to find it again, open up his Map My Run app, and see exactly where he’d been running to every morning.
* * *
—
On the ride home from dinner Olivia was silent. She knew Spencer would notice, knew he would ask what the matter was, but she couldn’t bear to make small talk. “Cat got your tongue?” he asked.
He thought he was being cute, but he had no idea how telling his little idiom was. Olivia pinched herself. College was not so long ago. Her sophomore class at Wellesley on the history of idioms had been one of her favorites. The phrase “cat got your tongue” was derived from ancient Egypt, where liars’ tongues were cut out and fed to the cats. She looked over at him and saw who he really was—a liar. He was a cheat and a fraud who had now made her life fraudulent as well.
It took every ounce of self-control to keep her mouth shut. She thought about her confession earlier, and how he had made her feel like she was crazy. It had felt awful to question her own sanity like that. To feel like some kind of lunatic wife who had come undone.
She stopped herself from rehashing everything that had transpired that night and focused on the possibility of creating an authentic life without Spencer, centered on caring for herself and her beautiful baby girl. She thought about the watercolors in her Amazon cart and diving back into graphic design again. An old client had left her a message just the other day about updating his logo. Thinking about things in her control calmed her. She breathed in and out purposefully and let her mind go to what needed to be done in order to achieve her goals—finding that second phone again and using it to bury the stranger sitting next to her.
“I’m just sitting here thinking how lucky I am that you forgave me for snooping,” she responded.
“You’re not yourself, honey. I understand. It’s the hormones.” He put his hand on her leg as he had on the way there. Now she recoiled from it.
At home she purposefully spent an extra few minutes in the bathroom getting ready for bed. He was out cold when she returned.
She said his name quietly. “Spencer?” Nothing.
And a little louder. “Spencer!” Still nothing.
She threw in a few choice words before heading to his closet to search for the other phone. By the time she reached the point of frustration, Lily cried her hungry cry from the crib, saving her from looking further. As she nursed, she pondered what could be so bad about it being just her and Lily. Alison was doing it alone and seemed so happy. But she gulped away tears as that desire faded; she was and had always been a Disney princess kind of girl whose happily-ever-after had always included a prince—a loyal prince, that is. This scenario—with Snow White busily keeping house while Prince Charming jogs by Cinderella’s every morning for a quickie—was not her dream.
She fell asleep in the chair; a blessing really, as she knew there was nothing lonelier than sleeping next to someone you despise. In the morning, Spencer came into Lily’s room and kissed her on the top of her head. She felt a pang of love: a moment in which she’d forgotten what was really going on.
“Come back to bed, baby, and get some rest,” he said.
“I’m OK.” She smiled, still vacillating between sleep and hell. She woke up and thought it through. It was Sunday, Spencer would not be running, and she would have little chance of finding that phone. She changed her mind.
“Actually. Would you mind taking care of Lily? I’m not feeling great and could use some more sleep.”
She stayed in bed until noon, a personal postcollege record. She only had to make it ten more hours without bludgeoning him.
CHAPTER 33
Alison & Marc
When Alison left for the city the next morning there were already three messages from Jack or Jackie. It didn’t matter what she called him now because she vowed never to call him again. Brought up by a woman deceived, she loathed any kind of deception. Still, she was feeling horrible and confused as to why she was feeling so horrible and confused about a man she barely knew.
When she’d returned home the night before, she went through their entire online correspondence. Her anger increased exponentially with each duplicitous post. Especially his last—Follow your heart. She was done with that; she