3. Chapter Three
Chapter Three
Nicole
The polished eye-cream video played on Nicole’s laptop next to a preschool folder, two uncapped markers, and a toy horse missing one leg. Onscreen, she held the small jar near her face.
“This is an eye cream, not a miracle in expensive packaging.”
The editor had kept the line. Nicole smiled and paused the video.
“You left my entire rant in,” she said.
Her content manager’s voice came through the laptop. “The audience likes it when you get angry at marketing.”
“I wasn’t angry.”
“You told people to keep their money.”
“That’s professional guidance.”
“With a threatening eyebrow.”
Nicole replayed the ingredient section and checked the text added along the bottom of the screen.
“Fix the spelling of niacinamide at one minute, fourteen seconds. After that, it’s ready,” she instructed.
“Already fixed in the final version.”
“Then why am I watching the wrong version?”
“Because you opened the file marked review two instead of final.”
Nicole looked at the file name. “I was testing you.”
“Naturally.”
They made two decisions about upcoming content and rejected a partnership that wanted Nicole to promise visible changes after two uses. The brand’s representative had called that claim “strong but realistic”. Nicole called it a lie.
When the meeting ended, she posted the final eye-cream review and began setting up her lights for a short video about repairing a damaged skin barrier.
She spoke through one clean take, explaining that burning, flaking skin didn’t need more acids just because social media had made exfoliation look like a competitive sport.
Her phone vibrated while she checked the sound. The first responses to the eye-cream review were useful.
“Can I use it with my prescription retinoid?”
Nicole replied that the follower should ask the prescriber and introduce only one new product at a time.
Another person asked if caffeine would permanently remove under-eye bags.
“No,” Nicole wrote. “It may reduce temporary puffiness. It can’t change the fat pads or structure under your eyes, no matter how expensive the jar is.”
Then the other comments arrived.
“Maybe review the blonde your husband keeps touching.”
“Trad wife has to earn her allowance somehow.”
“Angela would never sit at home making cream videos while her man works.”
Nicole deleted one, hid another, and passed the worst account to her team. She didn’t open Instagram. She didn’t search Alexander’s name. She had better things to do than let strangers punish her for a marriage they didn’t understand.
More important, Alexander had promised to come home. She hadn’t needed to text him a reminder. She’d looked directly into his eyes when he made the promise. He’d repeated it after they had sex, when there was no argument left to win and no reason to say what she wanted to hear. He would be there.
Nicole turned her phone face down and got back to work.
By the time Prim and Rose came home, her workspace held a tripod, a product sample that needed to be returned, the girls’ preschool art, and a bowl of crackers nobody admitted spilling.
“Don’t step there,” Nicole warned as Rose ran toward the tripod.
Rose stopped so fast Prim crashed into her.
“She bumped me!” Rose yelled.
“You stopped,” Prim yelled back.
“Because Mommy said.”
“That’s normally considered a good reason,” Nicole said.
Prim pointed at the lights. “You making cream?”
“I already made cream,” Nicole said, though it made no sense.
Rose stared at her. “You can’t make cream.”
“I made a video about cream,” Nicole explained.
“That’s not making cream,” Prim said.
Nicole looked at their nanny, Maya. “They’re tough today.”
“They’ve been practicing,” Maya said.
The twins demanded a craft, changed their minds halfway through it, and began arguing over a sheet of gold star stickers even though there were enough stars for both of them. Nicole separated the sheet down the middle.
Prim counted hers. “Rose has more.”
“You both have ten.”
“Mine are little.”
“They’re from the same sheet.”
“Hers look bigger.”
Rose held her half against her chest. “They’re mine.”
Nicole took a slow breath. “Nobody is stealing anybody’s stars. Put them on the paper, not on your clothes, your sister, or the floor.”
While the girls worked, Nicole answered a brand call, approved a change to the week’s posting schedule, and read a preschool email reminding parents to send clean spare clothes. She packed two labeled sets before she could forget, then returned to find a gold star stuck to Rose’s forehead.
“I said paper,” Nicole reminded them.
“My face is paper,” Rose said.
“It really isn’t.”
“It’s skin,” Prim explained. “Mommy knows skin.”
“Finally, some respect for my credentials.” Nicole chuckled.
Nicole let Maya help clean up, but she sat with the girls for dinner, cut Prim’s food after Prim declared it too large, and listened to Rose tell a story that changed every time Nicole asked a question.
She settled an argument about who would sit beside Daddy at story time by promising he could sit between their beds.
The girls were thrilled. Nicole was careful not to show how much she shared their excitement.
She didn’t keep checking the time. At least, she tried not to. Each time her phone lit up, her attention went to it before she could stop herself. None of the messages came from Alexander. He was working. He’d come home when he said he would.
“Daddy bath?” Prim asked when Nicole turned on the water.
“Daddy will help with bedtime,” Nicole said.
“He does bear,” Rose said.
“Yes, we’ve established that my bear is a failure,” Nicole said.
“Your bear sounds like Mommy,” Prim told her.
“It’s almost as if I’m Mommy.”
Both girls laughed as though she’d made a brilliant joke.
Nicole washed shampoo from Rose’s hair and watched the last of the light fade beyond the bathroom window. Bedtime had arrived. Alexander hadn’t.
Her phone rang on the counter.
Prim splashed upright. “Daddy!”
Nicole saw Vicky’s name on the screen. Her hope dropped so quickly that she had to steady one hand against the tub.
Vicky was Alexander’s executive assistant and the person who managed nearly every detail of his schedule.
If she was calling now, it wasn’t to say he was walking through the front door.
Nicole picked up. “Hi, Vicky.”
“Nicole, I’m sorry.”
“Where is he?”
“He’s in a meeting. It was supposed to end, but it’s still going. He asked me to tell you he’ll be late.”
“He asked you.”
Vicky went quiet. “Yes.”
“Did he tell you he promised to be home?”
“No.”
“Of course he didn’t.” Nicole kept her voice low, but Prim and Rose had stopped playing. They watched her from the bath. “Can you put him on the phone?”
“I can’t pull him out right now.”
“You can. You won’t.”
“Nicole…”
“I’m sorry. That wasn’t fair.” She pressed two fingers to her forehead. Vicky hadn’t made the promise. “Tell him the girls waited for him. Tell him I’m not explaining this away for him.”
“I will.”
“And Vicky?”
“Yes?”
“Next time, tell him to call his own wife.”
“I will. I’m sorry.”
Nicole ended the call.
“Daddy’s late?” Rose asked.
“Yes.”
“No.” Prim shook her head hard enough to send wet hair across her cheeks. “Daddy promised.”
“I know.”
“You said Daddy comes.”
“I know, baby.”
Prim slapped both hands against the water. “Call him!”
“He’s in a meeting.”
“No meeting!” Rose shouted.
“I agree, but I can’t make him leave.”
That was the wrong thing to say.
Rose began to cry. Prim joined her at once, louder and angrier. They refused to get out of the tub, then screamed because the water was getting cold. Rose kicked the towel away. Prim dropped to the floor in her pajamas and demanded Daddy so many times that the word stopped sounding like a name.
Nicole knelt between them. “I know you’re sad.”
“Want Daddy!” Prim screamed.
“I know.”
“Daddy said!”
“I know.”
“You make him come!”
The demand hit the tired place inside Nicole where anger had been waiting all day.
“I can’t.” Her voice cracked.
Both girls stared at her. Nicole pulled them against her, one small wet body under each arm. Rose resisted for a few seconds, then buried her face against Nicole’s chest. Prim stayed stiff until another sob bent her forward.
“I’m sorry,” Nicole whispered. “I’m so sorry. I can’t make Daddy come home, but I’m here. I’ve got you.”
“Don’t want Mommy bear,” Rose cried.
“That’s fair. It’s a terrible bear.”
Rose gave a broken little laugh, then started crying again.
Nicole got them into bed. She read the first book over their protests, and the second while Prim clung to her arm. She sang the song they usually saved for the end, then sang it again when Rose demanded it through tears.
“Daddy song,” Prim whispered.
“Daddy will sing it next time.” The promise came automatically. Nicole hated herself for making it.
She sat between their beds and held a hand from each girl. Her back began to ache. Her own anger had nowhere to go, so she breathed through it and kept her voice soft.
“Is Daddy working?” Rose asked when her crying slowed.
“Yes.”
“Does Daddy sleep at work?”
“Sometimes it feels like it.”
“He sleep here?”
“He’ll come home.”
“Before morning?”
Nicole looked down at Rose’s swollen eyes. “I don’t know.”
At least that answer was honest.
Prim finally fell asleep with her fingers curled around Nicole’s thumb. Rose fought longer, lifting her head whenever Nicole tried to move. Nicole stayed until both girls were deeply asleep and the room was quiet.
Then she went to bed alone.
She didn’t know when Alexander came in. When she woke early the next morning, the other side of the bed was empty again. His pillow was cool, and a folded note rested on top of it.
Nicole,
I’m sorry about last night. There was an emergency at the studio, and I couldn’t leave. I had to go back before you woke. I didn’t want to disturb you. We’ll talk later.
I love you,
Alexander
She read it twice. He couldn’t leave. The words from his promise came back with painful clarity. Even if something goes wrong, I’ll leave and come home.
Nicole sat against the headboard with the note in one hand. She should’ve gotten up. The girls would wake soon. There were messages waiting, content to review, and a household that would keep moving because she kept it moving.
Instead, she reached for her phone.
The blue light hurt her eyes in the dim bedroom. She opened TikTok, telling herself she only wanted to check the eye-cream video. Its views had climbed, but the useful questions were buried under comments about Alexander and Angela.
She moved to Instagram. New photographs showed Alexander and Angela outside a studio building. Angela’s hand was on his forearm. In another, they walked close together while she laughed up at him. There was no kiss, no secret touch, nothing Nicole could point to and call betrayal.
The comments didn’t need one.
“They look more married than he and Nicole do.”
“He’s never home because home isn’t where he wants to be.”
“Nicole’s just the nanny with a ring.”
She kept scrolling. Every cruel line pressed against the hurt he’d left behind. She knew what she was doing to herself and couldn’t stop.
A direct message appeared from an unfamiliar account.
“Everyone looks at your face, but I’m the only one who really sees you. You shouldn’t have to share your life with people who don’t appreciate it.”
Nicole’s skin prickled. The tone was familiar.
So was the claim of knowing her better than everyone else.
She tapped the profile. The account was gone.
For several seconds, she stared at the blank screen.
Then she locked her phone and told herself it was another obsessive follower looking for attention.
Her team would block the next account too.
Being visible online came with strange people.
It didn’t mean this one could reach her real life.
Her thumb unlocked the phone again. She just couldn’t help herself. The photograph of Alexander and Angela remained on the screen. Under it, a stranger had written the sentence hundreds of people seemed eager to believe.
“Angela Stone is going to be the next Mrs. Cohan.”
Alexander had written in his note that he loved her. Online, strangers were already choosing his next wife.