“How was, uh…
Nina’s?” Grant doesn’t look up when he says it.
He’s at the kitchen island with his laptop and his reading glasses on, same pose as the 2 magazine covers I cut out and stuck on the fridge next to Milo’s drawings.
Both articles called him a visionary and he never mentioned either one.
“Fine.” I set my bag on the counter.
The sitter must have left when Grant got home; her car wasn’t in the driveway.
I kiss the top of Milo’s head because Milo is at the island too, sitting on the stool that’s too tall for him with his legs swinging and a worksheet in front of him that he’s been coloring instead of completing.
“Hey, bug, what’s the— what’s the homework?” “Volcanoes.” “The worksheet says fractions, Milo.” “Mr.
Priestley says volcanoes are more important than fractions because volcanoes are real and fractions are just— just pieces of things.” He looks up at me with Grant’s eyes, dark brown and certain, and the name Mr.
Priestley just came out of my 7-year-old’s mouth when 40 minutes ago, Mr.
Priestley’s hands were up my shirt and on my boobs, my brain splits clean in half and neither woman in it can look at the other.
“He said my volcano was the best one.” “I bet it was, bug, but you still— you still need to finish the fractions.” “Can Mr.
Priestley come for dinner?” “No.” “Why— why not?” “Because Mr.
Priestley has his own dinner to eat at his own apartment.
So…” I open the fridge because I need to put my face somewhere that isn’t facing my son while we discuss the man I’m sleeping with.
“Did you eat?” I aim this at Grant, who is still scrolling.
“Hmm?” He doesn’t look up.
“Did you— did you eat, Grant?” “I, uh…
had a sandwich at the office.
Calloway ordered.” Calloway, Grant’s assistant, the man who runs more of my husband’s life than I do, who knows his schedule, his mother’s birthday, including what he eats for lunch while I stand in this kitchen and update a whiteboard that nobody reads.
The whiteboard is on the wall next to the pantry and I fill it in every Sunday night with the week’s schedule in neat black marker, and I’ve been doing it for 3 years.
Grant has never once glanced at it, and the housekeeper ignores it because she has her own system, and I keep filling it in because if I stop, I’ll have to admit that organizing this family is a performance I’m putting on for a theater that emptied out years ago.
I pour a glass of wine without counting and stop when it feels right, which is honestly sooner than I’d like.
“You’re home early,” I say.
“Conference call got moved to tomorrow.” “Huh.” I sip and lean against the counter and look at him, he’s typing again, keys clicking against the marble, the steady rhythm of every evening in this house for 3 years.
“That, uh— that happens a lot?
Calls getting moved?” “Sometimes.” He scrolls with one finger.
“Why?” “No reason.” He accepts this without a follow-up because he accepts everything I say without follow-up, and looking up from his laptop and actually studying my face would require curiosity about me, and he definitely ran out of that sometime around year 5.
I used to curate exhibitions in Chelsea.
I had a desk at a gallery on 22nd Street and a contact list of artists who called me back as well as shows that people reviewed in actual newspapers.
Now I have a whiteboard, Sub-Zero, and a wine glass I’m gripping too hard because the woman who used to broker a Basquiat is standing in her own kitchen at 4:45 on a Tuesday with her lover’s coffee still on her breath, her husband doesn’t notice because it’s not a thing he does anymore.
“Mommy.” “Yeah, bug?” “Mr.
Priestley let me pick the lava color for the volcano, and I picked red, then I picked orange, and he said I could do both.” Milo’s bouncing on the stool now, worksheet gone, his whole face wide open.
“Nobody else got to do both, just me, and he put it on the shelf by the window where everyone can see it.” “That’s— that’s great, Milo.” My hand is steady on the wine glass, and my face is doing what it needs to do, which is nothing, and I’m the best liar in this kitchen, the competition is not small.
“I’m glad he liked it.” “He said you’re gonna see it at the open house.” “I’ll make sure to look.” “Promise?” “Promise.” I reach over and push his hair off his forehead, sandy brown and always falling in his eyes.
“You should ask Daddy if he’s coming too.” “Daddy, are you coming to the open house?” Grant’s typing pauses for one beat.
“When is it, buddy?” “I don’t— I don’t know.
Mommy knows.” “I’ll, uh…
check the schedule.” And the typing starts again, Milo’s face does a small, practiced thing where the hope drains out and gets replaced by acceptance, and that’s worse than disappointment because he still expected better.
I want to throw my wine glass at the Calacatta marble.
“Do your fractions, bug.” I kiss his head again because this kid deserves 10 more kisses than he gets on an average Tuesday.
“Bath in, like, 20 minutes.” “I hate fractions.” “Everybody hates fractions, Milo, that’s why they make you do them in second grade before you’re old enough to refuse.” He giggles, and Grant almost smiles at the sound, but doesn’t look up, the almost is the whole marriage in one micro-expression.
“Oh.” Grant closes his laptop, takes off his glasses, folds them with both hands, and sets them on the island.
“The Marchettis are, uh…
coming for dinner Saturday.
I told Camille we’d do 8:00.” “You told Camille?” “She, um— she called this afternoon.” He picks up his phone and tilts the screen toward himself, away from me, the same way he always tilts it.
“Said she hasn’t seen you in weeks.
Sounded like she, I don’t know…
missed you.” He says Camille’s name sorta the same way I say Nina’s, which is somewhat flat and rehearsed, and I recognize it because I’ve been practicing the same trick for 6 weeks, where a name comes out of your mouth clean and casual, you hope nobody hears the fingerprints you left all over it.