Always the Last to Know

by Kristan Higgins

  “Got everything you need?” she asked.

  “Yes. Thank you again.” Humility was the price I had to pay. “Hey, Jules. Brianna said . . .”

  “What? Is she cutting herself?”

  “No! Jesus. Is she?”

  “I just asked you!”

  “Well, not that I know of or saw. She was wearing shorty pajamas, and her skin is perfect.” My sister’s shoulders relaxed a few inches. “No, but she said she heard you crying? In your closet.”

  Jules grimaced. “Oh.”

  “You’re okay, right?”

  “Yeah. A work thing. Plus Dad and Mom.”

  “Do you want to talk about it?”

  She sighed. Glanced down the hallway and came in, shutting the door behind her. “There’s this woman at work. She’s great. Very talented. I hired her, and I have nothing but good things to say about her, but . . .” She stopped. “Don’t tell Oliver. Or Mom. Do not tell Mom.”

  “Okay.” Wow. I didn’t know that Jules and I had ever had a secret, especially one we kept from our mother. “So what about her?”

  “She’s been . . . anointed. I don’t know how or why, but suddenly, I seem to be yesterday’s news.”

  I started to answer, then stopped. This was the closest Perfection from Conception had ever come to asking for advice or sharing anything except perfect nuggets from her perfect life. My answer had to be good.

  “I can’t imagine that someone with your talent and work ethic, with all the beautiful buildings you’ve designed, could ever be yesterday’s news.” I paused, curling my toes, and pulled out one of my best lines for my little students when they confided in me. “But that must be very hard.”

  Jules looked at me a second, and I wondered if maybe I blew it. Then she gave me a fast, hard hug, and left. “Sleep well,” she said.

  Then she was back. “And thanks for being so great with Brianna. She worships you.”

  She was gone again.

  Well, well, well. “Pepper,” I said to my dog, who was already asleep in the middle of my bed, “I think I’ve just had a bonding moment with my sister.”

  I got into bed, content with the world. Noah . . . well, we were friends again, at least. Dad was getting better. Juliet had said something nice to me. I loved my nieces.

  And I had a very good dog.

  If Sister Mary could’ve heard my thoughts, she would’ve said, “Count your blessings before the shit hits the fan.”

  A wise woman, that.

  * * *

  — —

  By the time I got back to my house the next day, Noah had been there and left, and there was a new and very sturdy-looking beam where the wall had once been. Safe to go upstairs said the note taped to it. I’ll be back later. Clean up the rubble in the meantime.

  So bossy. But it gave me a warm feeling, knowing Noah had been here. I’d have to sell a few more couch paintings to afford paying him. Maybe more than a few. Maybe I’d have to take out a bank loan.

  Whatever it cost, I didn’t care.

  Alexander texted me, asking if I could come to the city tonight for dinner and stay over. I was just about to turn him down, since I had homeownery things to do, when a car pulled into my little driveway. An Audi.

  It was Gillian Epstein of Epstein Events.

  Pepper, faithless cur that she was, bounded over to her. I wish I could report that Gillian was the type to shriek and be afraid and fuss over any fur on her clothes, but instead she bent down and rubbed Pepper’s neck and spoke to her, my dog’s tail beating the air so fast it was a blur.

  Then she straightened up. “Got a minute?”

  “You betcha!” I said. Sometimes my mother’s Minnesotan accent just popped out of me.

  Gillian was dressed in a red pencil skirt, a pretty white peasant blouse and a brown suede jacket I wanted to marry. I was dressed in yesterday’s jeans and a shirt I swiped from Oliver. She had that walk that some women have . . . the swaying, the grace, the somewhat arrogant stride that said, “Yes, I’m really this pretty.”

  “My house is under construction, so it’s probably best if we sit out here. Um, hang on, I’ll grab a chair.”

  I only had one, so I graciously gave it to her, then leaned tentatively against my decrepit railing, hoping it would hold me. It did. “Uh . . . that dinner party the other night . . . I hope it wasn’t too horrible.”

  “Oh, it was,” she said. “Your mother is wonderful, though. Such an impressive woman. I don’t think she remembered Noah and I were . . . together once. It’s fine.”

  “Mickey’s pretty great, though, don’t you think?” I asked. “I love her. Breast is best for baby, right? Funny that both you and I probably once thought we . . . Mickey, though, huh? She’s so open and fun and . . .” My hands flailed for something. “Yeah. Just great. Sense of humor. She’s very honest.” Stop talking. Stop talking.

  Gillian stared at me. She took a breath, then exhaled through her nostrils in a very evil-Disney-villain kind of way. “I don’t know if I should tell you this, but my therapist recommended it.”

  Fuck. I had been discussed in therapy. That was never a good sign. “Okay. Fire away.”

  “I obviously have . . . feelings . . . regarding you, since Noah . . . well. That’s neither here nor there.”

  Since Noah what? “Mm-hm.” Traitorous Pepper put her head on Gillian’s lap and gazed at her adoringly.

  “So. I’m going to tell you this only because I feel it’s the right thing to do. Not because I’m trying to make trouble or because I’m jealous of you. I have a very strong working relationship with your mother and the entire board of selectmen, and I don’t want that to jeopardize—”

  “Just spit it out, Gillian. It’s fine. Go ahead.”

  Another breath. “You’re dating Alexander Mitchum, correct?”

  “Yep.”

  “Your mother told me you’d been seeing each other a couple of years.”

  “Correct.”

  “I mentioned at the dinner party that he and I had met last spring at a yacht christening.”

  I suddenly had a bad feeling about this. “Uh-huh.”

  She looked at me, her red-painted lips tight. “He made a pretty hard pass at me.”

  “Oh.” My eyelids seemed to be blinking too fast. “Uh . . . are you sure?”

  “Yes.”

  “Last . . . last spring.”

  “Yes. May seventeenth. I checked my planner.”

  “And by ‘hard pass,’ what are we talking about? Because he’s nice to everyone, and you know, schmoozing is part of his—”

  “He pressed me against a wall, kissed my neck and asked me if I wanted to spend the night at the Madison Beach Hotel with him.”

  Oh, the fuckery.

  “That is a pass. Okay. Yep. You’re right.” I felt a little dizzy.

  “And when I said no, he told me I didn’t know what I was missing. He gave me his room key and told me I should change my mind so he could rock my world.”

  “Dick move.” I swallowed.

  “I thought so.”

  My legs felt weak, so I sat down, my knees wobbling like a newborn foal’s. My breathing sounded funny. Too loud.

  Rock your world. He’d said that to me on more than one occasion. Want to come back to my place so I can rock your world? I thought he meant it to be funny, and I always laughed.

  And last May—I remembered it was May because of the lilacs—he’d called me and told me to take the train up to Madison. Spur of the moment, he said, because it had been late in the day on Saturday. We’d have fun. And I did, and we did, and I’d been his second choice. At least his second choice, because who knows if he’d made that offer to someone else at the yacht christening party?

  “Look,” Gillian said, and her voice was gentler now. “I’m sorry to tell you this. I kn
ow it must seem like I’m trying to get revenge because of Noah, but I’m not. I just thought I’d want to know if my boyfriend made a pass at someone else.”

  “No, I appreciate it,” I whispered.

  “Do you want a glass of water?”

  “No, thanks.” Pepper left Gillian and came over to me and tried to sit on my lap.

  “Do you want to call someone, maybe? Your sister? Mom?”

  I blinked. Put my chin on Pepper’s head, getting my ear licked as thanks. “I’m okay, Gillian. I . . . I appreciate you telling me this.”

  She stood up, smoothed her skirt and walked past me on the steps. “I love your jacket,” I whispered.

  She put her hand on my shoulder. “In another world, we’d probably be friends.”

  Would we? “Drive safely. Bye.”

  She strode to her car, hips swaying the perfect amount, got in and gave me a little finger wave.

  Just then, my phone beeped. I took it out. Another text from my loving boyfriend.

  Please come, babe. I miss you!

  Did he now?

  On my way, I typed.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  John

  There was another woman. In the not-so long-ago, he had been with another woman.

  John remembers her hard face, which he had thought was not pretty when they met. (A party? There was dancing.) But the face became prettier as she said things he liked, things Barb didn’t say anymore. He knows now he should have been smarter. That these were the things all bored old men want to hear. He thought he deserved those things. He was a man, and men should be told those things.

  Handsome. Smart. Funny. Strong. Those were some of the feelings or words she had said.

  He said things to that woman, and most of them were lies. He lied about Barb. He lied about his unhappiness being her fault when she had always worked so hard. He remembers how hard Barb tried to fit in, to be not so different, because she thought being from Minnesota made her less . . . something . . . than other women. He told that other woman about that, and they laughed. The hard-faced woman laughed at his wife, and John had been glad and it makes no sense now.

  Now he remembers the meals Barb made, the cookbooks she bought, the vegetables she grew. How pretty their house was, how nice it always smelled. He remembers how loving she was with Juliet, how delighted Juliet made her.

  Juliet. John knows he could have been a better father to her. He should have tried more. She is an important person in the world somehow. People know her. She is impressive.

  That other woman, whose name he doesn’t remember, doesn’t want to remember, was like . . . like . . . like that plant that grows up a tree and chokes it. That invader. Invasive species, that’s it. Kudzu. The word flies into his brain. She was kudzu, taking over, blotting out the view, tangling, and he let her.

  Words are flying back into his head. Unfaithful. Cheater. Liar.

  Cliché.

  When his friend came, the new friend with the hair like pieces of rope, he was so happy. She didn’t know him when he was wrong, when he was a liar and stupid. She only knows him the way he is now, and there is no disappointment or hope in her eyes, no expectation that he will be anything other than what he is. She talks to him and talks to him, and laughs. She is not pretty, not like his girls or Barb or even the other woman, but Janet—yes, her name is Janet—makes him feel at peace.

  A fear seeps through him, its tentacles cold and coiling. That he has done something terrible by being sick, and his family needs him to be the father again, the husband, and that he will never be able to do this. That he has to fix something or his wife and daughters will never get . . . never be . . . never know . . .

  The thought is gone.

  Shame. Another word he knows now. He is ashamed of himself, for lying to Barb, about Barb. For telling the invasive species his wife was cold and self-absorbed. That she didn’t care about him anymore, didn’t want to talk to him, when he knows that he should’ve turned that knob and opened the door to the bathroom that day in the long-ago, held her close and cried with her. He knows in doing so, he could have changed the course of their lives.

  That is the thought that won’t go away. He hears her crying in the bathroom as he sleeps, and when he wakes up, he is so sad.

  There is something about a flower he has to tell Barb. Something important. Something that will fix things, but the flower floats away. It has to come back. He has to make it come back. He has to tell her about the flower, but LeVon makes him exercise and the bossy woman asks him to make sounds, and now he is trying, trying hard, because he has something important to say.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  Sadie

  I chose the restaurant in which I planned to dump Alexander, and I made sure it was as expensive as I could find, which was really saying something in New York City.

  He was there already, handsome, charming . . . shithead.

  “You look beautiful, as always,” he said, leaning in for a kiss. I gave him my cheek. The maître d’ showed us to our table, which was in a corner, because Alexander always asked for a great table. The restaurant was everything I hoped it would be—sleekly decorated, Michelin starred, quiet, with well-dressed people murmuring and drinking.

  I didn’t plan on murmuring, but first, I did want to order pretty much everything on the menu. Alexander, my soon-to-be ex-boyfriend, wasn’t getting out of here without bleeding money.

  The waiter came over. “Hello!” I said, as was my way. “How are you tonight?”

  “I’m quite well, signorina. My name is Luciano, and it is my pleasure to serve you tonight.”

  “What a beautiful name,” I said. “Please tell your mom she chose well! Luciano, I’ll have the Fiorentino, please.” I pointed to the drink that cost, yes, forty-nine dollars. Only in New York, folks.

  “I thought you didn’t like brandy,” Alexander said.

  “I’ve grown and changed.” I smiled brightly. “What are you having, hon?” The endearment felt like poison on my lips.

  “I’ll have the Dante,” he said.

  “Very good, signore,” Luciano said.

  “Oh, and we’ll have a bottle of Cristal with dinner, okay?” I said, smiling my sparkliest smile.

  “Excellent! Which year?”

  “Surprise us. It’s a special night.” I’d studied the champagne list after picking this place. The cheapest bottle of Cristal cost six hundred dollars, and the most expensive was well over a thousand.

  “Babe,” Alexander said, “uh, that’s kind of expensive.”

  “Oh! We can call him back, then, babe.” I raised my hand, knowing he would stop me. It would look like he couldn’t afford it, and he would hate that, especially here.

  As predicted . . . “No, no, it’s fine. A special night, like you said. How are you, babe? How was your week?”

  “So good, Alexander. So good.”

  He smiled, not picking up on the venom in my voice. “Well, it’s great to see you. I hope you can stay a few nights. I’ll be in town for four days. We could have a lot of fun. The Guggenheim has a new show, and—”

  I stopped listening.

  He had made a pass at another woman. He wanted to sleep with her in the hotel where we’d had sex. That image of him kissing her on the neck . . . it was kind of a specialty of his.

  I wished Gillian had kicked him in the nutsack.

  When the waiter came back, I was ready. “I’m starving!” I announced cheerfully to both men. “It’s been a tough couple of weeks, Luciano, and I haven’t been in the city in ages, and I think I want a bite of everything! How about the sea urchin with pickled fennel, the Chinese caviar, maybe . . . hmm . . . the red prawn antipasto, and the garden salad, and oh! That lobster risotto sounds great! And for my main course, the sirloin, please. With the roasted potatoes, please. And heck, throw in those wild mushroo
ms, too.”

  Luciano was in love with me now. “Excellent choices, signorina. For the signore?”

  Alexander looked incredulous. “Are you sure you can eat all that, babe?”

  “I’m super hungry, babe.” Sparkle sparkle. “Plus, you know how these Michelin-star places are. Every plate is basically two bites of food.”

  Luciano chuckled warmly. “Signorina, you are correct. Just enough to whet the appetite for the next course, si?”

  “Si,” I said, beaming.

  “Signore? For you?”

  “I’ll have the sea bass,” he said.

  “Oh, come on!” I said. “You can’t let me sit here and eat all those courses and just have one! This is an Italian restaurant! To eat is to love, right, Luciano?”

  “Si, signorina. The beautiful lady is correct, of course.”

  I winked at him. Alexander had flaws, but being a shitty tipper was not among them, and Luciano would leave here with hundreds of dollars from our meal alone.

  Alexander ordered a pasta course and the grilled octopus. I would also be ordering dessert. Possibly a dessert martini. Carter had already been notified about my romantic drama as I drove to the New Haven train station, and had ordered me to sleep over tonight, bless him.

  I drank the cocktail, wincing a little at the taste but appreciating the warmth.

  How could Alexander do this to me? Why? Wasn’t I the easiest, most laid-back girlfriend in the world? Had I ever complained about his travel schedule? Ever insisted he come to a school event or birthday party? Before my father’s stroke, he’d only visited Stoningham once. I was always cheerful and upbeat around him because I was those things, goddamnit.

  Luciano brought our courses. I ate, laughed, murmured in the appropriate places. The food was amazing. At least there was that. Also, the champagne, my God. So good. I might even order a second bottle.

  As I watched Alexander, I saw it. The performance. The need for validation. He was working hard to make sure we were The Couple To Be at this swanky, sophisticated restaurant. When I fake laughed, he’d glance around to make sure people saw that he had the power to bring humor. He smiled a lot, and where my dorky brother-in-law also smiled a lot, Oliver was . . . sincere. He loved my sister and his daughters. He adored my parents. He even loved me, not that I’d given him much reason to.