The Marriage Lie(6)

Dammit.

While I wait for the beep, I give myself a pep talk. I tell myself not to worry. That there’s a simple explanation for why he hasn’t called. The past few months have been particularly stressful at work, and he hasn’t been sleeping well. Maybe he’s taking a nap. And the man is easily distracted, a typical techie who can never seem to focus on one thing at a time. I imagine him punching in my number, then forgetting to push Send. I picture him hobnobbing with conference bigwigs by the hotel pool, oblivious to the buzzing phone in his hand. Or maybe it’s as simple as his battery died, or he forgot his cell on the plane. I think of all these things, and I can almost taste the joy.

“Hey, sweetie,” I say into the phone, trying not to let the worry seep into my tone. “Just wanted to check in and make sure all is well. You should be at your hotel by now, but I guess the reception in your room is crappy or something. Anyway, when you get a second, call me. This crash has got me a little antsy, and I really want to hear your voice. Okay, talk soon. You’re my very favorite person.”

In my office, I head straight for my computer and pull up my email program. Will sent me the conference details months ago, but there are more than three thousand emails in my inbox and no good system for organizing them. After a bit of searching, I find the email I’m looking for:

From: [email protected]

To: [email protected]

Subject: FW: Cyber Security for Critical Assets: An Intelligence Summit

Check me out! I’m Thursday’s keynote speaker. Let’s just hope they don’t all fall asleep, kind of like you do whenever I talk about work. xo

Will M. Griffith

Sr. Software Engineer

AppSec Consulting, Inc.

My skin tingles with relief, and I feel vindicated. The words are right here, in black and white. Will is in Orlando, safe and sound.

I click on the attachment, and a full-page conference flyer opens. Will’s head shot is about halfway down, next to a blurb advertising his expertise on all things access risk management. I hit Print and scribble the name of the conference hotel on a Post-it note, then return to my internet browser for the telephone number. I’m copying it down when my phone rings, and my mother’s face lights up the screen.

A stab of uneasiness pings me in the chest. A speech pathologist, Mom knows what working in a school environment is like. She knows my days are crazy, and she never disturbs me at work unless there’s a life-and-death situation. Like the time Dad hit a pothole with his front bike tire and flipped a three-sixty onto the asphalt, landing so hard he cracked his collarbone and split his helmet clean down the middle.

Which is why I answer her call now with “What’s wrong?”

“Oh, sweetheart. I just saw the news.”

“About the crash? I know. We’ve been dealing with it all day here at school. The kids are pretty freaked.”

“No, that’s not what I meant. Well, not exactly... I meant Will, darling.”

Something in the way she says it, in the careful and roundabout way she’s asking but not asking about Will, soldiers every hair on my body to attention. “What about him?”

“Well, for starters, where is he?”

“In Orlando for a conference. Why?”

The force of Mom’s sigh into the speaker pierces my eardrum, and I know how much she’s been holding back. “Oh, thank God. I knew it couldn’t be your Will.”

“What are you talking about? Who couldn’t be my Will?”

Her reply gets buried under a student’s loud interruption. “Mr. Rawlings told me to tell you they just released a list of names.” She screams the words into my office, as if I’m not sitting right here, three feet away, and on the phone. I shush her and shoo her off with a hand.

“Mom, start over. Who’s not my Will?”

“The William Matthew Griffith they’re saying was on that plane.”

Not my husband bubbles up from the very core of me, from somewhere deep and primitive. My Will was on a different plane, on a whole different airline even. And even if he wasn’t, Liberty Airlines would have already called. They wouldn’t have released his name without notifying me—his wife, his very favorite person on the planet—first.

But before I can tell my mother any of these things, my phone beeps with another call, and the words on the screen stop my heart.

Liberty Airlines.





4

With a shaking hand, I hang up on my mother and pick up the call from Liberty Airlines.

“Hello?” My throat is tight, and my voice comes out raspy and faint.

“Hello, may I please speak with Iris Griffith?”

I know why this woman is calling. I know it from the way she says my name, from her carefully neutral tone and businesslike formality, and the breath sticks in my throat.

But she’s wrong. Will is in Orlando.

“Will is in Orlando,” I hear myself say.

“Pardon me... Is this the number for Iris Griffith?”

What would happen if I said no? Would it stop this woman from saying the words I know she called to say? Would she hang up and call the other William Matthew Griffith’s wife?

“I’m Iris Griffith.”

“Mrs. Griffith, my name is Carol Manning of Liberty Airlines. William Matthew Griffith listed you as his emergency contact.”