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Everyone looked at Danny mesmerized, partially because he was mesmerizing and partially because he had to be telling the truth.
“And more importantly, tonight’s spinning away from what we’re all here for. And that’s to celebrate Sunny.”
I looked at him with such gratitude I thought I was going to cry.
“So you all should sit down, eat, enjoy your evening.”
Then he took my hand, really took it, gripping my fingers in his. And we walked through the restaurant and outside, Greenwich Street uncharacteristically empty.
This was when he turned and looked at me, his eyes no longer kind.
“I probably bought you a day back there to get your story straight.”
I didn’t want to look at him, so I looked down, cobblestones under my feet, my shoes sinking into each other.
“Was that a hotel bathroom?”
I didn’t answer.
“What was he doing with you there?”
My voice came out like a whisper. “Danny, I don’t know what to say.”
He lifted my face and forced me to meet his eyes.
“Say something,” he said. “Say something, or that’s the last kind thing I’ll ever do for you.”
“It isn’t what you think. It was just one night.”
“Just one night?” he repeated.
I nodded. Because, in that moment, I thought my ultimate loyalty was on the line. I believed that on one side of it, my husband of fourteen years and five apartments and all of my love (as flawed as it was) would be able to forgive me for a small transgression. One night, nothing in the scope of things. And on the other side of that line, there was nothing I could say—not I love you, not I’m sorry—that would make him understand.
He kissed my cheek softly, his skin rough, his lips quick. “I was wrong,” Danny whispered into my ear. “You should have said nothing at all,” he said.
6
I couldn’t bear to go back to the party. And going immediately home felt even worse. So I walked south down Greenwich Street, heading across the West Side Highway to Battery Park. I sat down on a bench, the night wind blowing, and looked out over the Hudson River, the world so beautiful and serene, it seemed impossible that my life had just imploded a few blocks away.
I couldn’t begin to touch what had just happened with Danny, which might be why I focused on myself. Damage control. The fifty people at my party, several of them with microphones to the world: How was I going to turn this around before they used them? Was Danny’s speech enough to hold them? Those embarrassing photographs—had Violet gotten Craig to pull them yet? How much damage had they done on a Friday night before she did?
I could only hope that, somehow, Ryan had figured out how to make it all salvageable. If he had managed to calm Meredith down, I knew we had a shot. He would go back inside, Violet alerting him to Danny’s speech, and he would do the rest. Ryan raising a glass to a birt
hday gone wrong, but a year ahead that would be full of goodness and friendship, etc.
If their fingers were in the dam, at least for tonight, if the New York Post and Food & Wine and all the press at the party tweeted our side of the story, we could deal with this tomorrow in some way. Couldn’t we?
The truth was, as I asked myself the question, as I tried to breathe in the possibility of the answer being yes, I knew it all came down to convincing the world that my relationship with Ryan was platonic. If there was one thing women couldn’t forgive each other for—if there was one thing they didn’t want to forgive—it was another woman being adulterous. You could abuse drugs (an addict, not your fault) or railroad someone at work (it’s business), but if you slept with another woman’s husband, it was like you slept with everyone’s husband. It was like you betrayed all womankind.
Until, of course, it was you who found yourself in the role of adulterous bitch.
And, for whatever it’s worth (and if you’re even able to believe me), my situation with Ryan was more complicated than the naked bathroom photograph would initially suggest. I only slept with Ryan once. Do I sound like a politician trying to get out on a technicality? Perhaps. So let me be clear. From day one, we flirted. We were more involved than we should have been, spending time together that we should have reserved for our spouses, and sharing pieces of ourselves that they longed for and we too easily gave up to each other instead.
The hotel in the photograph was the St. Regis in Aspen. We had been there for the Food & Wine Classic last year, so I could judge a new chef competition. At the party that night, Ryan drank too much champagne and lost his hotel room key and ended up on my floor. And when he got up and climbed into the bed, I let him in.
How had we gotten there? Into that hotel room together? Ryan was the only one who knew—truly knew—all my secrets. Maybe it was a justification, but it didn’t feel like a justification. Sometimes you create a world so intricate, so nuanced, that only the two of you can understand it. And that was what we did. It was never about love or anything like love. It was about something that felt completely real.
And the point is, the very next morning, I told Ryan it had been a mistake. Did I confess the transgression to Danny? Why tell him? It would only cause him pain. I guess that’s what all cheaters say. But in this case, it was true. Nothing had to change between us. I moved on and, with the exception of a little leftover weirdness, Ryan moved on too.
