Do I Know You?(57)

She’s shivering when she reaches the Jacuzzi, and she quickly lowers herself into the water. Hearts still pounding, we look at each other across the steam. It’s perfect—only us, the gentle hum of the Jacuzzi, and the incomprehensible vastness of the night. We’re alone together.

Eliza smiles, her cheeks flush with heat.

I lean forward to kiss her. The kiss is slow but not chaste, my lips sticking to hers like honey. Feeling her nakedness under the water, my body responds immediately. I know we’ll be getting that second round before too long.

While I return to my bench, my eyes never leave her.

“You’re incredible, you know that?” she asks.

Though I return her smile, the compliment feels precarious, like holding sand in cupped palms. I wonder if her words are for me, the man she married in the Huntington Gardens two days shy of five years ago, or the character I’m playing. David’s point from earlier echoes in my head. What’s the difference, in the end? Does it even matter which me she means?

It doesn’t, I decide. If this is who she wants, this is who I’ll be. Doing it might not be easy, but my new resolve suddenly feels like the simplest thing in the world. Because this is Eliza. This is our marriage. I’ll do anything to make her happy.

Finding her hand under the water, I pull her to me, the way the new Graham would.





33


    Eliza


I WAKE UP before Graham. The sun glows past the crack we left in the curtains, warming the room just enough for coziness. Staring up at him, I remember last night. He held me close while we slept, closer than he has in months. I can’t help grinning, realizing what this means.

This is working.

The improbability of it only makes me more grateful. In our familiar house, I was shadowed by conversations I couldn’t imagine having—interrogations of what’s wrong and whose fault and now what. Now, instead, circumstance has delivered us this unique way forward, and we’re finally making progress. We’re closing the distance between us, reforming connections.

It’s thrilling, but for the same reasons, it’s terrifying, because we can’t keep up this charade forever. Nor would I want to. I don’t want to lose this connection, but I don’t want to forsake the real Graham either, the one who’s never been to Santa Fe. If I focus on this riddle too much, it daunts me—until I remember this pretense was itself the very unforeseen solution to other problems that felt like they couldn’t be fixed. We just needed to not give up.

I nestle into Graham, content to relax into this moment before we have to figure out what’s next.

My phone vibrates suddenly on the nightstand, jarring me out of my rest. Reaching over to check the screen, I find it’s my mom. I dart a glance at the still-sleeping Graham—he looks soundly out, which doesn’t surprise me given the night we had. I slip out of bed and quietly shut the bathroom door before picking up the call.

“Mom,” I whisper, “if you’re calling about Michelle’s wedding, I need to remind you I wasn’t invited.” Unlike the bedroom, the bathroom is chilly, especially because I’m only wearing one of Graham’s T-shirts. With the phone held to my ear, I cross my free arm over my chest and sit down on the lip of the massive tub.

“Why are you whispering?” Mom asks.

“Graham is still asleep,” I tell her. For the first time, I don’t have to lie to my parents about where Graham is. It’s a relief.

“Well.” I feel my mom change conversational course effortlessly. “Your father invited you,” she says.

I exhale quietly. Of course it’s one more protracted negotiation on the subject of the goddamn wedding. “You do know that’s not good enough,” I reply, practically feeling my thumb itch to end the call. “Don’t you think Michelle might get a little pissed at you if you invite someone she expressly doesn’t want at her wedding? We don’t have to turn her day into family drama.”

“Oh, it’s already family drama,” my mom announces. I wince. If my dad imagines himself Phil Dunphy on Modern Family, my mom drapes herself in the robes of Judge Judy. She loves to play the fearless, fearsome adjudicator, arbiter of the Right Way. It’s not necessarily the friendliest quality, even when she eventually apologizes for, oh, declaring no one these days gets engaged when they’re twenty-three or makes a career in acting. I’ve never welcomed her relish for picking fights in the guise of “discussion.”

“I just wish you both would grow up and have a conversation,” she says.

Feeling my chest constrict, I reply coolly. “She can call me anytime she wants, but she won’t.”

“You’re the one who missed her party,” my mom returns.

I taste something sour, practically hearing her enjoyment of this gotcha moment. Fighting to keep my composure, I focus on the cold bathroom floor under my bare feet. “It’s not like I wanted to,” I reply patiently, ignoring the fact I’ve reminded every individual member of my immediate family of this multiple times.

“Does Michelle know that?”

I sigh, pinching my brow. Outside the bathroom, I hear bedsheets rustling. Clenching the phone, I decide I’ve had enough. “Mom, we have to talk about this another time. Maybe when I’m not on vacation for my anniversary.”