I stood in the hallway outside the English department office and almost laughed. A student walking by with earbuds in glanced at me, then quickly looked away.
When I got home, Daniel was sitting at the kitchen table.
The papers were spread in front of him.
He had not turned on the overhead light, so the room was dim except for gray afternoon through the windows. For once, he did not look composed. His tie was loosened. His hair was wrong. His hands rested flat on the table as if he were holding himself down.
“Claire,” he said.
I hung my coat on the hook.
Scout came to me, pressing his head against my thigh.
“We need to talk,” Daniel said.
“No,” I replied. “You need to talk to my attorney.”
His jaw tightened. “This is not what you think it is.”
I looked at him.
For ten years, I had loved that face. I had watched it soften in sleep, concentrate over blueprints, smile across restaurant tables, tilt toward me in the porch light. Now I saw something else inside it. Not guilt exactly. Calculation under stress.
“What do I think it is?” I asked.
He opened his mouth.
Nothing came out.
That told me more than any answer could have.
“It’s complicated,” he said finally.
“Ten years usually are.”
He flinched.
I took Scout’s leash from the hook.
Daniel stood. “Claire, please. Don’t do this through lawyers.”
“That is exactly how I’m doing it.”
“She contacted you, didn’t she?”
There it was.
Not, I’m sorry.
Not, I was going to tell you.
Not, I lied.
She contacted you.
I clipped the leash to Scout’s collar.
Daniel stepped closer. “You don’t understand the full situation.”
I looked down at Scout and said, “Sit.”
Scout sat.
Then I looked at Daniel.
“Move away from the door.”
He did.
I walked for forty-five minutes through streets slick with spring rain, past porch lights and dogwood trees and neighbors carrying groceries from Subarus. Scout walked unusually close, as if he understood that if he tugged too hard, I might come apart.
When I returned, Daniel was gone.
Half his closet was empty.
His toothbrush was missing.
His wedding ring sat on my nightstand.
I opened the drawer and swept it inside without touching it.
Melissa escalated first.
Of course she did.
Her next message came the following morning.
You don’t have to make this ugly.
Then another.
There are children involved.