Ten months ago, I saw my husband’s favorite suit in the pile of our things that were earmarked for Goodwill.
“How’d you get in there?” I pulled it out, whipping it a time or two to free the wrinkles it had accidentally caught by being folded. I still remembered the time I spent haggling with the clerk—it was from the prior season, but it looked amazing on him. I managed to get the price down, down, down, until my husband walked out with the nicest suit I’d ever seen. . .for a price we could actually afford.
And now that same designer label was staring at me from the donate box. It felt significant for some reason.
“This almost got donated.” I laughed as I handed it back to him. “Can you even imagine?”
Only, his chuckle when he took it and hung it on his side of the closet wasn’t quite right.
A few weeks later, when I drop an earring and watch it roll across the floor of our closet and onto his side, I get down on my hands and knees and follow it. When I stand up, my eyes are drawn to the rows and rows of suits hanging in his side of the closet. Plaid. Tweed. Grey. Tan. Striped. He has one of each, or in some instances, several. As a Brit, he can really wear almost anything and pull it off. Because he works in an office everyday—our office—he has amassed a metric ton of nice suits.
But the nicest one, the only designer suit he owns, is missing.
I wrack my brain to try and remember the last time he wore it, but I can’t. I run my hand down the row, just in case I’m missing it somehow, but the one that I bought him for my mother’s funeral’s definitely gone.
I slide my earring in place, and I walk out of the closet to ask where it has gone. “Hey, is the suit at the dry cleaners?”
“What suit?” When he turns to face me, it’s there again, the slight discomfort underlying his question. That’s when I recognize what I didn’t a month ago.
Guilt.
“Is something going on?” I ask softly, not sure I want to know.
Will my question cause a fight? What happens if it does? Do I really have the bandwidth to deal with a fight right now? I’m nearly ready for work. I just need to grab my jacket and slide my feet into pumps, but he’s ready now.
It’s not a famous designer, but his dove grey suit fits him just right.
That’s not something anyone would say about me. Nothing really fits me right now. Actually, I had to buy a whole new wardrobe after Mom passed, and then again a few months later. It’s been a rough year. But my husband looks flawless—my amazing, handsome, debonair husband.
The one who won’t meet my eye when I ask him about a suit.
He glances at his watch. “I better head out. I have an early meeting.”
“Wait, you’re driving separately?” I arch one eyebrow.
He nods. “Plus, after dinner I have that thing. Remember?”
“The fundraiser?”
He nods.
“Right.”
“Okay.” When he turns to go, there’s no hug. There’s not even a peck on the cheek. He just heads for the door.
That’s the moment that I know.
I can’t explain why I know. I’m not sure how it can be true. It wasn’t a single moment or a single day, but in that moment, it hits me like a mallet to the head.
My husband’s having an affair.
There have been too many things lately. There’ve been too many early meetings. And the most condemning evidence of all is the mysterious suit. Being in the donate pile clearly wasn’t a mistake. It was there intentionally, and I was too obtuse to parse out what it meant.
I wonder how many other things I missed.
I’m still not sure why the suit was cast off, but it’s definitely symbolic. I chose that suit. It was the one prize that came from this miserable excuse for a year. But now that I’ve recognized something’s off, I can’t pretend.
That’s not how I’m wired.
A moment later, I race after my fleeing husband, barefoot, no jacket against the cold. To add insult to injury, it’s raining outside, and when he sees me racing toward him, instead of being worried, instead of having concern for me, my darling husband’s jaw locks up. His eyes flash.
He’s annoyed.
I wonder, in that moment, what caused it. Was it the weight I gained that changed his regard for me? Was it my chronic neediness over the last year, clinging to him like he was my oxygen in a hostile, unfamiliar atmosphere? Did I treat him like I treated chocolate, as a life preserver in a terrifying flood?
Did my mother’s death destroy us? Or maybe it was my father’s. If not that, is there something about me that would have destroyed us no matter what external factors had come into play to damage our bond?
The rain has plastered my hair to my forehead, my cheeks, and my neck by the time I reach his side. He still doesn’t look concerned.
He looks tired.
“How many times?” I ask.
“What?” He’s scowling now. “Barbara, what are you doing out here? Go inside.”
“Just tell me how many times.” Even to my own ears, I sound crazy. Maybe there’s no way I could be sane in this moment.
“What are you talking about?”
My voice rasps the words, “How many times have you slept with her?”
I expect him to deny it. I expect him to lie, just as he’s lied with every small action, with every meeting that didn’t exist, and just as he’s lied with every missed touch and kiss.
I expect him to lie straight to my face.
So when he doesn’t, when he asks, “How did you know?”
It hurts.
I start to shiver then, as the rain sluices between my neck and my blouse, as my unprotected feet are sliced by the rough shape of the malicious gravel underneath them. “It’s true.”
He sighs, finally pulling out an umbrella and holding it over his own head, not mine. “How did you find out?”
“It was the suit.” My lips are shaking as raindrops hit them and run down to my neck. “You donated the suit.”
He laughs, but this time he’s not even trying to mask his frustration. “I threw it away,” he says. “It’s what I was wearing when—” He cuts off in disgust. “It kept accusing me, just like you are now.”
He was wearing my suit when. . . “We’re over,” I whisper.
In the movies, couples argue. Even cheaters fight for the love they’ve clearly abandoned. The heroine retains a shred of pride, because the guy pretends to care that he screwed up. But not my husband. He just nods slowly, turns around, and gets in his car. He has a meeting, after all, and later today, he has a thing.
What he doesn’t have any more, apparently, is a wife.
No, I’ve clearly been all on my own for a while.
I’m just finally realizing it.
Here’s the blurb for Minted, which will be out just after Thanksgiving.
Barbara’s year has not been going well. Both her parents died, she gained a lot of weight, and her husband left her. And now, she’s stuck attending a million holiday parties for work. . .with both her ex and his new girlfriend. She’s not feeling the holiday cheer, that’s for sure.
Bentley, on the other hand, has realized that while his life is pretty good, he really wants to settle down with an amazing woman. Unfortunately, while he’s a whiz at making money, he’s not so great at choosing people to date. He and his old friend Barbara make a deal. He’ll be her date to the dreaded holiday parties, and in exchange, she’ll help him weed through the dross to find the shimmering treasure he wants to build a life with.
It doesn’t take Bentley very long to realize that Barbara’s the one he wants, but she’s not as quick to believe that she’s good enough for the handsome billionaire Bentley. Can he convince her that she’s everything he needs in time to spruce up the holiday season? Or will her miserable year come to just as tragic a close?
