Mulligans

29. Don't Lie to Me

Stacey sat at the dining room table with a pinot noir, mindlessly turning the pages of a family photo album. She couldn't quite bring herself to look at the pictures and the memories that were reflected there, but it gave her something to pretend to be doing as she waited. Despite her surface stillness, a storm was heaving inside her, growing more deadly and wrathful with each passing moment. So many accusations were piling one on top of the other in her mind, she was reeling just to try keep them reined in and organized for her arsenal. It had been nearly an hour since she'd sent Birdy to play at the neighbor's house, and though she was grateful to have solitude in which to hide her grief, the waiting was nearly driving her to madness. A glass of wine to try to calm herself had turned into a near-empty bottle. The alcohol had only stirred and boiled her emotions instead of quelling them for a time as she had hoped. Hearing the front door open, she steeled herself and did not rise to meet her husband as she customarily would have, but remained seated, staring out across the table and into the yard through the large picture-frame window.

"How was your day?" she asked, impressing herself with her controlled tone.

"Good. Yours?" Nathan called from the foyer.

"Fine," Stacey said calmly before drawing her first weapon. "How's Chase?"

She could hear her husband pause in the kitchen and pull a glass from the cupboard, filling it with water. "I think he's gonna be okay."

"Mmmm...," Stacey purred, but it barely concealed the roar growing inside her throat. "And how about you? Are you going to be okay?"

Nathan set the glass on the granite countertop. "I don't know what you mean."

"Really?" she said musically, beginning to enjoy his mounting discomfort, like a cat playing with her food.

"What's this about? You told me to spend some time with Chase. What are you upset about?"

"Oh, I'm not upset," she lied, swirling the last of the pinot in her crystal, disgusted by how it reminded her of her mother. She could feel Nathan's eyes boring into her back, feel the accusation he was about to fling at her forming in his mind.

"Stacey, you're drunk."

"No, just high on the adrenaline of a good game of golf."

"What were you doing at the golf course?" Nathan asked, a hint of concern in his voice.

"Birdy and I went to play. I didn't realize it was out of bounds for us." She calmly closed the photo album and turned to look at him over the back of her chair. "I saw you."

It was all she could do to remain in the chair and not run over and slap him as his lying face twisted into a caricature of confusion. "Excuse me?"

"At the golf course, with Chase," she explained for his benefit. "I saw you kiss him."

And in that instant her female instincts surmised that the well was much deeper than what she had witnessed. This man whom she had shared her life with for the past twenty years could not hide the guilt that colored his face. "What else have you done?" she continued.

"Nothing....," he choked out.

"Don't lie to me, Nathan."

"This is—"

"What? Crazy? Are you about to call me crazy?" She stood and walked steadily despite the wine into the kitchen to face him. "I am a perfectly sane woman dealing with completely irrational behavior. If you've forgotten, this is our life you're toying with. Now tell me what happened."

Nathan looked at the floor, shaking his head. "What you saw was an accident. It didn't mean anything."

She sneered, but the laugh in her throat started to push the tears out without her permission. "An accident is when soy sauce spills on a white shirt. An accident is forgetting to confirm dinner reservations. Cheating on your wife with a... a... I can't even say it. That is not an accident. When did it start?"