Unfaithful - Natalie Barelli Page 0,22
Normally I’d walk on the path that meanders around the flower beds and then backtracks towards the Law faculty, but today I follow Geoff as he strides across the lawn, even though you’re not supposed to, and steps over the leafy hosta patch and what’s left of the blue irises. Maybe that’s what’s wrong with me: I never break the rules. Maybe that’s why I never get what I want.
It’s not a birthday party: it’s a retirement farewell and we missed the speeches, but not the alcohol. I’d never do something like this normally—crash a professor’s retirement party. That’s very Geoff, though. He’s always looking for a way to get something for free.
We stand at the drinks table—plastic cups, carrot sticks and dips—and Geoff finds two beers at the bottom of a plastic bucket full of watery ice. He hands me one and we clink bottles.
“I’ll be right back,” he says, then disappears to talk to someone at the other end of the room.
I watch him go, confused, and shake my head. I don’t know why he bothered asking me along. I should just leave, I think, as I lean against the table, holding the bottle of beer without a bottle opener, wondering what I’m even doing here.
“Is that your boyfriend?” A man in his mid-thirties with a short beard and green eyes has slid up next to me. “Sorry, is it okay if I join you? I should probably have asked that first.”
I’m about to say no, I’m leaving anyway, but I clock Geoff glancing my way, then checking this good-looking man chatting me up, and I change my mind.
I lift my beer. “If you can open this, you can absolutely join me.”
He takes the bottle and unscrews the cap with his hand before handing it back to me. I laugh.
“Easiest job I’ve had all day,” he says. He leans against the table too so we are next to each other, sipping our beers. He points with his chin in Geoff’s direction. “So, is he?”
“What? Oh, no, he’s not my boyfriend.” He glances at my left hand. “Your husband then?”
“No, not my husband either.” At the word ‘husband’ I feel the sting of tears in my nose and take a swig to hide my discomfort. “He’s an asshole,” I say, wiping my mouth with the back of my hand. I’m not even sure who I’m talking about anymore.
“Really? Wow, okay, what’s the story?”
My eyes never leave Geoff as I turn my head slightly so I can whisper in this stranger’s ear.
“He’s having sex with one of the math lecturers, and just gave her a full professorship in return.”
“Ha! So the whole hashtag MeToo thing, not really on his radar, amiright?”
“Please. He wouldn’t know how to spell hashtag.” He laughs.
“The professorship was actually meant for me,” I continue. “But I refused to have sex with him. He tried, once. I said no.”
I don’t know why I say that. It’s like I’m throwing pieces of history in the air and letting them fall wherever they land, just to see what this new, random version sounds like. “That’s why she got the promotion and not me.” I take another swig.
“That’s a terrible story. What’s she like?”
I think of smart, beautiful Mila, with her long shiny hair and perfect skin and her thin gold chain around her delicate ankle. “Ordinary,” I say, and shrug. “But some people will do anything to get ahead.”
“You could sue, you know. You’d win.”
I shrug. “Hey, I just roll with the punches. My husband is having an affair, that’s my biggest problem right now.” I’m completely unstoppable now. Maybe it’s the beer. Or maybe I’m just lonely and tired of being everyone else’s support system.
I could have confided in Lori, which would make a lot more sense, on the surface at least. Except that Lori—who I don’t see much anymore since she moved to Seattle, and who is on her third marriage, with a teenage son from the first—always comments on how lucky I am. “You have the perfect husband, the perfect children, the perfect career! How did you do it?” she’d say. And I’d joke back with something like, “You can have my kids if you like them so much. Scratch that. I’ll throw in the husband, too. Take the lot. See how you like them after a week.” But, deep down, I believed she was right. I did have the perfect family and the perfect life. So there was no way I was going to confide