Page 113 of The Husband Hour
What?
For fifteen, twenty minutes, she sat in the bookstore café, fighting the urge to look around the room. Instead, she stared at the same page she had been reading when he called, trying to figure out what was going on.
“Hey.”
He pulled out the seat across from her and sat down. If this were a movie, or if he were a different person, he would have maybe used a cheesy line like “Is this seat taken?” But it was Rory, and Rory just focused his intense eyes on her. He was tan. He looked beautiful.
Before she could say anything, his big hands enveloped her small ones.
“I’ve missed you.”
She started to speak, but nothing came out. What was there to say? He’d come back for her.
A month later, they were looking for houses together in Los Angeles.
Lauren hit the Play arrow on Stephanie’s interview, then skipped back a few minutes.
“Was Rory faithful to your sister?”
Suddenly, Lauren felt sick. The summer came back to her in sharp cuts.
Stephanie had pulled away from her so completely.
And Rory had committed to her so absolutely.
No.
Hands shaking, Lauren removed the disc and inserted the first interview. She didn’t realize what she was looking for, didn’t understand that her subconscious was already piecing together what her conscious mind couldn’t handle.
The thumbnail files lined up, still images of Stephanie but also of Ethan. She clicked on Ethan on the beach, running with a soccer ball. He dropped it to the sand and dribbled it with considerable deftness before kicking it to the edge of the water.
“Score!” he said, raising his arms in victory and then pulling his right elbow sharply in toward his rib cage, a gesture so familiar, so precise, she gasped.
The video kept going, but she was watching a different scene, a scene in her mind’s eye. An argument, long ago, interrupted by a phone call.
It was two months into her life in LA with Rory. The stress of the new season was already bearing down on them, and she’d just found a bottle of Ambien in his nightstand.
“Since when are you taking Ambien?” she asked Rory.
“Since when do you go snooping through my drawers?”
“I wasn’t snooping. I was trying to find a phone charger. Why didn’t you tell me about this?”
“Probably because I knew you’d overreact.”
His phone rang. He checked the incoming number. “It’s your mother. Why is she calling my phone?”
“Probably because mine is dead—because I can’t find my charger!”
He tossed her the phone.
“Mom, this isn’t a good time.”
“You don’t have time for family news?” her mother said. Lauren sighed. Okay, she’d take the bait.
“What’s the news?”
“Your sister is pregnant.”
