Wish You Were Gone(46)
“Emma ordered Thai.” Willow went to the refrigerator and retrieved a bottle of water, which she guzzled.
“You were at Hunter’s again?” Lizzie asked.
“Yeah. Why?”
Her daughter capped the half-empty bottle and returned it to the fridge.
“Nothing.” Lizzie entered a few numbers into Excel, then deleted them, then corrected them. “You’ve been spending a lot of time over there lately.”
“So? Why shouldn’t I be?” Willow asked, fiddling with the basil plant in the front window.
“It’s just… I feel like Emma and her kids could use some time to themselves,” Lizzie said carefully. “It’s a weird time for them right now.”
Willow dropped her hands heavily at her sides. “Yes, Mom. I’m aware of that.”
“I’m just saying—”
“I know what you’re saying,” Willow said, striding past her. “I’m going to go finish my homework.”
Once her daughter was gone, Lizzie let out a deep sigh and sipped her wine again. There should be a special reward in heaven for parenting a teenaged girl. Or some sort of awards ceremony. Best Handling of an Awkward Situation Without a Meltdown, and the nominees are…
The phone rang. It was Emma. Immediately, Lizzie thought of her odd encounter with Gray outside the café. Should she tell Emma about it? Was Gray actually tracking her husband? Without his knowledge? And the woman thought Lizzie had an obsessive relationship with Emma. Such a hypocrite. And to top it off, Gray acted toward Emma as if Darnell was the perfect husband, like she was so appalled by James’s supposed cheating behavior. So why the hell was she following her own husband around? Because she trusted him implicitly? What a joke.
She wondered what Gray had pulled Ben aside to talk about. She’d thought about asking him when she’d gone back inside the café to accept his invitation, but she’d felt like a stalker and decided it best not to come off that way before they’d had a chance to go out. He’d been so excited when she accepted the date. Every time she thought about the broad smile on his face, she felt a tiny thrill.
“Hi, Emma,” Lizzie said into the phone. “How’s it going?”
“You’re never going to believe what I found in James’s closet,” Emma hoarse-whispered. “Cuff links. A Valentine’s gift. From someone with the initials JM.”
Lizzie’s heart sank. She grabbed her wineglass and drained it. “Oh my God, Emma. I can’t believe it.”
“Me neither.” Emma sounded stunned, but also, somehow, excited. “It’s true, Lizzie. It’s all true.”
WILLOW
2:15 p.m.
11 hours before the accident
“You sure about this?” Hunter asked as Willow got into the Jeep.
“Sure I’m sure!” She clicked her seat belt, pushed her hair out of her face, and smiled at him. She was manic with nerves, but she wasn’t about to back out. Backing out was not an option.
“You’re being weird. And, like, smiley.”
“And this is worth commenting on because…?”
“Willow. I’m serious. He’s not gonna like this.”
“I think that’s been firmly established,” Willow said. “Now drive.”
Hunter shook his head and pulled away from the curb. She’d met him around the corner from school, each of them having snuck out half an hour before last bell from different classes on opposite ends of the building.
“It’s just… there’s a lot of stuff you don’t know about.”
“So tell me,” Willow said.
Hunter’s nostrils flared and she saw his jaw muscles working as he kept his eyes on the road. His forearms flexed when he adjusted his grip on the steering wheel, and she noticed a smattering of angry, red scratches on his tanned skin. “I just want you to be okay,” he told her.
“I appreciate that,” Willow said matter-of-factly, though deep down, she was touched. “And we never tell a soul.” She held up a fist. “Code of silence, right?”
Hunter rolled his eyes. Code of silence was something they’d come up with in third grade when they’d used his mother’s favorite casserole dish to serve microwave popcorn to their friends and dropped it on the kitchen floor, shattering it into a dozen jagged pieces. They’d covered it up with newspapers in the garbage can and sworn each other to a “code of silence,” which didn’t even make any sense, but they’d been using it both sincerely and jokingly ever since. Willow knew that if any of her hipster friends or any of Hunter’s preppy crew ever heard them say it, they would have been summarily disowned. Neither group understood the bond between Willow and Hunter—hell, sometimes she barely understood it—and they definitely wouldn’t get code of silence.
Hunter, however, knocked his fist into hers. “Code of silence,” he intoned. They shared a smile and drove on.
EMMA
The kids were in bed; the house was silent. Emma sat in the living room, her laptop closed on her lap, eyes focusing and unfocusing, trying not to imagine her husband with some random woman. Trying not to think about what she looked like. How they’d met. Whether they did things together like go on dates, or whether it had just been about the sex. What had they talked about? Had James shared details about Emma with his mistress?