“I was thinking the same thing,” said Robin. They were at home now, just the two of them, eating an early dinner that Eric had prepared—grilled tarragon chicken, mashed sweet potato, fresh asparagus. Eric was an excellent cook. Much better than Robin, though of course that wasn’t saying much.
“This is really delicious,” Robin said.
Eric put his wineglass down, reached across the kitchen table, and squeezed her hand—something he used to do all the time when they were dating. I just want to make sure you’re real, he used to say. Cheesiest line ever and he knew it. They both knew it. Robin would respond,You’re just trying to get me in bed. And he’d prove her right every time.
Robin smiled at Eric.This could work again, she thought.We could work again.But then she remembered the past year, how lonely it had been.
She used to tell herself that it was normal, natural, this separation between the two of them. And it was, at first. After the honeymoonperiod, all couples reach the same fork in the road and they make a choice: they either grow apart and develop their own interests, or, like April Cooper and Gabriel LeRoy, they become codependent, feeding off and fueling each other’s weaknesses until neither one of them can stand on their own.
But Robin and Eric had gone overboard. They’d started growing apart, ever so slightly, before he’d taken the job atAnger Management, a show they’d both made fun of, but one that paid very well. He’d assured her at first that he was only doing it for the money—a short-term fix that could take care of both their student debts. And though the old, scrupulous Eric never would have considered a move like that, it was one that Robin, fresh off a stint at a trashy celebrity mag, completely understood.
What neither of them had figured on was how Eric’s job would accelerate the growing apart until it became unnatural, unhealthy. How as the months, then years went by, the job would absorb him the way a lover would. How Eric would grow defensive ofAnger Management, of creepy, cleavage-ogling, whiskey-stinking Shawn Labatoir, whom Robin couldn’t bear to be in the same room with. But that’s what had happened. Responding to her complaints about his long hours, his dubious “scoops,” his devotion to a man they had both considered a fraud, Eric had turned argumentative, then secretive, then absent most of the time. And eventually, Robin had stopped complaining. It was easier to nod and simmer, to rely on the support of her parents instead of her husband, to glare at his Twitter feed and ply her mind with suspicions and pull even further apart. Only now did she really feel how much damage had been done—now that her father was gone and she wasn’t sure who her mother truly was—and beyond anything else she needed someone to talk to, to trust.
Robin felt Eric watching her.
“Penny for your thoughts,” he said.
She looked at him, millions of dollars of thoughts running through her mind but only the strongest one escaping. “I miss you,” she said. “I miss us.”
Eric moved closer to her. He took her in his arms as though she were made of glass and kissed her very gently.
“Stop.”
He let go. “I’m sorry.”
“That’s not what I mean.” Robin grabbed hold of his shirt. She pulled him to her, with a force that surprised them both. “Stop treating me like I’m going to break.”
THEY NEVER MADEit out of the kitchen. They were rough and urgent, zippers yanked open, mouths searching, buttons popped and skittering, as though Robin and Eric had been simultaneously possessed and, in a way, they were. It had been such a long time, the space widening between them with each day, week. Month. God, had it really been that long?
Robin felt the tile counter against her bare back, then the granite island, and then she was riding him on the hardwood floor, a need roiling within her that she hadn’t felt in years, maybe not since the first time she’d been with Eric—a longing so intense and unfillable that it bordered on pain.
After they finished, they lay beside each other, Robin drained, fileted, the stress sapped out of her, replaced by a sense of well-being that, considering the reality of her situation, proved what simple, physically driven creatures human beings truly are.
“Wow,” Eric said. “That was...”
“Yeah.”
More silence. But that was normal. Neither of them had ever been big sex-talkers. Not during, not after, both preferring the sound ofeach other’s breathing. It was good to know that in this area at least, Robin and Eric hadn’t changed since they met.
“Eric?”
“Yeah?”
“Can I trust you?”
“What? Of course you can.”
“Eric...”
“I don’t know what you think was going on with me, but—”
“I’m not talking about a month ago or a week ago. I don’t care what was going on back then. Well, actually, that’s not true, I do care.” She took a breath. “But I’m willing to just... shut the door on everything that happened before the shooting. Okay? I won’t think about it. I won’t ask you about it. As long as I can trust you from here on in.”
“Robin,” Eric said. “I never cheated on you.”
She rolled over on her side and gazed at his profile, strong arms folded behind his head, eyes aimed at the ceiling. Outside the kitchen window, the sun was starting to set, casting a pink glow across the room. Eric’s blue eyes shined in it. She wanted to believe him. But.
Eight months ago, at the height of their estrangement, three friends on three different nights had spotted Eric at Chez Chas—a Midtown restaurant with a celebrity chef and seriously dark lighting. Two had seen him entering the place, one had seen him leaving. That friend, the one who had seen him leaving, was the one who had seen him with a woman.
