It always seemed like Lennox had thought of everything, as if the entire affair was perfectly in her control. When he offered to put on a condom, she told him breezily not to worry about it, to simply pull out when he was ready to finish, which he attempted to do—though over time, he may not have always been as prompt as he should have. He reasoned that she was married and ambitious and intelligent; surely that meant she was on birth control, or otherwise unable to conceive.
He was surprised when she invited him for coffee; it felt like an oddly formal venue for conversation, given the weekly intimacy that was available in the hotel. As soon as he sat down, she told him matter-of-factly that she was pregnant, and based on the timing, she was confident that it was his. He was stunned into silence as she laid out her plans to keep the baby and present it to her husband as his. Rawlins was physically similar enough that it was unlikely any telltale physical trait would give away the truth of the child’s parentage. Rawlins did not protest, nor was he given a chance to do so. The affair ended overnight—as did nearly any acknowledgment from Lennox that it had ever happened.
In the aftermath, Rawlins spun out. He tried to tell himself that he was fortunate, that their secret would be kept, that he would be spared life-altering consequences and could focus on his work and never worry about it again. But he was obsessed. He tried repeatedly to contact Lennox, and her brief replies were all to the effect ofwe have nothing more to discuss.Once, he showed up at her office hours, attempting to force a conversation, and she politely closed the door and let him speak his piece, let him confess his love and offer the possibility of the life they might have if she left her husband for him. She nodded, then told him none of that was going to happen, and it was time for him to act like an adult and forget about it entirely.
He tried. He threw himself into his work with a zeal that paid off. Years later, he looked back and wondered if the breakup was responsible forThe Arcane and the Ordinary;wondered if he ever could have completed such a book, devoted himself so completely to his work at such a young age, if he were not actively running from the prospect of any human relationship…and if he were not hoping, in some secret corner of his mind, that Lennox would see the book, witness his success, and realize she had made a terrible mistake.
If she did, she did not let on. After the book had reached stratospheric levels of popularity and he appeared on a popular talk show, she sent him a tersely worded email of congratulations. Rawlins tried to ignore the sting of it as he lost himself in the pleasures of his newfound celebrity, hopping from one glamorous guest-teaching stint to another, from one brief relationship to the next. He delighted in the beauty and status of those he was able to date and bed, but the pleasures were hollow. He could not heal the wound Lennox had left; he could merely harden it into a scar such that he no longer craved her, nor even hoped to experience the love he had once felt for her with anyone else.
Years passed. Rawlins’s fame dimmed slightly, and the time came to settle at a university where he could teach and settle into tenure. Many were surprised that he opted for Newlyn. Lennox must have known that he’d passed up bigger offers from schools in far more glamorous locations; surely, she was aware of the reason he chose hers. But they never spoke about the matter; she greeted him cordially when he arrived for orientation.
By the time Rawlins started teaching, Max was entering high school. The first time he glimpsed his son in person, it was in passing at a café near the university, where the boy was doing his homework. Time stopped. Rawlins could not help but stare. It was not at all like looking in a mirror—thankfully, Max resembled his mother most—but there were subtle details that even pictures online had not prepared Rawlins for. The boy’s eyes. The shape of his ears. The way his brow furrowed as he bent over his studies, and the way he waggled his pen as he thought. Rawlins felt an ache, but left the café before it might compel him to do something rash.
When Max started attending Newlyn, Rawlins felt like fate had contrived a way to bring his son into his life. In truth, it was a prosaic train of causation; he had come to teach at Newlyn because of Max, and Max had enrolled there because he lacked the high school grades to get into an elite, competitive school, except for the one where his mother’s position ensured his admission. Back then, Rawlins had taught an introductory class required for every freshman majoring in arcane arts, and it was not out of the ordinary for a prodigiously intelligent young pupil to feel unsatisfied with the conservative curriculum, and seek him out in search of further reading.
Lennox spoke with Rawlins about Max exactly once, when she pulled him aside after a faculty meeting. She did not even explicitly acknowledge Max’s parentage. She merely warned Rawlins that Max was impressionable, and he ought to exercise caution. “Of course,” he replied, even though his bag contained a pair of forbidden books he intended to give the boy in their weekly tutoring session later that day.
Had Rawlins shown him special attention? Certainly. Had he encouraged his pupil to expand his studies beyond the curriculum? Without a doubt. Had he laid the groundwork for the boy to spiral into an unhealthy obsession with pushing the limits of what could be done? Yes, undeniably; it never would have happened without Rawlins’s intellectual encouragement.
But was heresponsiblefor the crime? Was he every bit as negligent as Max? Should he have wound up in jail alongside his son? Should he have confessed, at some point during the investigation and trial, that he was the boy’s father?
Those were the questions that still kept him up at night.
The memories played out inRawlins’s mind like a degraded old film—the colors saturated, the details grainy.
He sat on the back deck, shivering in the early-evening chill as he stubbed out a cigarette.
It had been years since he had indulged his smoking habit beyond an occasional late-night cigarette, but he was making his way through a pack with abandon.
Barely past six o’clock, the sun had already set, plunging the valley into cold darkness.
Headlights were visible on the roads down below as the streets filled with students heading home from class. This time of year, the onset of evening always felt abrupt and violent, as though the daylight were being choked out prematurely.
A glass of scotch sat on the table, one large ice cube softening at the edges. Rawlins had poured the drink with celebratory intentions. His impossible plan had worked. News of Max’s parole had reached him earlier that day, shortly after arriving at his office. Yet he could not bring himself to take a drink, instead ramping up his anxiety with nicotine as if to punish himself.
For years, guilt over Max’s imprisonment had been like shackles that he dragged along—slowing his progress, stifling his joy, spoiling every holiday and success. An incessant voice that whispered into every pleasurable silence,You don’t deserve this.
He had hoped Max’s parole would bring him some measure of triumph. But it was only met with a knot of dread in his stomach. A panicky stomach-dropping sense of vertigo. He hoped it was merely shock, perhaps amplified by fear that his crimes would be discovered and both he and Max would be unceremoniously carted off to prison. He expected the panic to pass quickly, replaced with a longed-for sense of relief. But as the day progressed, his breathing remained shallow, his chest remained tight, and he couldn’t shake the sense of impending disaster.
Rawlins had grown accustomed to the low-grade, seething loneliness of having no one with whom he could talk about this. Max’s parolewas supposed to be the milestone that freed him from that need. Instead, it had only grown.
Lennox, of course, was the one person who knew the whole history. But he was terrified that she would figure out he had used obscuration, or at least suspect. Based on her unflappable behavior at the lecture, he was also confident she had no interest in discussing the matter, certainly not with him.
There was only one person he could actually talk to. He picked up his phone and texted simply,Need to see you. Come over tonight?
When Ellsbeth stepped into hisfoyer an hour and a half later, she was more cagey than usual; even as she slipped off her coat and hung it up, revealing a plunging top underneath, her body language was closed-off, and a tone of challenge entered her voice as she asked, “So, what did you have in mind? You want to punish me?”
Rawlins shifted uneasily. “Look, I didn’t invite you over for…that,” he said. “I was thinking…Can we just have dinner? I’m making chicken cacciatore.”
Her brow furrowed as she looked toward the kitchen, smelling the tomato sauce simmering on the stove for the first time. “I’m okay for now, thanks.”
“Okay, well, how about a glass of wine?” he asked. “After everything today, it would be nice. To talk to someone.”
“Talk to someone…” she repeated slowly, then snorted out a bitter laugh. “I’m sorry, but you’re the one who put an end to things likedinner.We agreed to keep it just physical.”
“Look, I was caught off guard earlier,” Rawlins said. “And there are certain things, for your own good, that I can’t tell you, but—”
“You can’t do that,” she cut in, with an edge of anger he had not heard before in her voice. “It’s not fair. To ask to talk, and then set the terms.”
