Unfaithful - Natalie Barelli Page 0,26

I hand it back to him.

“Thank you.”

He smirks. “You want to catch up for a coffee sometime?”

“No.” I turn around to walk away.

“Anna?”

I stop, spin around. “How do you know my name?”

He gives an exaggerated eyeball roll. “Jeez, paranoid much? You told me.”

He sneers at me, like a cocky teenager. Did I really almost have sex with this man? What on earth was I thinking? I have a family. I have children, for Christ’s sake. I blame Luis. Luis who can’t keep his penis in his pants. Luis who lied to me about where he was at the time I needed him most. Luis who suddenly drinks out of tall-stemmed wine glasses and eats olives stuffed with yak cheese off handmade pottery.

Ryan puts his hand on my arm but I shrug it off while pretending to pull the strap of my bag farther up my shoulder.

“You don’t need to be embarrassed. About last night,” he says.

“I’m not,” I blurt. I feel myself blush crimson. I’m not embarrassed, I am humiliated.

There are more people around now, students, staff, professors, and I wish he would shut up. My eyes dart around like ball bearings in a pinball machine, frantically checking to see if anyone is listening. “Let’s just forget about it, okay?”

“If you say so. Want to be friends? I’d like to be friends.”

“Sorry. I really don’t have time for that.” Then I add, “But if you mention… anything about last night, I’ll deny it.”

I march out and this time he doesn’t call out to me or try to stop me. I can still feel his hand on my skin. Like a burn.

I have a class that morning. Calculus. First years. I teach it on autopilot, distracted by everything going on in my life. Alex, Geoff, Ryan. Luis. When it’s over I walk out and run into Geoff. Again. I’m beginning to wonder if he’s doing it on purpose. Maybe he prefers to have all our conversations in corridors.

“What happened to you last night? I went looking for you everywhere. I thought we could share a cab home.”

I almost blurt that I left early, claim a headache, then remember my handbag hanging on the back of the chair.

“Yes, sorry, I got sidetracked in conversation.”

“Yeah, I saw that. That guy, right?” He smiles. “You two seemed to have a lot to talk about. Then you both disappeared!”

I feel a blush creep up my neck. “Right. Anyway, Geoff, I really have to go.”

“Sure, sure. You have time for a chat after work?”

“Why?”

“No particular reason. I just want to see how you are. I imagine Alex’s death must have hit you pretty hard.”

“Thanks, but I can’t.” I am already walking away when he speaks again.

“Okay, next time then. I’m worried about you!” he shouts to my receding back.

Twelve

One week later, and I barely think about Alex anymore. It’s a terrible thing to say, I know that. And when I do think of him, it is with anger. It’s the thought that he used me just so he wouldn’t have to write the paper himself that makes my chest vibrate. His death? I don’t know. Maybe it hasn’t really sunk in. Maybe it never will.

At this point, all I think about is Luis. Like I’m stuck on a loop. Luis and me, Luis and I, Luis and some other woman. The idea that Luis is having an affair—by now I have convinced myself of this fact—is obsessing me. Whenever he’s out of the house I rummage through his things, his pockets, the drawer of the small desk that is unofficially his in the corner of the living room. The family computer that also is unofficially his and on which he keeps his email account. Carla came up with the password to that computer, and it’s scribbled on a Post-It note sticky-taped to the bottom of the screen: chez-les-sanchez.

I trawl through his emails, fingers in my mouth, other hand on the mouse, scrolling, reading, scrolling, reading, until my eyes bleed. Nothing. Nothing unusual in his appointment book either, not even a squiggle or a code word that I can detect among Luis’s organized, neat, everything-spelt-out entries. I pore over his cellphone bills, looking for a repeated number, an unusual one. I call the ones I don’t recognize—Hello, is this the aquarium?—but they’re all legitimate numbers: art supplies stores, 3-D printing, packing and transport; Perry Cube Gallery, recycling plants. Although it’s not to say he didn’t meet her at one of those places, obviously.

One day I surprise him