Page 27

I looked down at my hands.

“What if I've made him into something he's not?”

Kim was quiet for a moment before she answered.

“That sounds like a reason to get to know Dean better, not a reason to marry Paul.”

I looked at her, frowning.

“That was annoyingly sensible.”

She threw a fry at me, and I caught it before it could hit my shirt and leave a ketchup stain. I laughed, but a girl walking past our table caught my attention. She wore white shorts and carried a copy of People folded beneath one arm, Mary Lou Retton smiling from the cover.

Something tugged at my memory. Claire had taken gymnastics.

Hadn't she?

I could almost see a little girl in a pink leotard balancing on one foot in our living room while Paul sat on the sofa pretending to judge her routine.

Or maybe that had been someone else's daughter?

The image wavered as my fingers tightened around my Coke.

Kim was saying something, but her voice seemed to recede as I reached for another memory, something easy, something that had nothing to do with the children.

There had been a woman in Cleveland. Blond hair. A blue coffee mug. Floral curtains in a kitchen where I'd sat dozens, maybe hundreds of times.

We’d belonged to something together. Book club, perhaps, or a committee. She had brought soup once when I'd had the flu and Paul was out of town.

Susan?

No. Susan was Paul's cousin.

Janet?

Maybe.

I could see her hands wrapping around the blue mug, remember laughing with her, but I couldn't remember her name.

The realization moved through me cold and fast enough that the temperature seemed to drop.

“Lorrie?”

I looked at Kim.

“What?”

“You went somewhere.”

“I'm fine.”

“You don't look fine.”

“It's hot.”

I lifted the Coke and drank because it gave me something to do.

The woman remained in my mind, faceless except for blond hair and the knowledge that she’d once mattered enough to bring me soup.