Chapter 3 - What Was on the Phone
The screen was still glowing in my hand.
It was a photo. Wade and a woman I'd never seen, standing close together on the sidewalk outside some restaurant I didn't recognize. His hand was flat on the small of her back. Her head was tipped toward his shoulder.
They looked easy with each other. They looked like two people who had stood exactly like that a hundred times before.
The little timestamp in the corner said it was taken four days before our wedding.
"Who is she?" My voice didn't sound like mine.
Wade finally moved. He took one step toward me with his hand out, palm up.
"Let me explain—"
"Who is she, Wade?"
He stopped. His hand dropped.
"Her name's Sabrina." He said it like the name itself was supposed to be an apology. "We were together before I met you. It ended. Then last year she came back around and I—" He pressed his lips together hard. "It was a mistake. It was over before the wedding."
"It was not over." Erin's voice was flat and cold as a countertop. "Show her the rest."
I looked at my daughter. "There's more?"
Erin took the phone out of my hand and scrolled it herself, jaw locked tight. She found what she wanted and held it up.
A text thread. Wade's name at the top. The last message time-stamped the morning of our wedding.
I can't stop thinking about you. I'll call you tonight.
The room tilted a few degrees.
"Tonight," I said. "You mean our wedding night."
Wade sat down on the little bench by the coat hooks without being told to. He put his face in both hands.
"I ended it after that. I swear to you, Nora. I ended it that same night."
"You ended it." I set the phone down on the side table. I put it down slow and careful, like the whole house was made of glass. "You ended it on our wedding night. While I was asleep three inches away from you."
He didn't answer.
Erin crossed her arms. "Tell her why I left, Wade. Tell her what you said to me."
He looked up. Something moved behind his eyes. Close to fear.
"Erin—"
"I found the messages three weeks before the wedding," Erin said, turning to me. "I wasn't snooping. He left his phone face-up on the counter and it lit up while I was standing right there getting a glass of water. I saw her name. I saw enough of it."
"You went through my—" Wade started.
"I saw it pop up on your lock screen. I didn't touch a thing." Erin's voice went ragged. "I confronted him that same night, Mom. You were over at Aunt Jodie's. I told him he had to tell you, or I would."
I turned to Wade. "Is that true?"
He was quiet for a solid three seconds.
"Yes."
"And what did you say back to her?"
His eyes went to the floor again.
Erin answered for him. "He told me if I said one word to you, it would wreck you. He said you'd already been through hell after Dad. He said I was being selfish." Her voice snapped on the last word. "He told me I was going to blow up the one shot at happiness you had left."
The silence after that was the loudest thing I've ever stood inside of.
I looked at the man I'd married nine days before. The man who held both my hands at the altar. The man who stood next to me at my first husband's funeral and told me, quietly, that I was the strongest person he'd ever met.
"You told my eighteen-year-old," I said slowly, "that she was selfish. For trying to protect me."
Wade's eyes were wet. "I panicked. I know it was wrong. I know—"
"You manipulated her." It came out almost calm. That scared me more than yelling would have. "She's a kid, Wade. And you made her believe she was the problem."
"Mom." Erin's voice was barely there now. "That's still not the worst part."
I turned to her.
She pulled the phone back and scrolled again. Further this time. Then she stopped.
Her hand was shaking when she held it out.
May you like
I looked at the screen.
And this time I had to sit down.
