Chapter 27 #2
“How so?” Beau asks, and Alexander stiffens again.
“Some folks feel more comfortable by starting at the beginning,” I say.
“Okay, yeah,” he says. “So I met my wife in college. I wasn’t really looking for a relationship, but I didn’t want to not be with her.
She was pretty and fun and thoughtful; she’d make me cookies for long study sessions.
She’d clean my apartment, do my laundry, that sort of thing.
I know that makes me sound like a chauvinist ass.
But this is about honesty, yeah?” Alexander spins his beer on the coaster.
“No judgment,” I say as Beau offers a slow “Right.”
“The relationship moved along. Our friends paired off and got married one by one. And eventually, we got married. Bought a little house. Had two kids. And I did love her, I really did. But I’d never gotten out of the habit of sleeping with other women.”
I school my expression, an expertise developed in this process. We’ve heard so many despicable things from people hoping that the antiseptic of truth will cleanse their shame.
“So you were unfaithful,” Beau says.
Alexander nods. “When we started dating, it started out as one-night stands with girls at parties or old girlfriends or casual flings with friends. After we got married, I kept it impersonal.”
I hear Beau mutter something under his breath. I think he says, “Thoughtful of you.” I step on his foot, and he swallows a growl.
Alexander looks from Beau to me and back, his lips pursed.
“What happened then?” I ask, because Beau has forgotten his commitment to neutrality.
“I didn’t want to embarrass her. So I’d”—he sighs—“sleep with women I met while traveling for work until I finally started using apps, but that got complicated, too. I matched with a single mom at my son’s school, so I deleted those accounts and decided I needed more anonymity. From there it escalated.”
This is when Beau usually jumps in with follow-up questions, seeking to understand the impact.
But his gaze is focused over Alexander’s head, his body rigid like a hunting dog pointing toward its prey.
I understand that Beau is angry with me, but it’s clear his reaction to this interview is about more than me.
I can’t get distracted by wondering about the wounds of Beau’s marriage right now, though, because he’s checked out, leaving me to pick up the slack of this interview.
“What do you mean ‘escalated’?” I ask, nodding at him to continue.
He drops his voice. “I hired sex workers.”
I look to Beau, but he won’t engage. I nudge him under the table, but he’s catatonic. I proceed cautiously. “And your wife? Did she find out?”
He shakes his head. “My wife died of cervical cancer—caused by an STD.” Alexander drops his voice so low I crane to hear him over the conversations at nearby tables.
“Her doctor said it could have been dormant for years. But she’d only been with one guy before me.
And that was thirty years before she got cancer. ”
“I can’t imagine how painful that must have been for your family,” I say, choking out an understatement because I don’t know what else to say.
“The worst part was, she never doubted me—didn’t even ask me.
And until she got sick, I hadn’t felt guilty.
She made me happy, and I think I made her happy.
I just had this secret—this habit I couldn’t break.
But from the day she got sick to the day she died, and for two years since, I’ve been suffocating on the guilt. Knowing I killed her.”
He drops his head into his palms. Beau is motionless, isn’t looking directly at him. And I let my empathy wash away my disgust like a tidal wave. Our volunteers are looking for something they think we can give them. If not absolution, then unburdening.
I whisper these words into the wind: “Even with our biggest mistakes, sometimes the consequences are far crueler than anyone deserves.”
“But I deserved it. She didn’t.”
“You’re right,” Beau says, his eyes trained on the river beyond. “Your punishment is living with it.”
Beau doesn’t speak when Alexander makes his way out of the brewery, and I don’t know what to say to him.
He’s angry at me, perhaps hurt, too, but he lost all impartiality once Alexander admitted to infidelity.
Beau’s good at compartmentalizing for work—he’s a productivity robot.
But he refused to engage with Alexander; I asked all the follow-up questions while trying to capture notes before Beau blew it up.
I think I salvaged the meeting with my good-cop routine.
But Alexander may call and revoke his consent after Beau took a scouring pad to his open wound.
I think we need to renegotiate our agreement. Beau’s getting a lot of value from my free labor.
“I have a call,” Beau says. “Can you hang out in town until I’m done?”
The pressure is building behind my eyes again, but I blink it away.
I want to sleep. Maybe I can handle all these inconvenient emotions after a nap.
Perhaps if I get some rest or a moment to breathe, I can process my feelings and be prepared to discuss us —whatever us is. “Could you drop me at the motel?”
“We’re camping tonight.” Beau slides his laptop into his messenger bag. “There are shops across the way—a bookstore, a library, a café. I won’t be long.”
“We’re camping?” I need a quiet motel room where I can escape from him for a while, where I can rest and hope it will realign my world.
“I told you we’d be camping,” he snaps.
“I thought you were kidding. Or trying to scare me away.”
“I wish I were. I booked the site before I knew I’d have an interloper.”
“Hey,” I say, fed up with his attitude, “this interloper just saved your ass in that interview. You were unprofessional and unkind.”
“That guy didn’t deserve my kindness,” he says, still concentrating on sorting the contents of his bag.
I know Beau’s pissed at me, but his animosity toward Alexander is pointed.
While I’ve wondered before whether Bianca was unfaithful, now I’m certain.
It’s hard not to notice the difference between Beau’s normal interview demeanor and whatever that was.
He’s listened to shocking stories of deception for weeks without batting an eyelash.
“Beau, do you want to talk about why that interview ...” I don’t even know how to ask him, especially now that he’s so angry with me. “... was so personal to you?”
He lets out an incredulous laugh as he drops several twenties on the table, slinging the messenger bag over his shoulder and adjusting the strap across his chest. I look away. I don’t need a reminder of what his pecs look like. “I’m not having this discussion with you.”
His phone rings, and I glance at the screen on instinct. Bianca.
“I’ll meet you there in an hour.” He motions across the street to an outdoor courtyard. “Hi,” he says into the phone. “Let me find somewhere I can talk.”
As I watch him stride away, my tears threaten to break free, damming behind my eyes like white rapids tipping over a fall, but I refuse to give in.