Chapter 2 - She Needed a Husband Only When People Watched
Three weeks later, Mallory came home carrying an ivory envelope.
She placed it on the kitchen island with an enthusiasm I hadn't seen in months.
"Annual gala."
I glanced up from the cabinet hinge I was repairing.
Mallory worked as a senior account director for Arden & Pike, a Boston strategy firm where people apparently wore expensive shoes and invented reasons to use the word synergy.
The gala happened every spring.
We'd attended together for years.
"You want to go?"
She frowned.
"Of course I want to go."
"I meant with me."
Something flickered across her face.
Then the corporate smile appeared.
"Obviously with you."
Obviously.
Interesting word.
She pushed the invitation toward me.
"It's important this year. I'm being considered for regional director."
"Congratulations."
"It's not official."
"Still."
She walked around the island.
"Grant."
Her voice softened.
I looked up.
For the first time in weeks, she touched my shoulder.
"You're coming, right?"
There was something almost intimate in the gesture.
For half a second, the old reflex took over.
Hope.
Then I saw it.
Not affection.
Need.
She needed her husband.
Not on Wednesday nights.
Not during breakfast.
Not during weekends.
But beneath chandeliers, surrounded by executives who valued stability and judgment.
She needed the picture.
"Sure," I said.
Her relief was immediate.
"Thank you."
She kissed my cheek.
The gesture was so unfamiliar I nearly laughed.
Instead, I watched her walk upstairs.
Three days before the gala, Mallory came home at 10:17 p.m.
Her perfume was mixed with a men's cologne I didn't recognize.
Maybe she'd hugged someone.
Maybe she'd sat beside someone.
Maybe I was becoming paranoid.
I hated that uncertainty almost as much as I hated her distance.
She placed her purse beside the stairs.
"Long day."
"How was Evan?"
She froze.
Then took off one earring.
"What?"
"I asked how Evan was."
"Why?"
"You usually tell me."
Her expression turned guarded.
"I'm going to bed."
I nodded.
"Good night."
She stared at me, apparently waiting for something else.
An accusation.
A fight.
Maybe pleading.
I gave her none.
That night I lay awake until nearly three.
At some point, I made a decision.
I would attend the gala.
I would smile.
I would be polite.
I would embarrass nobody.
But I was finished performing a marriage that Mallory had stopped participating in when there wasn't an audience.
The gala was held at the Beaumont Crown, a hotel overlooking Boston Harbor.
Mallory spent almost two hours getting ready.
When she came downstairs, I had to admit she looked breathtaking.
Her gown was midnight blue, fitted through the waist, falling in clean lines to the floor.
I'd once told her that shade made her eyes look almost silver.
She hadn't worn it in years.
"You look beautiful," I said.
The words came automatically.
Her face softened.
"Thank you."
She stepped close enough to straighten my bow tie.
Her perfume surrounded me.
For one painful second, we looked like ourselves again.
The couple who used to dance in our kitchen after midnight.
The couple who once drove through a snowstorm just to find the diner where we'd had our first date.
The couple who knew each other's coffee orders, scars, childhood nightmares, and stupid private jokes.
Then Mallory said, "We really need to make a good impression tonight."
And the moment died.
During the drive, she placed her hand on my knee.
The first voluntary touch she'd initiated in weeks.
"Stay close tonight, okay?"
I looked at her hand.
"Why?"
She laughed lightly.
“What do you mean, why?”
“You haven’t wanted me close in six months.”
Her fingers withdrew.
“Can we please not start?”
“I didn’t start anything.”
“This night matters to me.”
I looked through the windshield at the harbor lights.
“So I’ve noticed.”
She said nothing else.
Inside the hotel, she changed.
It happened almost instantly.
Her arm slipped through mine.
Her shoulders relaxed.
Her smile became bright and affectionate.
“This is my husband, Grant.”
She introduced me to vice presidents, directors, clients.
Every time, she touched me.
My forearm.
My shoulder.
My back.
Once she pressed herself against my side while laughing at someone’s joke.
Months earlier, I would have treasured every contact.
Now each touch felt like theater.
Then her eyes found someone across the ballroom.
I knew who he was without being told.
Evan Mercer was standing near the bar.
Early thirties.
Tall.
Fit.
Clean-cut brown hair.
An expensive charcoal suit.
He was laughing with two men until Mallory entered his line of sight.
The laugh stopped.
His eyes moved from her to me.
Something passed between them.
Not lust exactly.
Recognition.
History.
Awareness.
Mallory tightened her grip on my arm.
“That’s Evan.”
“I figured.”
She glanced at me.
“Please don’t be weird.”
I almost smiled.
“Have I done something weird?”
“No.”
“Then we’re okay.”
But her expression said she didn’t believe that.
Twenty minutes later, the jazz quartet changed songs.
Mallory looked toward the dance floor.
Then at Evan.
Then back at me.
“Come dance with me.”
There it was.
The request.
So ordinary that nobody would have understood why it changed everything.
She reached for my hand.
I looked at it.
The same hand that had pulled away from mine beneath the covers.
The same fingers that had spent evenings typing messages while I sat three feet away wondering when my wife had stopped needing me.
“No, thank you.”
Her smile remained in place.
“What?”
“I’m fine here.”
She laughed because two colleagues were nearby.
“Don’t be ridiculous.”
She tugged gently.
I didn’t move.
“Grant.”
“I’m not in the mood to dance.”
Her eyes sharpened.
“We always dance at these events.”
“Do we?”
“Yes.”
I met her gaze.
“I don’t remember you wanting to be close to me lately.”
The smile vanished for half a second.
Color drained from her cheeks.
“Not here.”
“Exactly.”
“What is that supposed to mean?”
“It means you don’t get to ignore me in private and borrow me in public.”
Her grip loosened.
A woman nearby glanced toward us.
Mallory immediately smiled again.
“We’ll discuss this later.”
I nodded.
“That would be new.”
She walked away.
Not stormed.
Mallory was too disciplined for that.
She crossed the ballroom with perfect posture, joined three women near the stage, and laughed at something one of them said.
Too loudly.
I stayed where I was.
For the first time in six months, I didn’t chase her.
May you like
Something inside me felt terrible.
Something else felt free.
