Page 25 of Life, Love, and Other Messes

Silence. Silence like I’d never experienced before. I needed to say something, and fast, but I said nothing, just sat there staring like an idiot. And, of course, when I finally did, the dumbest thing came out. “What?”

Lisa laughed a little and curled tighter into herself. “The husband throws things off, doesn’t it.”

“Well, yes, kind of.” I blinked at the coffee table, letting everything sink in. In one split-second, she had just become infinitely more attractive, if that was possible. I wanted to know everything: why she was with Corey, how long they’d been together, and if she’d ever been with a woman before, but I couldn’t find the guts to ask. “Are you just separated now?”

“We go to court in three weeks. He’s moving in with his girlfriend,” she added thickly. “He’s been fucking around forever.”

“I’m sorry. Did you know it?”

She nodded. “I called him on it a couple times, but I was stupid, you know? His stock answer was that he’d made a mistake and it’d never happen again and please take me back, baby, you know?”

“And you took him back.”

“And I wasn’t being entirely level with him, so yeah, I took him back.”

I nodded like that made sense, even though I could wrap my head around nothing. “So does he know about you?”

“Yes.”

“But…” I waved my hand ethereally. “Are you bi, then?”

Lisa broke eye contact with me and consulted the floor. “Pretty sure I’m just gay. I was with women in college, but people found out and shit blew up and…I don’t know, I freaked out. Corey and I were friends forever and he kissed me one day and I was like okay, this would solve all of the problems. I really thought I could make it work, you know?”

I didn’t know personally, but I knew several people who had done just that. “I’m sorry.”

She shrugged. “Like I said before, it is what it is. He’s gone and I’ve got this second chance now, you know? To get things right.”

“That’s a lot.”

She laughed to herself, but her voice went higher. “It is a lot.”

“You’re brave.”

“I’m not.”

“You are. You just came out to me like it was the easiest thing in the world.”

“I knew you’d be okay with it.”

I couldn’t stand seeing her swipe at her cheek with the back of one hand. Now Lisa, cute, fresh-from-being-married-to-a-man Lisa from down the street was sitting in my living room crying. Shit. I wanted to hold her, but that seemed really forward. I didn’t know how to make it better. My heart was pounding one million miles a minute. I chewed my lip, wishing I had any idea of what to do. “It’s still hard to say it out loud.”

She grabbed the throw pillow from the other side of the sofa and hugged it to herself. “I feel like I’ve been lying to everyone and I don’t know how I got here.”

“You weren’t lying, you were surviving. And you don’t need to tell everyone all at once. Let your feelings about Corey settle. Ease into it.”

“I know, but like…I’m tired of living as this person, this Mrs. Sutherland, this façade.”

“Do your students call you Mrs. Sutherland?”

She shook her head. “They call me Ms. Lisa.”

“Well, there. That’s not going to change. And you don’t have to call up your family and tell them this instant. Or ever.”

“That’s no big deal. I text my sister, that’s about it most of the time.”

“Phone calls on Christmas and birthdays?”

She gave me a lopsided smile. “We don’t really do Christmas. It’s a long story. I’m just…I don’t know. In this day and age, this shouldn’t be so hard.”