Mom.
“Stop talking to him,” I say, my entire body quivering with rage. “Just stop with your stupid games already.”
Mom frowns. “What is wrong with you, Ada?”
“What is wrong with you?” I scream. “I mean, come on, Mom!”
She shakes her head, still acting puzzled. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“I know about the affair!” I burst out.
Silence. It’s like I’ve turned everyone at the table to stone.
Afton is the first to break the spell. “Ada—”
“It’s my turn to talk now,” I say. “I’ve been trying not to talk about it all week, but I just . . . can’t pretend it didn’t happen. I’m sorry. I’m not built that way.”
“Oh, honey,” Mom says after a long moment of silence. Her expression is weird, like she’s surprised but some part of her was also expecting this. “I didn’t know that you knew.”
“Of course I didn’t know!” I glance at Pop wildly. He doesn’t look surprised, either; he looks deeply embarrassed. “How would I have known?”
“We just wanted to wait until you were old enough to understand. We didn’t want you to be hurt,” he says gently.
“Oh, god.” I glance from him to Mom to Billy and back to Pop. “So you . . . this is so messed up. I mean, I’ve heard of people swinging and playing fast and loose in their marriages, but this is messed up.”
“Now wait just a minute, young lady,” Mom says, back to her no-nonsense voice. “That’s not what we—” She composes herself. “We don’t need to talk about this here.”
“It’s all right,” comes a voice from farther down the table—Jerry, who has never looked more ready to take charge of this kind of social emergency. Beside him, Penny gives a nervous giggle, and Kate is buried in her phone, probably live tweeting the entire exchange. “I’ll talk to the waiter,” Jerry says. “We can get a different table, maybe inside. It’s too bright out here anyway.”
Without waiting for confirmation, everybody gets up, the chairs scraping as they hurriedly push them back. They all start to file out, except for Marjorie, who stays right where she was.
“Margie?” Nick’s dad asks.
She waves him off like a pesky fly. “No way, sonny. I want to see how this turns out.”
I boil over again as the Wongs also start to slink out. “Wait, you’re not leaving, are you, Billy?” I ask loudly.
He stops. “Me?”
“Don’t you think you, of all people, should stay?”
His eyes are wide. The fear I see in them gives me courage. “You’re an excellent actor,” I go on. “You missed your true calling by becoming a surgeon.”
“Oh my god, Ada, stop,” says Afton, standing up.
“I mean, you’ve got balls, I have to admit,” I continue like I didn’t hear her. “The way you dare to sit here, next to her, when she’s here with my father. You absolute fucking bastard.”
Now everybody at the table is saying the words Ada and stop and don’t. Then, above them all, comes the high, reedy voice of my little sister.
“What’s an affair?” Abby asks. “Why is everyone so upset?”
Shit. I forgot about Abby. I am officially the worst sister in the universe. “I’m sorry.” I glance at Afton, whose face is pale as milk under her tan. “I’m sorry. I just couldn’t do it anym—”
“It was me,” Afton says then, loudly and clearly and slowly, like she’s speaking to a person who doesn’t speak English well. She draws herself up to her full height and looks into my eyes. “It. Was. Me.”
I don’t understand.
“It was me you saw that morning,” Afton says. She closes her eyes for a moment, and a myriad of emotions cross her face in quick succession. Anger. Guilt. Relief. Then she takes a deep breath and turns to our parents. “Ada thinks Mom is having an affair, because earlier this week she came back to the hotel room, and she saw me—”
I’m shaking my head. “It couldn’t have been you. I saw—”
“It was me,” she insists fiercely. “Trust me. I was there.”
Now I feel sick for an entirely new reason. “You and Billy Wong?”
“Ew!” Afton exclaims. “Ew, no! No, stupid. Me and Michael.”
Everyone in the group swivels to stare at Michael. He’d almost made it to the door of the restaurant, attempting a half-hearted escape, but at his name he knows he’s caught. He freezes for a second, like maybe if he doesn’t move, we won’t see him.
“Well, son?” pipes up Marjorie. “Was it you?”
He sighs and turns to face us. “I would just like