Chapter Twenty-Seven
Now
The kids noticed the new surveillance equipment when they came back for the university’s fall break, which really amounted to a long weekend. They also spotted the new refrigerator.
“Nice,” Adam said while using the internal water dispenser. “How much did this cost?”
“Too much,” I responded.
He nodded his approval. “It’s about time we got a decent fridge.”
I was thrilled to have them home. They might not have bothered to come back for such a short break before Ali died. But now they showed up whenever they could. I was always happy to see them, mostly because I could check on them. Also, the house seemed a lot less scary.
Adam was pretty much his usual self, while Ayla still mostly kept to herself and rarely initiated conversation. They both assumed I installed the new security system because I lived alone. I didn’t tell them about the intrusions.
“Mom, when are we supposed to get a marker for Dad’s grave?” Adam asked while we ate take-out kebab from a nearby Persian place.
“Soon.” The bite of grilled chicken turned rubbery in my mouth. “I need to do that.”
“We went by the cemetery on the way home,” he told me. “Dad deserves better than the little plastic name tag.”
Did he, though? “Yeah, I’ll need to order it soon.”
“Well, I visited Dad,” he clarified, “while Ayla stayed in the car. She wouldn’t even get out to see Dad.” Accusation rang out in each word.
Ayla put her plastic fork down. “Whatever,” she mumbled.
Unease squeezed my chest. “Ayla, why didn’t you get out?” I asked. “I mean, I know Dad’s loss has been really hard on you.”
“What’s the big deal?” she retorted. “It’s not like it matters to him anymore.”
“It’s a sign of respect,” Adam said. “He deserves for us to show that we care.”
Acid rose in my throat. How would Adam react if he found out about Lizzie Martins and the secret house? I’d hide the truth from them forever if I could. But it didn’t take long for me to learn that as hard as I tried, I couldn’t keep my children in a protective bubble indefinitely.
The following morning, I was wiping down the kitchen counters when I heard someone coming down the stairs. From the weight and pace of the tread, I could tell it was my son.
“Wow,” I called out, my focus on an unidentified pink counter stain, “you’re up early. It’s not even eleven o’clock in the morning yet.”
“Is it true?” Adam’s voice quavered.
I turned to face him. He wore sweats and a hoodie. His face was ashen, his beautiful dark eyes rimmed in red.
“Habibi, what’s wrong?” Alarm filtered through me. “Is what true?”
“About Dad buying a house for his mistress.”
I felt like I’d been slammed against the wall. “Where did you hear that?”
“From an article on a DC gossip site.”
Dread coiled through me. “It’s online?”
He teared up. “So it is true?” His face contorted. “How could you not tell us?”
“Tell us what?” Ayla padded into the kitchen in her baggy red-and-black plaid pajama bottoms topped with a white T-shirt. I noted the dark circles under her bleary eyes. “What’s going on?”
Adam handed her his phone. “Read it.”
My mind slowed to the point of almost stopping. How was I in yet another unfathomable situation? Where was Ali when I needed him? And then I remembered that he was to blame for putting me in this position.
The beat of my heart throbbed in my ears. “Can I see?”
“You’ve known all along,” Adam said accusingly. I watched helplessly as whatever innocence my son had left, whatever naivete remained after his father’s sudden departure from his life, drained away.
Ayla’s face transformed as she took in the contents on her brother’s phone. It was like watching a house implode, shrinking into itself, closing and shuttering all its windows. I silently cursed Ali for breaking our little girl’s heart.
She looked at me. “How did they find out?”
“What the fuck is going on, Mom?” Adam demanded to know.
Normally I’d come down hard on my children for using curse words.
Swearing was always unacceptable in our house.
But that was before. Our lives would forever be cut into two parts now.
The before, when Ali was alive. And the after, the vast space of time ahead of us that we were supposed to live without him.
College graduations. Marriages. Births. Celebrations.
Revelations. All faced without him. One era ended.
Another beginning. In this new era, profanity didn’t even register. We lived on a different planet now.
“I’m still trying to figure everything out,” I said to my children. “I was going to tell you after I had all the answers.”
“What is there to figure out?” Adam demanded, his face red. “This is crazy. There’s no way it’s true.”
Ayla studied my face for what felt like forever. “It’s not bullshit.” Her voice was almost a whisper.
Tears filled my eyes. Their shock and disappointment, their hurt, was a physical pain inside my body, a knife twisting in an open wound. “I didn’t know.” My voice faltered. “I had no idea.”
“About what?” Horror spread across Adam’s face.
I reached for his hand. “Oh, habibi.”
He backed away. “What are you saying?”
“Just spit it out, Mom,” Ayla said sharply. “The article says Dad left a house to his old girlfriend and that you found out after he died and sued her to get it back.”
I was trapped. What could I do except tell them the truth? Even if it shattered everything they thought they knew about their father. “For the most part, yes.”
“That fucker!” Adam burst out.
My voice trembled. “Whatever your father’s faults, he loved you two more than anything.”
“Apparently not more than his girlfriend,” Ayla retorted. “She got a whole house to herself. The three of us get to share this one.”
“Who is this lady?” Adam asked. “The story doesn’t mention her name.”
“She’s an old girlfriend. Dad was dating her when he met me.”
Ayla’s eyes narrowed. “He dated you and this lady at the same time?”
“No, he broke up with her after he met me.” Supposedly. “He knew your grandparents would never accept him marrying a non-Muslim.”
“If he broke up with her, why did he leave her a house?” Adam asked. “An entire house.”
I shook my head helplessly. “I don’t know. I only learned about the house after Dad died.”
“What the hell?” Adam asked, incredulous.
“Where’s the love nest?” Ayla asked with a bitter twist to her lips.
“The what?”
“The house Dad gave his old girlfriend. Or maybe not-so-old girlfriend.”
I forced myself to stay calm. To keep breathing. “It’s in North Carolina.”
“Have you seen it?” she asked.
“From the outside, yes.”
“What’s it like?”
“It’s not big,” I told her. “It’s just a nice, normal-size house.”
“Who cares how big it is!” Adam burst out. “This whole thing is fucked up. Screw this.” He stormed out of the kitchen. I heard him going up the stairs and slamming the door to his bedroom.
“I know this doesn’t make any sense right now,” I said to my daughter. “But we need to reserve judgment until—”
“Stop.” Ayla backed away, hands over her ears. “I don’t want to talk about it.”
The phone calls and texts started coming in almost immediately. My parents called from the West Bank, where they spent several months a year now that Baba was retired.
“Is it true?” Mama asked. “I can’t believe it.”
Baba’s irate voice sounded in the background. “I told you it’s not good to marry a boy who has a girlfriend. You and your mother should have listened to me.”
“He shamed his whole family,” Mama declared. “They have no honor now.”
“Maybe they knew,” Baba said. “Maybe Ali’s family kept his secret.”
“Baba,” I said, “I don’t think they knew.”
“Maybe.” His skeptical voice was tinny in the background. “I knew a guy who disappeared for nine years and the family pretended not to know where he was, but they knew. They always know!”
“It’s not true,” Um Ali insisted over the phone when she called later. “My son wasn’t like that. It’s a lie.”
She truly seemed shocked. Maybe Ali’s family hadn’t known? I couldn’t reassure her, so I kept it vague. “I’ll figure everything out. Wallah. I swear.”
I did appreciate it when Claudia reached out to ask how she could help.
But annoyance flashed through me when Nicki and Rula, who had basically been MIA since Ali died, texted to see if I was OK and ask if it was true that my husband left a house to his mistress.
I ignored their messages. I was learning that maybe friendships, even the longest and deepest ones, had a season, and ours had come to an end.
I would be cordial when I saw them, but my inner circle had shifted.
Ali’s death had realigned my relationships.
Lulu and Nasser came over right away.
“Well, this is pretty messed up,” Lulu proclaimed as she made hot mint Arabic tea for us.
“How do you think this happened?” I asked Nasser. “How did it get out?”
“I asked around. I haven’t heard back yet. But you did tell people,” he reminded me.
“You did?” Lulu slid a steaming mug in front of me. “Who did you tell?”
My head throbbed like I had the worst caffeine headache in the world. But a thousand cups of coffee wouldn’t cure this disaster. “I mentioned it at dinner with some of Ali’s college friends. I thought they might know something.”
Lulu handed Nasser a coffee. “Would your college friends call a gossip column?”
He shrugged. “It’s DC. Word gets around.”
I swiped a tear away. “If only Ali had never gotten that stupid TV gig. This wouldn’t have made a local gossip column if he was a boring accountant that no one had ever heard of.” Not that Ali had ever been boring.
Nasser’s phone pinged. He studied it. “Well, that answers the question of how the local gossip website found out.”
Nausea stirred in my stomach. “It’s my fault, isn’t it?”
His mouth stretched into a grim line. “It came from Ian.”
“Who’s Ian?” Lulu asked.
“A college friend,” Nasser answered.
“No!” I said at the same time. “How?”