Page 50 of Rachel Weiss's Group Chat
I called her, and she insisted on meeting for coffee before she would explain what was going on. I agreed to meet her at a Starbucks on my lunch break; she was apparently taking a sick day from work.
She looked… not herself. Her hair was all stringy and she wasn’t wearing any makeup. She was already at a table nursing a cup of tea. Nothing makes a person seem unwell in my book more than choosing tea over coffee. She half stood when she saw me, then hastily sat back down, her lips pressed into a miserable line. I thought she was going to tell me she had cancer.
“Hi, Rachel. Thank you for meeting me.” Her voice was tight and thin.
“Amy.” I sat beside her and grasped her hands. “What is going on? Please tell me you’re okay.”
Her mouth wobbled and she shook her head.
“Are you sick? Is it Ryan? Is he—”
“Rachel, please stop. Stop being nice to me.”
“What are you talking about?”
“I’m so sorry. I did something—” Amy’s voice grew choked and she broke off.
I was getting seriously alarmed now. I leaned in close and whispered, “Whatever it is, it’ll be okay. I’ll help you. I’m very familiar with dealing with felons now, thanks to my mom, so just—”
“I slept with Stephen,” she whispered back.
I was so shocked that at first I didn’t equate Stephen tomyStephen, to Stephen Branson. My first thought was:So she actually cheated on Ryan but it’s okay, people don’t burn women at the stake for committing adultery anymore. And maybe if she loves this person, this Stephen, then—wait. Stephen?
“StephenBranson?” Just to be sure.
“Yes.”
“Ah. I see.” I drummed my fingers on the table. “But—when?” My brain felt foggy—my married best friend sleeping with my boyfriend: this was uncharted territory for me. I probed my innermost feelings and was surprised to find that I wasn’t hurt or jealous, merely concerned for my friend. Apparently I was truly over Stephen.
“That night we went to Havana.”
“What? Did you… in the bathroom?” I couldn’t see where else they would have done it.
“No.” Amy sounded like she was going to cry. “I went home with him.”
“Youdid?”
“Remember, he left without saying goodbye, and then… and then I left.”
“Oh.” The words hit me with shocking force; I remembered that moment clearly, remembered how innocently I’d accepted Amy’s words without questioning them. The idea that she was off for a secret rendezvous with Stephen would have been absurd. And yet—I remembered her missing wedding ring, the way she’d gazed at Stephen as if she wanted to devour him, the way he remembered what I’d told him about her being sexually frustrated. The way he’d singled her out for conversation, and how I’d thought it was because he was trying to get to know my friends. I’d thought he was doing that for me.
“I feel stupid. I had no idea.”
“Rachel, please don’t. I’m the one who should feel bad—and I do feel awful. I cheated on Ryan, I made your boyfriend cheat on you. I haven’t been able to sleep, I—”
And then I remembered something Stephen had said when hebroke up with me. That he thought he loved this mystery woman he’d been with.
“Did it happen more than once?”
She nodded, her eyes filling with tears. “Twice.”
“Amy.”
“I know. But it was so… good. And I’d already done it once. It was easy to do it again.”
I know it’s wrong, but I almost wanted to laugh. It was sogood? Was sex with Ryan that mediocre? Or maybe Amy and Stephen had a chemistry that I’d lacked with him. Perhaps that was one of the things that had been wrong with our relationship—if you could even call it that.
“Rachel, I’m so, so sorry.”
