Page 55 of The Wife

As Ginny was flipping radio channels on the drive home, a DJ was rating Angela and the two women who were suing Jason on a scale from 1 to 10. Apparently Angela would be an 8 or even a 9, except she seemed the type who would “just lie there like she was doing you a favor.”

Her hands were still shaking on the steering wheel when she pulled into her driveway.

36

Jason was charged the day after he was arrested. He was sued the day after he was charged. And the day after he was sued, he was notified by the university that he was suspended from teaching immediately.

An hour before the last class of the semester, the dean appeared in his office, accompanied by the university’s in-house counsel. His students were being notified by e-mail that class was canceled. Their final papers would be graded by another professor on a pass/fail basis. His interns did not need to finish their final week at FSS to earn their academic credit. He was prohibited from supervising or communicating with any students in his capacity as a professor until the cases against him were closed and the university had completed its own review.

Jason called me with the news as he was boxing up files on campus to move to the FSS offices.

“Are they still paying you?” I asked. I felt petty asking about money when his career was falling apart, but he was the one who had told me that we were on thin financial ice.

“I’ll get my salary through the summer, but it’s obvious they’re going after my tenure. Olivia’s going to find me an employment lawyer, but told me to stay away from campus for the time being.”

“What did Olivia say about the lawsuit?”

“Not much. I’m supposed to meet with her at noon to talk about it. Colin said he’d go with me.”

I pictured her logging more hours on her bill. I thought about that e-mail I had seen in Jason’s account from the Department of Human Resources. He had had a question about his retirement account. Was he dipping into it?

“We can always sell the house,” I offered.

“Jesus, Angela, where did that come from?”

“Well, with the legal fees, and the lawsuit—”

“We’re not losing our home, do you hear me? I’m the one who fucked this up. I’m the one who’s going to fix it, okay?”

“Okay, fine.” I knew I didn’t sound either okay or fine.

“I need someone to still have faith in me.” I could hear his voice crack. I hated the idea of him crying alone in his office, wondering if he’d ever be welcomed back into it again.

“I still have faith in you,” I told him. I just wasn’t sure that faith was going to be enough.

Susanna called me from my stoop a little after two o’clock. She knew I was ignoring knocks at the front door.

She didn’t bother sitting down. She took one look at me and went directly into the kitchen and opened the refrigerator. “There’s no food in here,” she declared. “No wonder you’re skin and bones. Are you eating anything?”

I gave her a quick hug. “Did we switch roles when I wasn’t looking? I’m usually the food pusher, and you’re the one starving.”

“That’s because I’m the one still working on television next to a bunch of thirty-year-olds whose journalism credentials are a list of beauty pageants. You, my dear, are supposed to have a kitchen full of food.”

“Spencer’s at camp, that’s all. Trust me, I’m eating. Your story today was really good, by the way—like a how-to manual for a juicy episode ofThe Americans.” Susanna was beloved for her somewhat cynical but always cheerful morning banter, but I knew that this morning’s segment about fake IDs had been the result of nearly a year of research. “So what will happen to the employees who played along? If you ask me, they deserve medals of honor.”

“The one story I can’t stop thinking about is Lucia’s. If she hadn’t gotten fake passports for her and her kids, her husband would have killed her when she tried to leave. And the passport clerk who handled the paperwork only did it because his sister couldn’t afford chemo. So, yes, if you can set aside the mafiosos in the middle, you could say it’s a win/win scenario.”

I continued to press her for details about the ins and outs of her research for the story until she finally cut me off. “Okay, that’s enough with the change of subject, missy. You’re trying to avoid talking about the fact that you’re not taking care of yourself.”

“I’m fine.”

She followed me into the living room and sat next to me on the sofa. “You don’t sound fine.” She was staring at me, and I could feel her reading my thoughts. I wanted to hide. “Are you thinking about leaving Jason?” she asked. “Because no one would blame you under the circumstances.”

I shook my head.

“There’s something else bothering you,” she said, “more than what you’ve told me so far.”

I hadn’t seen her in person since we had lunch at the 21 Club before Jason was forced to tell me about his affair with Kerry, but I had given her the bare-bones version of developments since then. It wasn’t the same as telling her what was really on my mind.

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