“Of course,” I say. Habit.
Fay smiles at that. She’s tall and slim with dark hair neatly pulled into a bun and fingernails painted an elegant pale pink. I remember thinking she was beautiful, the way you can recall being feverishly sick without being able to summon up the sensory experience at all.“Ah, so you’re ending another marriage. Always were cynical about that institution.”
She says it wryly, without malice, but there’s a sadness in her eyes.
“I’m so sorry, Fay. I was— I should never have let it go on as long as it did, knowing I couldn’t?—”
She’s shaking her head. “I know you were—trying. I’m the one who should have known better. I knew how you felt, and I pushed and pushed. I was the one who kept hinting about ring shopping and a proposal, even knowing that I wasn’t going to be the one who changed your mind.”
“Still,” I say.
“Apology accepted.” Her smile widens. “Also,thank you. Because I’m engaged now, actually.” She flashes a ring in my direction, and I catch a glimpse of a rainbow of semi-precious stones. “And if things had worked out between you and me, I wouldn’t have met her, and that would have been a crime against humanity, because she’s terrific.”
My eyes widen.
“We met on a dating site,” she says, grinning at my surprise. “On a whim I saidall genders, even though I’d never thought I’d be into anyone except men. It turns out it pays to be open-minded.”
“Wow,” I say.
“Oh, yeah, so, belatedly: I’m bi.” She beams.
I open my mouth and close it again. “Ah.”
She rolls her eyes at my inability to utter more than one useless syllable at a time, but she’s laughing. “And you? I assume you’re still convinced marriage is a remediable evil?”
“I—”
That’s as far as I get before words fail me.
Her eyebrows go up.
“You’re notmarried,” she says.
“No.”
“Engaged, then.”
“No.”
“But thinking about it?”
An image pops into my mind. Eden. Crouching at the family dinner, hand on Gus’s head, smiling up at Quinn.
“No…”
It comes out far less solid than the last two nos.
The corner of her mouth turns up. “But…?”
I shake my head.
She tilts hers.
“Who is she?” she asks.
I think of all the ways I could answer her question.
She’s the ex-wife of a former client.
