I unfold the foil snowflakes and the cutout scraps scatter onto the table like silver rain. I take them over to the window and fasten them with Blu-Tack, arrange them neatly in rows. Then I untangle the strings of colored lights and start to fix them to the window frame, concentrating on the task. When I step back again, I’m pleased. The room looks right: cozy, inviting, festive, all the things I want it to be. Being here at the new house has helped. After everything that happened, staying where we were felt like an impossibility.
It doesn’t mean I don’t think about my wife. I still think about her all the time, wondering where the core of her was, if anyone had ever delved deep enough to find a nugget of truth, something that was unambiguously and uncomplicatedly her. But Jade and I, we’re on our own now. We’ve survived and we’re free. Sometimes this freedom feels exhilarating—a vista of limitless possibilities, exciting and new. Sometimes it feels terrifying—free-falling through a void, with no way of knowing when we’ll hit the bottom. But either way, we’re in it together.
I glance at the clock, knowing Jade will be home from school soon, and as I do my gaze falls on the letter that came this morning, which I still haven’t put away. Quickly, I cross to the table and unfold it, scanning its contents once again. Just a couple of lines, printed in large black type across the page.
I saved her life. One good turn deserves another, don’t you think?
It’s probably just kids. Some silly preteen prank.
I step forward to adjust the lights a little, and as I do so I see Jade walking up the road, her head ducked down a little against the softly falling rain. She looks thoughtful but content, absorbed in herself. I watch her for a few moments, and then I flick the switch. The window is illuminated with bright jewels of red and green and silver, and the sudden light must catch her eye, because she looks up, straight at me, and she smiles. I crumple up the sheet of paper in my hand, shoving it into my pocket, and smile back.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Rebecca Fleet was educated at Oxford and works in brand strategy. She lives in London. The House Swap was her US debut; The Second Wife, her second domestic thriller, is forthcoming from Pamela Dorman Books/Viking.
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The Second Wife Page 30