Chapter 4
Story: My Father Called Me With My Husband Still on the Pavement — Then the Other Woman Spoke
The next call came twenty minutes later. I was sitting at the kitchen table, the wine finally poured but untouched, the phone on the table in front of me.
"Dad," I said.
"Marla." His voice was different. Careful. Measured. "Kira and I have been talking. She's going to come with me to the house."
"What? Why?"
"Because she wants to see it." He paused. "She wants to see the house, Marla. The one Paul never told her about. And I want her to see it — because she needs to understand who he really is."
"Dad, I don't think —"
"Marla." His voice softened. "She's been lied to too. She's a kid. She's twenty-five years old, and she's been sleeping with my son-in-law for nine months, believing his wife was in Seattle and that she had nothing to worry about. She deserves to see the truth."
I closed my eyes.
"Okay," I said. "Bring her."
The drive felt interminable. I walked to the front window every few minutes, watching the street, listening for the sound of a car. The pasta sauce sat cold on the stove. The wine sat warm in the glass. I didn't touch either.
Then I saw the lights. A car pulled into the driveway — my father's car, the old navy sedan he'd had for years. The engine cut. The doors opened.
My father stepped out first. He looked at the house, then at the door, then at me standing in the window. And then Kira stepped out.
She was younger than I'd imagined. Slender, with long wavy auburn hair and fair freckled skin, wearing a cropped maroon bomber jacket that didn't look warm enough for the evening. She stood by the car, staring at the house, her hands clasped in front of her.
I opened the door.
"Come in," I said.
She walked toward me like she was approaching a loaded weapon. Her eyes were wide, taking everything in — the porch, the door, the warm light spilling out onto the steps.
"This is your house," she said.
"It's our house," I said. "Or it was."
She followed me inside. She stood in the foyer, turning slowly in a circle, looking at the living room, the kitchen, the hallway that led to the bedrooms.
"He told me he had an apartment," she said. "One bedroom. He told me he'd show it to me someday — he said it was a work in progress, that he was saving for something better."
"There's no apartment," I said. "There's this house. There's this kitchen. There's eight years of marriage."
Kira walked to the kitchen and stopped. She looked at the marble counters. She looked at the stove, the pot of sauce. She looked at the wine bottle and the glass.
"He told me you were in Seattle," she said. "He told me he never heard from you."
"He lied," I said.
"He lied to both of us," she said.
The word hung in the air between us. Both of us. Something strange happened in that moment — something I hadn't expected. I looked at this girl — this twenty-five-year-old girl in the maroon jacket — and I didn't feel anger toward her.
I felt something else. Something sadder.
"Can I show you something?" I asked.
She nodded.
I walked to the mantel in the living room and picked up a photo. It was from our wedding day — Paul and me, eight years younger, standing under a flowered arch, smiling like we had no idea what was coming.
"Eight years," I said. "That's how long I've been married to this man. And he told you I didn't exist."
Kira took the photo in her hands. She stared at it for a long moment.
"He has a scar," she said, "on his shoulder."
"Yes," I said. "From a climbing accident."
"He told me it was a rock-climbing accident," she said. "He told me he went with friends from work."
"He did," I said. "He went with me. We were on the same rope."
Kira set the photo down gently, like it might break.
"I'm sorry," she said.
"Don't be," I said. "You didn't know."
"I should have —"
"You should have known," I said. "But he was good at this. He made sure you wouldn't."
My father came in from the porch, closing the door softly behind him.
"Paul's calling," he said. "He's called six times in the last twenty minutes."
"Let him call," I said.
"Your brother texted," he said. "He saw Paul's car downtown."
"I don't care where his car is," I said. "I care about what I'm going to do next."
"What are you going to do?" my father asked.
I looked at Kira. She looked back at me, her eyes reddened, her mouth tight. We were strangers — we had been, until an hour ago. But we were both standing in the wreckage of the same man's lies.
"I'm going to go to the courthouse," I said. "Tomorrow morning. And I'm going to find out whether my husband filed for divorce."
"And if he didn't?" my father asked.
"Then I will."
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