jonah don’t. In fact, she can’t remember the last time Jonah called instead of texted her.
“How’s the singleton doing?” Felix uses the term for a single fetus that must be their nickname for the baby.
“Good.”
“Just good?” The excitement in Felix’s voice strains her. Jonah had the same, at the start. “Usually you’ve got some clever euphemism for how he or she’s using you as a punching bag.”
That this Ilena makes jokes is strange enough, but that she makes jokes about the baby irks her.Must be nice.
“Well,” Ilena says, “today’s been somewhat overshadowed by other things.”
“The ultrasound, of course.” Felix’s tone sobers.
Ultrasound? She’d meant this place, Grayson in a blanket in front of her, Aubrey likely throwing up in the powder room. But ultrasound? For the singleton?
“It’ll be fine,” Felix says. “Though I’m not supposed to say that. This happens before every appointment, and I understand. You need to feel your feelings, and worry is a perfectly fine feeling. Though how about you let me take that off your shoulders for today? I’ll worry for the both of us.”
A warmth wraps around her, an unfamiliar feeling as Felix takes on the role she’s used to filling. “Okay,” she says simply.
“I’ll swing by your office in an hour?” Felix says.
Her heart trips. “No, don’t. It’s just, I’m out lunching with Mallory.”
“Ah, of course she’d want to celebrate. Keep her to one old-fashioned, would you? The contract for the appearance requires actual brainpower. I’m leaving it on her desk as we speak.”
“Appearance?”
“That’s what they call it, apparently.”
Ilena goes silent. Being here is like sprinting through a minefield.
“Ilena,” Felix says, “I know how scatterbrained Mallory can be, so it’s terrifying to have her as the sole AIM founder on national television.”
Bombs throughout that entire sentence.
Felix continues, “But let her haveThe Shandy Shane Showherself. You have so much more already.”
Ilena narrows her eyes at Mallory. “You’re right. Just a momentary lapse. Call it a bit of Mom brain from the singleton.”
Felix laughs before describing the lemon-cumin chicken he’s making for dinner, and Ilena quickly lowers her phone, checking her calendar to make sure the ob-gyn’s name and address is in it. Ilena says “Sounds delicious” and “See you soon” and doesn’t wait to see if she and Felix have a special sign-off. She simply hangs up.
Ilena drops the keys onto the seat of the wheelchair. “Andwhen were you going to tell me you’re doingShandy Shanealone?”
Mallory, with a sheepish smile, says, “After it aired?”
