Table for Seven (37 page)

“Calm down. Take a deep breath,” Jaime said. “What’s going on?”

“Today’s my presentation on the early pioneers, and I left all of my stuff at home on my desk,” Emily wailed.

“Can’t you just ask your teacher if you can give your presentation tomorrow instead?”

“No way! Mrs. White is so mean. She’ll make me give the presentation today, even if I don’t have my notes and visual aids. And then she’ll fail me! You have to bring them to me. Please, Jaime,” Emily begged.

“But you said they’re at your mom’s house? How am I supposed to get them?” Jaime asked. She suddenly pictured herself trying to crawl into Libby’s house through a window and getting arrested for breaking and entering in the process.

“There’s a spare key hidden by the front door. It’s under the sundial,” Emily said. “
Please
, Jaime. Practice went so late last night, and Coach Sarah made me run wind sprints. And then I had to stay up past midnight to finish my presentation and I overslept this morning, and Mom made me rush to get to school on time, and I forgot it,” Emily wailed. “I swear, if you bring it to me, I’ll never ask you for anything ever again.”

Jaime hesitated, but then sighed. “Where exactly is this key hidden?”

“Thank you, thank you, thank you!”

JAIME LOADED AVA AND Logan into the car. Ava was rubbing her stuffed turtle against her face. Logan had brought along three Thomas the Train engines with him, but was worried about the ones he’d left at home.

“Mommy, I need Percy,” Logan said.

“Don’t worry,” Jaime soothed. “Your trains will be fine. We’re almost at Emily’s house.”

“I thought our house was Emily’s house,” Logan said.

“This is Emily’s other house. Where her mother lives,” Jaime said.

“I want two houses, too,” Logan said.

Ignoring this, Jaime said, “Once we get there, we’re going to run into the house, pick up something for Emily, and then drive it to her at school.” Jaime glanced in the rearview mirror and groaned inwardly. Ava had fallen asleep. It meant that the already Herculean task of herding the kids from the car to the house, back into the car, then into the school, then back to the car yet again would be made even more difficult by the heavy weight of a sleeping child. It was one of life’s mysteries: Sleeping children always weighed more than awake ones.

Jaime pulled in to the driveway of Libby’s large home with its stunning view of the Intracoastal and found herself staring at Mark’s car. She felt a stab of irritation. Had Emily also called Mark and asked him to pick up the forgotten history presentation? And if so, why hadn’t she called back to tell Jaime he was getting it?

“Typical,” Jaime muttered.

Jaime pulled out her cellphone to call Mark to confirm that he was in fact bringing the school project to Emily before she bothered to unload the children.

The phone rang four times and then went to voice mail. Jaime tried again. This time, the phone rang only twice before it went to voice mail.

Did he just reject my call?
Jaime wondered, her irritation growing tenfold.

Then, suddenly, Emily’s voice came back to her.
I can’t get ahold of my mom
.

Libby wasn’t answering the phone, not even for her daughter. And now Mark wasn’t answering his phone. And his car was parked in front of his ex-wife’s house.

Suspicion trickled down Jaime’s neck like cold water.
No way
, she thought. There was no way Mark would ever have an affair with Libby. He couldn’t stand his ex-wife. They always made an effort to remain polite for Emily’s sake, but when Mark and Jaime were in private, Mark rarely had a positive word to say about Libby or his marriage to her. He thought she was selfish and demanding, said that she had always put her needs ahead of his and Emily’s.

But then Jaime thought of all the late nights Mark spent at the tennis club, all of the weekend trips he took with Emily. Libby went sometimes, too. Jaime had never thought much of it—they were both committed to Emily’s tennis career, and besides, they always traveled separately and, of course, stayed in different hotel rooms.

Didn’t they?

No
, Jaime thought.
No way
.

Then again. The weekends away would have given them plenty of opportunities to be alone together. When she
wasn’t playing, Emily always spent most of the tournament weekend off with her girlfriends, hanging out by the pool or in the hotel coffee shop.

Jaime turned her ignition off. She glanced back at the kids. Ava was still asleep, but Logan was wide awake, kicking his chubby legs up in front of him.

“Come on, we have to go inside for a minute,” Jaime told him.

“Carry me?” Logan asked hopefully.

“I can’t carry both you and your sister. You’re going to have to walk,” Jaime said, wishing she could leave them in the car, but knowing it was probably a bad idea. Logan was perfectly capable of unhooking the straps of his car seat, climbing into the front seat, and putting the car into gear. Just the mental picture of the SUV rolling down the driveway, out of control with both of her children inside, gave Jaime the chills.

Jaime could feel her heart beating hard and fast, as she climbed out and retrieved the children from the backseat. With Ava heavy in her arms and Logan’s small hand in her own, Jaime made her way slowly to the front door. The whole way, Jaime kept hoping the door would open, that Mark would come out with Emily’s school project in hand.

On the front step, Jaime hesitated, wondering what she should do. Ring the bell, or retrieve the hidden key and let herself in? If she rang the bell and waited to see if anyone answered, she might never know what was really going on. Mark might have an excuse for why he was here, why he wasn’t answering his phone. Then again, if Mark and Libby were having an affair, did Jaime really want to walk in on them, both babies in tow?

Jaime pressed the bell and waited. No one came to the
door. Jaime pressed the bell again, this time leaning on it for longer. The third time, she hit it repeatedly, not caring how obnoxious this was. And the obnoxious behavior was rewarded: Footsteps echoed inside, and a moment later, the door opened. Libby was standing there, wearing white shorts and a man’s striped button-down shirt.

It was Mark’s shirt. One of the striped, French-cuff shirts Jaime bought him for Christmas the year before, ordered specially from London. This one was yellow and blue. She had a very clear memory of Mark pulling it out of the closet that morning. He’d said that the dry cleaner had used too much starch, and Jaime had promised she’d mention it the next time she went in to drop off the laundry.

Jaime’s skin suddenly felt too tight, and she struggled to focus her eyes. It felt like she was looking through a telescope, where Libby was at the same time right in front of her and yet very far away. She wondered, distantly, if this was what a nervous breakdown felt like. And then, with Ava’s heavy bulk to remind her, she remembered that she was a mother, and therefore couldn’t afford the luxury of a nervous breakdown.

“Hi, Libby,” Logan said, waving.

Libby was standing very still, her hand still frozen on the doorknob. She gave no indication that she’d heard Logan.

“Where’s Mark?” Jaime asked. She was shocked at how calm she sounded. As though it were a common occurrence for her to stumble upon her husband and his ex-wife in the sort of intimate situation that ended up with Libby wearing Mark’s shirt.

“Mark?” Libby asked. She shrugged and tried to feign surprise. “Why would he be here?”

She’s seriously going to try to brazen this out?
Jaime thought. While wearing Mark’s shirt, with his car in the driveway? It was almost funny. Or else, it would be if it weren’t so horrific.

Ava was heavy in her arms, and Jaime tried shifting her daughter without waking her up.

“Please tell him I’d like to see him,” Jaime said. Libby opened her mouth as though to protest, and Jaime added, “And you might want to give him his shirt back before he comes out.”

Libby looked down at her shirt, and then back up at Jaime.

“He isn’t happy, you know,” Libby finally said. Her voice was quiet, but without contrition. In fact, she seemed almost defiant, as though daring Jaime to deny it.

“That’s funny. He always told me he wasn’t happy when he was married to you,” Jaime said. Her cool tone was belied by the tears that were welling in her eyes. “Isn’t it interesting how we keep believing him? Actually, it’s not really interesting at all. It’s tragic, considering there are three children involved.”

“Mommy, when are we going home?” Logan asked, pulling at the hem of Jaime’s shirt.

Libby looked down at Logan, as though she was just now seeing him and Ava. Her face went pale and slack, and she suddenly looked like she might be sick.

“I never stopped thinking of him as my husband. Even after we divorced. Even after he married you. And when this happened … it just seemed right. Like we were hitting a reset button,” Libby said.

Libby reached out to touch Logan’s head, but Jaime said,
“Don’t.” The word was almost a growl, and Libby’s hand fell away. Logan looked up at his mother, clearly startled by how ferocious she sounded.

“Lib? What’s going on?” Mark’s voice called.

“Daddy?” Logan asked in a clear, carrying voice.

“Mark, can you come out here please?” Libby asked.

Mark appeared at the door. He was—thankfully—dressed, wearing a tennis jacket and shorts. Jaime wondered if he kept clothes at Libby’s house.
He probably does, the bastard
.

“Oh! Hey, honey, what are you doing here?” Mark asked.

He had clearly decided to take the same tack as Libby and pretend that there was nothing unusual about his being at his ex-wife’s house in the middle of the day, when he was supposed to be at work. Still, all of the color had drained from his face, and his eyes were moving shiftily from wife to ex-wife and back again.

“Daddy!” Logan said, his small face lighting up. He ran to Mark, who scooped him up in his arms.

“Hey, squirt,” Mark said, hugging Logan. “What are you guys doing here?”

“Emily asked me to come by and pick up the notes and visuals for her history presentation,” Jaime said. She was still amazed at how calm she sounded and wondered, distantly, if she was in shock.

“She did?” Libby asked. “She left her presentation at home?”

“Yes,” Jaime said.

“Why didn’t she call me?” Libby asked.

“You were apparently too busy to answer your phone,” Jaime said, raising her eyebrows.

Recognition dawned on Libby’s face, and she blushed and looked away.

“Oh. Right,” Libby said.

Mark looked back and forth between them again. “This is an odd coincidence. I stopped by to go over Emily’s tournament schedule with Libby,” he said, affecting the same breezy tone. “Too bad Emily didn’t call me, I could have saved you the trip over.”

Jaime stared at her husband, and decided that she officially hated him. In fact, all of the very characteristics that had first attracted her to him—his dark eyes, the sexy thin lips, the square jaw—were now the things she hated the most about him. Well, his face, and the fact that he was a lying son of a bitch.

“Mark, she knows,” Libby said wearily.

But even then, Mark wasn’t ready to drop the act. “Knows what?” he asked. “That we’re meeting to discuss Em’s schedule?”

Libby gave him the sort of irritated look that Jaime again thought might have been funny, had this all not been happening to her. She wondered if, like her, Libby was finally seeing Mark for the sort of man he was. Standing there with his young son in his arms, lying glibly.

“She knows about
us
,” Libby clarified. She gave Logan another uneasy look. “Maybe Logan should go up to Em’s room, so we can talk? And you can put Ava down in …” Jaime was sure that Libby had been about to say,
my bedroom
. But, as if remembering what had just happened in that bedroom, she quickly substituted, “the guest room.”

“I want to go to Em’s room,” Logan said, looking delighted at the idea. He adored Emily, and although she was very sweet to her younger siblings, this affection did not stretch to allowing them unfettered access to her room and its precious belongings.

“No,” Jaime said, raising a hand. “We’re going to leave.”

“You shouldn’t drive while you’re upset,” Libby said.

“I’m fine,” Jaime said. She looked at Mark, who was pale with shock and looking almost lost, as though he couldn’t figure out what to say or do. “Or I will be. Come on, Logan. Let’s go home.”

december

a tasting menu

SEARED FOIE GRAS WITH A RED WINE AND SOUR CHERRY REDUCTION

SEARED DIVER SCALLOPS WITH BLOOD-ORANGE SAUCE

VEGETABLE TERRINE

SLOW BAKED DOVER SOLE

DUO OF BEEF

CARAMEL AND SEA SALT ICE CREAM