Six #2
She was aware of but refused to consider too closely an additional factor: that living in a house with two teenage daughters who were in that delirious place between girlhood and womanhood had loosened something inside her.
Something dangerous. She was grateful her girls were growing up in such a different world.
And envious. Every day they shimmered a little brighter, while she felt herself curling at the edges.
One thought clamored around in her head hour after hour—how much time left?
She wanted to have an affair. It started as a tiny gnat of an idea and wouldn’t let her go.
At first, it was like telling herself she wanted to color her hair or perfect her duck confit or paint the front door purple—idle entertainment.
But she didn’t want a different hair shade or door color, and her duck confit was pretty good.
She wanted to transgress. She wanted something brief and intense and hassle-free. Maybe more than once.
For years she’d consoled herself with Sam’s mostly amiable companionship because it was more than many marriages had.
He was a good provider and a great father, and shouldn’t it be enough?
But once she let herself accept the possibility of infidelity, once she let it seep through the cracks and disturb her carefully constructed identity, it was all she could think about.
The how and the when and the where. Oh, and of course, the who?
After the first time at the lake, Nina had considered confessing all to Finn.
But whenever she tried to rehearse the story in her own head, it was too mortifying.
How could she make sense of that morning last April, when she’d looked out her living room window to see him stretching for his morning run?
It had been months since his heart failed him so spectacularly, and he’d changed his ways.
He’d quit smoking and cut back on beef and eggs and butter and alcohol.
No more french fries or sugary soft drinks.
An entire section of Finnegan’s had been revamped as Heart Healthy!
and the store sponsored weekend events at all its locations with nutritionists roaming the aisles and advising curious shoppers about what to eat for strength, health, and longevity.
He started taking vitamins every morning, snacking only on apples, and running every other day.
Honey had coerced him into going to Weight Watchers with her and they both—Honey would cheerfully announce to anyone who would listen—could fit back into their wedding clothes.
Nina noticed. And that particular spring morning, she’d taken in Finn’s bright orange sneakers, the green gym shorts with white trim that were too short on his very long, very freckled legs.
He touched his toes and grabbed one foot behind him to stretch a quad and performed a few jumping jacks and something inside of her had shifted so ferociously she could almost hear it, how she imagined the grinding of tectonic plates might sound if you put your ear to the ground.
Tectonic plates were on her mind from the previous day when she’d helped Bridie study for the SAT, and they’d gone over an entire reading passage about the earth’s subterranean movements.
She liked the idea of the ground beneath her having life; she found the seismic possibilities exciting.
She watched Finn through the window that day, a person she’d known forever, and thought, Him.
How to explain to Finn that Honey hadn’t sent Nina to the boathouse that afternoon at the lake to help him collect folding chairs, but that she’d had her eye on him since the moment they’d arrived.
She had tried to persuade herself for weeks that her fantasies involving Finn were just that.
But when it had started to rain and he’d headed across the lawn, she’d recklessly followed him.
She had not intentionally gotten soaked, but certainly understood what he would see when she walked into the boathouse in her drenched, white clinging blouse like a floozy on the cover of a drugstore Harlequin romance.
For years, the speculation in the neighborhood was that Finn and Honey’s marriage was an unhappy one.
Nina was never sure if this was true (although Honey was as close-lipped as she during their group’s sex conversations) and even thought it might be unfair because Finn was a force.
Handsome. Tall, long-limbed, sandy-haired, looking like he belonged on the tennis court or behind the wheel of a yacht, smart and doggedly successful.
Honey was a complete contrast to Finn aside from looks—she could have been on the cover of a yachting magazine, too.
Hard-edged where he was smooth, unforgiving when he was accepting, high-strung while he was easy in his bones.
Finn was outgoing and garrulous, and Honey was—not.
It was hard to imagine what they’d seen in each other.
But now, Nina had unleashed something far more complicated than her careless imaginings. What had he said that afternoon in the boathouse immediately after? The two of them breathless and stunned and vibrating like a pair of tuning forks. “This is going to be trouble.”
And now trouble was crossing the street with a book in his hand.
She didn’t go to the door or the window because she wasn’t ready to engage with him, not until she understood what he meant when he said, “I have a solution.” He put the book into the mailbox.
Lifted the little red flag and took off down the street at a light and steady jog.