“Three-eighths,” Jonah says, tapping Milo’s worksheet with his pencil, his voice is the teacher voice, you know, patient, encouraging, but it’s the same mouth that was between my legs last week, and I’m sitting at the kitchen table 3 feet away pretending to answer emails on my laptop.
Milo is between us.
His stool pulled up to the table, his legs swinging, his pencil gripped in his fist because he still holds a pencil the same way you’d hold a weapon, honestly.
Jonah’s knee is close to mine under the table, not really touching, but close enough that I can feel the warmth of him through his khakis, and the distance between touching and not is the distance between this kitchen and his apartment, and I am losing my mind on a Tuesday afternoon while my son practices fractions.
“I don’t— I don’t get it,” Milo says.
“Okay, so, think of it this way.” Jonah leans forward.
“You have a pizza, right?” “What kind?” “I don’t know, any kind.” “Pepperoni.
Definitely pepperoni.” “Sure.
Pepperoni.
You cut it into 8 slices, and you eat 3, how much of the pizza did you eat?” “Three pieces.” “And 3 pieces out of 8 is…” “Three…
eighths?” “There it is.” Jonah holds up his hand, and Milo high-fives him.
The crack of their palms fills the kitchen, and I stare at my laptop where my email draft says Dear followed by nothing because I can’t remember who I was writing to or why at all.
Milo does 3 more problems, gets 2 right and 1 wrong, and Jonah explains the wrong one again without a shred of impatience.
I’ve never seen Grant explain anything to Milo without checking his phone mid-sentence.
Jonah’s attention is full, undivided, pointed at my son with a focus I’ve been begging Grant to give this kid for years, and I watch it happen then the word “love” wanders into my head uninvited but I delete it exactly the same way I always delete Jonah’s texts from my phone.
“Mr.
Priestley?” “Yeah, buddy?” “Do you— do you have a girlfriend?” Jonah’s ears go red, definitely not his cheeks, but just his ears, and only the tips of them, and now that I think about it, I’ve never seen that happen in his apartment before, because apparently this question from a 7-year-old does what my body doesn’t, which is make Jonah Priestley blush.
“Not— not right now, buddy.” “Why not?” “That’s…
that’s a complicated question, Milo.” “Mommy says complicated means you don’t wanna talk about it.” “Your mom is pretty smart.” Milo looks at me.
“Mr.
Priestley says you’re smart, Mommy.” “I heard him, bug.” I bite the inside of my lip, hard, and I don’t look at Jonah because if I look at him right now with my son between us, I will do something visible, even though Milo is 7, he’s not blind.
“Finish your last problem, and then you can— you can go play, okay?” Milo finishes, he gets it right, then high-fives Jonah again, and then slides off the stool and runs to the living room where his LEGOs are spread across the carpet in a pattern only he understands, apparently.
The kitchen goes quiet, but Jonah’s knee still presses against mine under the table, and neither of us moves, but the contact is 1 square inch of fabric against skin, and it fills the room.
“Hi,” he says, very low.
“Hi…” “You look good.” “I look like a woman who’s been staring at a blank email for 45 minutes.” “You look good doing it anyway.” I close the laptop because the pretense is pointless and he’s right there, but I can’t touch him, can’t cross the 6 inches of air between his hand and mine, because my son is 1 room away building a spaceship out of plastic bricks, and the rule is the rule no matter what, even when it feels like it’s strangling both of us.
“Tell me something,” he says.
“Tell you…
what exactly?” “Something about you, before all…
this.” He gestures at the kitchen, then at the table, and then at the space between us.
“Before…
me, you know?” Nobody in this house has asked me about my life before Winding Ridge Road in years.
I look at him, his face is very open, it’s very patient, and he seems to be genuinely interested, so I start talking because he’s listening, and he’s the opposite of Grant, ’cause Grant doesn’t listen, and the difference between those 2 facts is pretty much the entire reason I’m in this mess in the first place.
“I used to curate art exhibitions.” The words feel rusty coming out of my mouth, a bit old, maybe, like I stopped speaking this language a long time ago and I’m not sure I remember how.
“I had a desk at a gallery in Chelsea, 22nd Street, I had artists who trusted me, collectors who returned my calls, and shows that got reviewed in newspapers.” “What happened?” “Grant happened, then Milo, but also the gallery closed during the pandemic, and I was already 3 years deep into being a wife, a mother, and the career just…
folded, you know?” I look at my hands on the table, the wedding ring, then the blank laptop.
“I folded it up, put it in a drawer, and closed it.” “That’s—” “Don’t say sad.
Please.” “I was gonna say…
wasteful.” I look up, and his jaw is set, and he actually means it, which is really something, because he’s angry on my behalf.
This 26-year-old who earns less in a year than Grant spends on watches is angry about my dead career, but the anger isn’t pity, honestly, it’s more like indignation, and Grant has never once been indignant about what I gave up because he never thought it was a career worth mourning anyway.
“There was a Basquiat,” I say, and I don’t know why I’m telling him all this except that he’s listening and genuinely, that’s the most intimate thing a man has done for me in this kitchen in years.
“An early work, not that famous yet, but I knew what it was gonna be worth.
I had the collector ready, I had the artist’s rep in my inbox, and the deal collapsed because I went into labor with Milo 3 weeks early, and by the time I came back, the painting had gone to a gallery in SoHo for twice what I was negotiating, so…” “Do you miss it?” “Every single day.” “So go back.” “It’s not that simple…” “Why not?” “Because I’ve been out for 7 years, and the contacts are dead, the art world moved on, and the woman who used to walk into galleries and command a room is buried under school pickups, dinner schedules, and whiteboards nobody reads, Jonah.” I stop myself because I can hear how I sound, angry, tired, small, and this isn’t what Tuesday tutoring is supposed to look like.
“I’m sorry, I honestly don’t even know why I’m dumping all of this on you.” “Because I asked.” He reaches across the table, his fingers stop an inch from mine, hovering over the marble, not really touching, because Milo is in the next room and the rules exist even when they’re choking us.
“Go back, Margaux.
I know I’ve just known you 7 weeks, but…
I already know you should.” My phone rings before I can answer, it’s Grant’s name on the screen, I pull my hand back from the space where Jonah’s fingers were almost touching mine.
“Hey.” “Hey.” Clipped and efficient, the voice he uses when he’s delivering a schedule update and doesn’t want a conversation about it.
“Meeting ran long, I’m gonna be late, so don’t— don’t wait up.” “How late?” “Midnight, probably, and Calloway has already ordered food for the team.” And then I hear it, behind his voice, underneath the efficiency, a sound, a woman laughing, not particularly loud, and also not close enough to the phone, but it was there, just a bright, quick laugh that could belong to anyone on a team of 20, but it lands in my ear, and it stays.
“Is the— is the whole team there?” “The whole team’s here, Margaux.” A pause, 1 beat too long.
“Why?” “No reason.
See you later.” “Kiss Milo for me.” The line goes dead, I set my phone on the table, Jonah’s watching me, and his face has shifted, the openness gone, replaced by the careful look he gets when the rest of my life walks into the room.
“Midnight,” I say.
“I heard.” “The whole team’s there?” “That’s what he said.” I look at Jonah across the table where he just taught my son fractions, where his knee is still warm against mine under the marble, but the woman’s laugh is still sitting in my ear.
I can’t identify it, I can’t place it, and I don’t have the right to investigate because I’m sitting across from the reason I don’t have that right to begin with, and the hypocrisy is so thick I could choke on it, but I hear the laugh anyway, playing on a loop, bright, quick and impossible to ignore.