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“What changed your mind?”
“Life.” She looks sad when she says it, so I try my best with what I say next. I don’t have to dig too deep; I genuinely like spending time with her. She’s the first person in a long time who hasn’t asked something of me, with the exception of fair payment for her time. I don’t think the exchange is so unreasonable. Not anymore.
“I was just thinking…” I say. “We should meet up here again. Sometime in the future.”
She cocks her head. “Why would you say that?”
“Just in case everything goes south.”
“As opposed to what?”
“Nothing.” I glance at my watch. “It’s November fourteenth. Let’s agree to meet here again ten years from now.”
“That’s crazy,” she tells me through narrowed eyes. “And quite cliché.”
I nod. “A lot can change in ten years.”
“Yeah,” she says. “And we probably won’t even remember.”
I smile. “You’re right.”
We each stare at the church ceiling for several minutes without speaking. “I think he’s crazy, just so you know. Your husband.”
“You don’t know him.”
“I don’t have to. But also, I think you’re crazy for staying.”
“Sounds like you’ve got it all figured out.”
I shake my head. “I have nothing figured out.”
Later in the car, she told me to pull over. It was raining out, so I took the next exit and pulled into an empty lot. She wasted no time. She climbed in the backseat and prompted me to follow. “Last call,” she said sliding out of her jeans. “Before we go back to real life.”
“This isn’t real life?”
She didn’t answer; instead she pounced. I don’t know how to describe it except to say that it was different. It was more. It was a finding without knowing. There had been a tsunami in Sri Lanka once—I had been there. I saw wood and concrete buildings ripped before the fury. This was a tsunami between two people—a man and a woman who each belonged to other people.
Then it was more: an understanding, like enemies who’d once been friends might understand each other.
Afterward, there was silence between two people who should not have been silent. She didn’t want me to hold her. The storm had passed, and it seemed our words went with it.
Chapter Twenty-One
Vanessa
If it weren’t for Matthew, I would have been sad to tell Elliot Parker goodbye following our trip. I know the attraction isn’t real. He pays me to play a part, and I am playing him because that’s my job. But still. I like him, and I can’t say that about all of the people I sleep with.
Still, I’m very aware soon he will find out who and what I really am, and it’s far worse than what he suspects. This part always makes me a little melancholy. It’s terrible to lose a friend when you don’t have many.
The reminder alarm chimes on my phone. I don’t have to read it to know what it will say. If I don’t hurry, I will be late to the clinic. I have a standing appointment for my quarterly injection to ensure I remain sterile.
Many women within the local congregation—all women, in fact, who are not permitted to bear children— will make the same trek. It is my fault that we are no longer to be trusted with managing our own birth control.
Matthew wasn’t supposed to exist. It’s not that I wanted a baby—I didn’t. I really didn’t. The truth is my son only complicates things. He makes it harder to leave, harder to take risks, and for him, I have to keep going.
Maybe this was the reason I found it difficult to bond with him. It wasn’t until he was talking that we hit it off, and even then the connection was spotty. I blamed it on being away so much for work. But I think we all knew it wasn’t that. I was angry to have to make the sacrifice. I knew loving something—or rather someone—this much was going to be difficult to bear. I knew they would use it against me, and I knew it was Matthew who would suffer for it.
After my appointment, I’m in the office typing up notes on a mark when the doorbell chimes. I stop what I’m doing and walk to the foyer, only to find that Sean has beaten me there. “Oh,” I say to Gina. “I wasn’t expecting you today.”
