The photo is taken from behind; her head is turned. I can barely make out her profile. Her hair is loose in waves down her back, but covered with a wispy white veil. It is of their wedding day and the jealousy surges, this awful, clawing, clamping tightness in my throat. Her dress is fitted, she’s impossibly thin, elegant in an ivory fishtail gown. I shove the frame back under the files. I back out of the closet, the bile in my throat. I push sideways the idea of being threatened by a swatch of bare spine and a mane of thick hair.
With the birth certificate and the adoption agency memo in one hand, I call Cash. He picks up before the phone even rings.
“Hi, it’s Zoe. I was following up about the story? If you finished it?”
He pauses. “Yeah, mostly. I had a few other questions. Would you want to meet for lunch?”
I agree, but suggest a coffee shop closer to my apartment than his office. Neither one of us suggests the diner and the conversation is stilted. He asks if I’m okay.
I feign surprise. “I’m fine!” I say brightly. We agree to meet at noon. I check my watch and it’s ten after ten.
I tuck paperwork into my purse, folded into a square small enough to fit in the pocket. I feel guilty, lying to Henry. Honestly, I’m not even sure what I’m doing yet. The lie feels good, fits like a well-made winter coat.
I step out into the sun and the air is brisk. It smells woodsy out, that faint promise of summer. I skip-step to the curb to hail a taxi and change my mind. I walk the six blocks and before I realize it, I turn west.
Henry works out every day at 11:30. Five miles on the treadmill, a hundred push-ups, a hundred sit-ups, exactly one hour, not including the shower. His gym is across the street from his office, and I stand in front of it, hopping from one foot to the other. I’ve never surprised him like this; Henry doesn’t particularly care for surprises (his words, I don’t particularly care for surprises).
Sometimes I think about the Henry who wooed me, buoyant and boyish, and I remember that he liked surprises. I can’t tell if I’ve been conned or if all relationships slow to the everyday, if marriages settle and become mundane at some point. To some extent, everyone puts on a show, their best foot forward, smiling at hobbies they hate, pretending to love football teams they couldn’t care less about, or eating sushi and secretly spitting it into a napkin.
I hover in front of the door. I’m not even sure I can get in the building without a membership badge, which I don’t have. He’s never asked me to join him. I’m still trying to figure out why I’m here when a group of two men and two women barge through the doors, talking and laughing. I scoot behind them and let the mirrored doors close behind me.
The lobby is austere with mirrored walls, floors, ceilings, white and black countertops, and a single twenty-foot tree stretching up to the ceiling. I follow the group down the hall and skirt away before I reach the locker room. At the end of the hall is another entrance into one of the main gyms, and the last twenty feet of hallway is a one-way mirror, presumably for prospective clients to view the amenities without current members feeling put on display.
My mouth goes dry and I involuntarily place my hand against the wall, the heat from my fingertips leaving condensation prints against the cold glass. Henry is in there, his movements quick and smooth, his back muscles flexing with each up and down. Push-ups are last, he’s close to done. If he makes a move toward the lobby or toward the locker room, I’ll reveal myself as a pleasant surprise. Maybe blow Cash off and grab a middle of the week lunch with Henry.
He stands up and gulps water and I watch him lean in, whisper to a coltish blonde on the mat next to him. She throws her head back, as though he’s said something hilarious, which I know could never be true because Henry is not funny. At least, not recently. But something about him is different to me: he’s loose-jointed, almost swaggering, a hand poised cockily on one jutted hip. I lean forward until my nose is almost touching the glass. Henry cracks another joke and the blonde swats at his arm. He reaches out and pats her bottom, her round, perfect pink-spandexed bottom and hovers there, his fingers gently flexing on the rounded swell.
The heat flushes my face and I back away from the window. Men flirt, it’s how it is. I still feel dizzy and I push the heel of my palm to my forehead.
With my head down, I scuttle through the lobby.
“Ma’am!” The receptionist calls but I flip my hand up in her direction and push out the front door. In the time I’ve been inside the club, cloud cover has rolled in, cloaking the sky in thick gray cotton. The cool breeze brings gooseflesh to my arms.