Listen to your artistic instincts, that first impression. Go with your gut every time. It always ends up being accurate. Otherwise, we waste time following another path, another way, when we knew all along the first idea was the right one.
She knew what she had to do the moment she entered the cottage. All the way home from London, Noelle had fought it. Made excuses, gone over every square inch of her dates and phone calls with Preston since that first night they’d had coffee. Impossible, that he would be married. What about all our London dates? If he had a wife, what lies did he give her? A “night out with the boys”? Late faculty meetings that went overly long?
With a quick pat of Mr. Darcy’s neglected head, Noelle made her way to the kitchen, wriggling off her coat as she went. Though she would’ve loved some tea, maybe even a scone, they would have to wait. Google beckoned. She typed in his name, along with the college name to specify, and voila! Everything she needed to know. Why didn’t I do this weeks ago?
After skimming past the first three useless links, she paused: “College Banquet Honors Teacher Award Recipients.” Noelle clicked the link and scrolled down the article. Definitive proof. Preston, one arm wrapped around the waist of a pretty blond woman. The caption confirmed it. Mrs. Preston Evans.
Just to be sure, to be absolutely sure, she scrolled back to the top of the article. Three weeks ago. Right around the time he had sat beside her at Sketch.
Angry tears blurred the text. Sometime during her fight with Adam, Noelle had actually known. Something about his words made an odd sort of sense. Before now, she couldn’t put her finger on it, but something had been “off” about Preston. A measured distance, an occasional bumbling or stutter. Times when he would cancel a date abruptly or end one early, without a solid explanation. He had a wife to get home to, apparently…
With closer analysis, she remembered other things. A resistance to let her see his apartment—they were always meeting at restaurants or the college instead. The pattern of taking her to big touristy London places, places a London-based wife probably wouldn’t visit. The way he isolated their relationship—he never introduced her to his friends, rarely talked about his own family.
Noelle closed the laptop and stared ahead, waiting for the numbness to wear off so she could decide what to do. How to extract herself from the situation, from a person with no regard for her reputation, her character. Or apparently his own. Surely, he knew he’d be discovered one day. But maybe he loved the thrill of the game, enjoyed the possibility of being caught.
The thought of other female students he’d “asked for coffee” made Noelle groan. She envisioned her own relationship from Preston’s point of view, knowing how easily she had fallen into his trap. Flirting with him, laughing at his jokes, listening intently to his stories about art.
More than anything, she felt sucker-punched for believing him. For giving him every benefit of every subconscious doubt. She’d invested time getting to know him, invested future time thinking the relationship might actually go somewhere. She’d started to care, started to count on his calls, on their weekly dates. On his kisses. When all along he wasn’t hers to kiss in the first place.
Tears streaked down, and she wanted to call the one person she could talk to, count on. But Jill had much more important things to deal with tonight. Of course, Noelle’s second choice normally would’ve been Adam, but she couldn’t face him. Call it pride or embarrassment, even though he’d been right. No, she’d have to deal with it alone.
Mr. Darcy sprang up onto the chair beside her, his whiskers spreading in a melodramatic “meow.”
“C’mon, my little man.” She picked him up, glad for a diversion. Even if the diversion only entailed pouring cat food into a bowl.
It had been Jill’s idea to arrive at the end of Preston’s art class. Give no hint of anger, of having been enlightened. Then lure him in and drop the bomb. At first, Noelle didn’t know if she would be capable of even seeing him again. But she wanted to do this with dignity. She wanted closure, to see his face drop when she told him she knew.
She also considered calling him out, phoning up the wife, telling her everything. But why should I be that person? The one who might instigate a breakup of a marriage. Besides, the wife might not even believe her, might not want to believe her.
Six days had passed since Jill had given birth and the bottom dropped out of Noelle’s relationship with Preston. She’d called Jill yesterday to let her know the situation, and Jill had been every bit as infuriated as Noelle had predicted. “Bastard!” “Two-timing wanker!” “Total prat!” were only some of the choice words she’d spat into the phone.
Noelle conjured them up for strength now as she waited outside the classroom. The timbre of Preston’s voice emanated through the door as he wrapped up his lecture.
Finally, when class finished and students gathered their books and bags and followed each other out the door, Noelle stepped inside, catching him off guard as he clicked off the projector.
“Hey, beautiful.” He smiled and walked toward her, leaned down to kiss her. She tilted her face to dodge the kiss. “Are you okay?” He rubbed at the side of her arm. A gesture that used to melt her now made her cringe. “Do you want to eat? I can call for reservations at Luigi’s.”
“Don’t you think your wife would mind?” His expression shifted to confusion as he dropped his hand and took a step back. She wanted to read all the frantic thoughts running through his mind.
“Wife?”
“Yes. Wife. I guess you have a special amnesia when you’re with me.” Noelle enjoyed the calm, methodical taste of the words. “Pretty blonde, works as a pharmacist, I believe.”
Surprise darkened his face, a mixture of guilt and shock in his eyes. He’d been caught, foully, and had nowhere to go. No defense, no preparation.
Rather than drag this out, watch him squirm, or listen to a million excuses, Noelle was finished with the conversation. With him. Tired of the games, of trying to wrap her brain around “Why?” and “How could he?” “Good-bye, Preston. I’m not coming back.”
“Noelle, I…” he said as she left the room. At least he might stay there awhile, dumbfounded, with worried questions of his own. “How did she find out?” “Did she tell my wife?” “Have I just screwed up my marriage?” Or perhaps he could live with himself, would soon move on and find another victim. Noelle didn’t know him well enough to know which type he was. Thank goodness, she never would.
“How did things go?” Jill asked the moment Noelle stepped into the sitting room. Gareth had let her in, taken her coat, and offered her tea, which he’d just disappeared to retrieve. Home from the hospital a couple of days before, Jill lay on the sofa, covered in a silky crème blanket and looking healthy and content.
Noelle set down her gift on the coffee table and kissed her friend on the cheek. “You look radiant. How’s that beautiful baby girl?”
“Beautiful but loud. I barely got a wink of sleep last night. Gareth put her down an hour ago, and so far, so good. Come sit.” She patted the sofa. “Get to the good stuff. The bastard. How did you handle him?”
Noelle obeyed and sat, recounting their meeting an hour ago, the reserved, dignified tone Jill had coached her to use, the icy strength she’d gathered when she said good-bye, and finally, Preston’s deer-in-headlights expression as Noelle walked away.
“Brilliant!” Jill exclaimed, smiling. “See? Didn’t that feel good?”
“Well.” Noelle winced. “I wouldn’t say any of it really felt ‘good.’”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it that way.”
“It’s okay. I’m just relieved it’s over.”
“You’re much too good for him. Wanker.”
“Thanks. I still feel a bit of a fool, though.”
“How on earth are you the fool?” Jill snapped. “He never gave you reason to believe he was married. This is entirely on him. Don’t you ever forget that.”
“I agree. I really do. But I can’t help wondering… that I should’ve known, somehow. Been more aware. I should’ve paid better attention to the signs.”
“What signs? He didn’t give you a single clue, did he?”
Noelle sighed. “No. He didn’t. Well, at the hospital that night, he got a couple of calls then left suddenly. Probably had to get back to ‘the wife.’”
“Men are absolute beasts. Except Gareth, of course.”
Right on cue, Gareth entered the room with two cups of tea and placed them on the table.
“Thank you, darling,” Jill called as he left the room again.
Noelle handed Jill her cup and said, “Adam knew.”
“What?”
“That night at the hospital, we had this awful fight in his car. Adam told me to be careful. He actually Googled Preston, said he had a gut feeling about him. Adam’s the one who told me Preston was married. I, of course, didn’t want to believe it. I defended the jerk.”
“Have you spoken to Adam since?”
“No.”
“Don’t worry. You’ll make things right. You two always do.”
“Okay, enough of all this,” Noelle insisted. “I didn’t come to vent all my troubles. I came to help out, to welcome you home! To shower you with gifts. Speaking of, are you ready for yours?” She set aside her tea.
“Ooh, I adore presents!”
Noelle reached for the cellophane-wrapped basket she’d put together this morning at the cottage. Homemade scones, fashion magazines, and a silk nightgown she’d bought at Mrs. Mulberry’s shop, all wrapped in tissue paper and decorated with a sprig of lavender. “I know we had a shower for little Evie weeks ago, and all the presents were for her,” Noelle explained. “But it’s time to pamper the mother.”
“You know me too well.”
Noelle nudged three hefty shopping bags onto the kitchen table, rubbing her wrist at the place where the straps created an indentation. She’d spent the loveliest day in Bath, browsing shops, stopping for an ice cream, splurging on Irish lace and even a new Wedgwood vase, which would be perfect for the white roses blooming in the garden. Retail therapy, Jill had called it when she ordered Noelle to get out of the house this morning. Pleasantly refreshed, she poured a glass of water in the kitchen and sat down to check her email. Nothing important except for one from Mr. Lester, about the Cornish cottage’s lease expiring at the end of June. The current tenants didn’t wish to renew, so he suggested renting it out during the summer to vacationers. She agreed and responded briefly back then closed her laptop.
She thought about her trip to Bath, wondering how she could busy herself next. It had taken two weeks since the Preston fiasco to navigate through the varying stages of shock, anger, and finally, indifference. The only temperature left for him was lukewarm, much like the tap water she sipped.
She realized, even through her anger, that her involvement with Preston all those weeks had ultimately been selfish. In a way, she had used him, too. She couldn’t deny that she enjoyed having someone handsome on her arm to show off in restaurants or in hospital waiting rooms. For the first time in a long time, she hadn’t been the only person without a relationship. Ultimately, the main reason for her anger was not that the relationship had ended, but that the truth had blindsided her.
As she petted Mr. Darcy, her cell rang on the table.
“Hey, Sunshine,” Adam said when she accepted the call.
She hadn’t spoken to him since the fight. Neither one of them had made any effort to reconcile. For a moment, she wished she hadn’t answered. “Hey, yourself.”
“How’ve you been?” he asked, his voice light, friendly.
“Fine. Busy, but fine. What about you?”
“The same.” Another pause. Adam cleared his throat. “So. The reason I called…”
“Yes?” she prompted.
“This is hard. You’re not making it easier.”
“What did I do? All I said was ‘yes.’”
He sighed and said, “Okay. Look. I’m sorry. I was wrong about the whole Preston thing. I shouldn’t have judged him without knowing for sure. It’s your life, your business. I’m a jerk. I stuck my foot in my mouth. It happens. Okay?”
“You weren’t wrong.”
“About what?”
“About Preston. You weren’t wrong. He’s definitely married.” She sighed.
“What happened?”
“I don’t want to get into the gory details. Let’s just leave it at you were right.”
“Wow, that sucks. Are you okay?”
“Yes, I’m okay. I think I’m okay. Just can’t believe this happened again. Why do I attract all the cheaters?” Noelle drank her water, wishing she’d plopped in a couple of ice cubes. Mr. Darcy sniffed at his empty food bowl and skulked away.
“You’re a nice girl. And the jerks can always sense that. Jerks take advantage of nice girls.”
“Thanks. I think.”
“It was a compliment. I’m just glad you left before you got in deeper.”
“I’m sorry, too. About the fight. About getting all defensive and upset when you were only looking out for me. I’m just stubborn. And I didn’t mean to drag Laurel into it. I shouldn’t have mentioned her.”
“It’s okay. I know how she comes across. Her personality can be… intense. She’s one of those people who has to work at being happy. It can get pretty draining sometimes.”
For her, or for you? Noelle thought.
“So, we’re friends again?” Adam asked.
“We never weren’t friends. We only had a little fight.”
“I tried to email you a dozen times but couldn’t bring myself to hit ‘send.’”
“I did the same thing. I wanted to text you about something funny the vicar said the other day but thought you weren’t speaking to me.”
“What are we, in high school or something?” Adam chuckled.
Noelle rolled her eyes. “Basically, yes.” She balanced her feet on the rim of the opposite chair and twirled a strand of hair through her fingers.
They spent the next hour and a half talking about the project—the glitches and workarounds, the natural stops and starts involved with a renovation that size. Nothing Adam and his competent team couldn’t handle. By the time they hung up, things were right with the world again. Still, she should have been the one to call Adam first. High school behavior, indeed.