When Rowan told Jake to sit down—-on the only uncluttered seat in her office, the antique fainting couch—-she’d fully intended to start from the beginning and tell him the whole truth.
The problem: the beginning—-the real beginning—-was so long ago and far away that she kept getting sidetracked.
“Why are you telling me this?” Jake asks edgily, as she recounts the first time she ever cut class in high school.
“I just feel like . . . you know, I’ve done some not great things in my past, and—-”
“We all have.”
“You?” She shakes her head. “Please. The only bad thing you ever did was senior prank.”
Jake and a -couple of his friends were, in fact, elevated to folk hero status following the legendary “missing piglet” incident at the high school shortly before graduation.
“Anyway,” she adds, “that was genius, and they didn’t even press charges, so it doesn’t count as getting into trouble.”
“Not true.”
“That it was genius?”
“No, that it’s the only bad thing I ever did. It’s the only one I’ve told you about.”
“What else did you do? Chew gum in class?”
“Does this have something to do with Mick?”
“Mick? Why?”
“Because I’ve been thinking about him all day and I’m guessing you have too.”
She flashes back to the conversation in the car when she drove her son to work.
“We both know he didn’t really have to take a test first thing this morning, Ro.”
“If we both know it, then why am I the only one who acknowledged it?”
“Because you’re the mom, I guess.” Seeing the look on her face, he adds, “Bad answer? Only one I’ve got. Sorry. I guess I’ve been preoccupied with work and I’m a little slow figuring things out.”
“I talked to him this afternoon. He said he had an argument with one of his friends.”
“And . . . ?”
“And that’s why he’s been upset.”
He shrugs. “Maybe that’s true, but it’s not all that’s going on with him. And even if it were—-which it’s not—-it’s no excuse for lying.”
“You’re right. There’s no excuse for lying,” she says quietly.
“He lied about coming home on time on Saturday night, too. I’ll admit I was dozing on the couch, but I woke up a few times after midnight, and I know he wasn’t here when he should have been.”
“Katie missed curfew a few times, too.”
“She never lied about it.”
No. She wouldn’t lie.
“Are you hungry?” Jake asks, looking at his watch. “I’ve had Italian food on the brain all day.”
“I meant to make dinner. I just—-”
“No, it’s no big deal. Why don’t we go over to Marrana’s? We can drive Mick home when he’s done with his shift. Maybe he’ll talk to us.”
“So you think he’s in some kind of trouble?”
“Serious trouble? No. But he lied to us and his grades stink. I think we’d better sit him down and deal with it.” He starts to get up off the fainting couch.
“Jake. Wait.”
“What?”
“I didn’t finish telling you what I was telling you.”
“Oh. Right.” He looks at his watch again. “Can we finish talking about it over dinner? It’s getting late.”
He has absolutely no clue that for perhaps the first time in their marriage, she’s trying to tell him something so grave that it can’t possibly be discussed in public over Cavatelli a la Mama.
She was planning to take her sister’s advice and tell him what happened fourteen years ago—-
“Fourteen years ago!” Noreen kept saying. “It’s ancient history. Just get it out in the open, say you’re sorry, show him the stupid snow globe, and move on.”
She made it sound so simple.
The reality is anything but.
I can’t do this right now, Rowan decides. If she does, it will blow up and envelop them both. They won’t be able to deal with Mick, or . . . with anything.
Maybe it’s an excuse.
Maybe it’s a valid reason to wait to tell him until later, or tomorrow, or . . .
Maybe he doesn’t need to know after all.