“I’m sorry,” Selena said again when she was done. “Why did I just tell you that?”
“Obviously,” said Martha with the same kind smile Selena had tried to offer her earlier, “you needed to tell someone.”
Martha produced another little bottle of Grey Goose. Her manicure, bloodred, was perfect—her fingers slender and white, no rings. As Selena cracked the bottle open and took a sip, she noticed the other woman staring at her diamond engagement ring. （Women often did. It was huge.） It felt good to let it all out. She’d put the weight of it down for a while.
“But you don’t know for sure?” asked Martha.
Selena shook her head.
“Do you have reason to doubt him?” she asked.
“No,” said Selena. “It’s just a feeling.”
“Well,” Martha lifted her little bottle and they clinked again. “I hope you’re wrong. And if you’re not, I hope he gets what he deserves.”
She offered the final sentence with a devilish smile, but something inside Selena went a little cold. What did he deserve? What did anyone deserve?
“Men,” said Martha when Selena stayed silent. “They’re so flawed, so broken, aren’t they? They’ve screwed up the whole world.”
The other woman’s tone had gone dark, her eyes a bit distant. “All they do is create damage.”
Selena felt the bizarre impulse to defend all men, even Graham. After all, she had two boys of her own. But it died in her throat. It was true, wasn’t it? In some sense—war, climate change, genocide, cults, pedophilia, rape, murder, most crime in general—men were responsible for a good portion of the world’s ills. They’d been running amok for millennia.
“Don’t you ever just wish your problems would take care of themselves?” Martha asked again. “No effort on your part?”
But problems didn’t solve themselves. And suddenly it occurred to Selena that Martha was the other woman, sleeping with someone’s husband. A woman who owned the company where Martha worked, who was probably as trusting of her husband and her employee as Selena had been. Earning a living, supporting her family, while her husband fucked the first pretty girl to come along.
“How would your problem be solved?” asked Selena, dabbing at her eyes.
“Today I was thinking it would be great if he just—died,” she said with a wicked smile. “Car accident, heart attack, random street crime. Then I could just keep my job, no one the wiser.”
Martha laughed a little, a sweet, girlish sound, then took another delicate sip from her little bottle. She was just kidding, of course. Wasn’t she? Selena shifted away slightly, clutching her bag to her middle.
“And I’d never be so stupid again,” Martha went on. “I wouldn’t be so afraid for my job that I’d submit to some predator’s advances.”
Was that how Geneva felt? Selena wondered. Had Graham come on to her, and she’d submitted because she was afraid to lose her job? It definitely didn’t seem that way. But there were always layers, weren’t there? Graham was in a power position. Selena knew that Geneva did struggle to make ends meet, couldn’t afford not to work, even for a short time.
The lights flickered and the train jerked forward. Selena felt a surge of hope. But then nothing.
“There was a blockage on the track,” came the conductor’s voice, carrying over the speaker system. The man beside them jerked awake and looked around, confused, sat up and checked his phone. “It’s been cleared, and we should be on our way shortly. We apologize for the inconvenience.”
The man gathered his case and walked to the other car.
“And how would your problem be solved?” asked Martha. Her stare was intense, and Selena felt almost pinned by it.
She tried for a wry smile.
Single women, they just didn’t get it yet, all the complicated layers of a marriage, of a life with children, all the sacrifices and compromises you made daily so that everything worked.
My problem can’t be solved, thought Selena.
Divorce her husband, become a single mother with the kids gone every other weekend and holiday? Or stick it out? Fire Geneva, a girl the boys both loved, and try to find a reason that was palatable to them, that didn’t shame Selena and ruin her husband in the eyes of their kids? Then quit her job and live off savings until Graham found another position and went back to work. Confront him, couples’ counseling, maybe find a new way forward. There was no solution that didn’t introduce a whole host of new problems. Problems she frankly just didn’t have the energy to solve.
“Maybe she’ll disappear,” said Martha. “And you can just pretend it never happened.”
Her voice, it slithered like a snake, was a whisper in the dark.
When Selena looked into Martha’s eyes, it was like staring into space, cold and distant, empty. The vodka was making Selena feel a little sick.
What if Geneva just didn’t turn up for work one day? Disappeared. Graham would pick up the pace on his job hunt big time, Selena bet, if he was full-on with the kids. Maybe Selena could just pretend it never happened. It would be so much easier. For a second, it seemed possible. Her mother, after all, had done it for decades to keep her family intact.
But no. She couldn’t. She couldn’t unsee what she’d seen, unknow what she now knew about her husband. She wasn’t like her mother. She couldn’t just stand by for the sake of the children. Could she?
The train came to life then, lights coming on, lurching forward. Nauseated, heart racing a little, Selena started to gather her things.
“Yeah,” Selena said, managing a thin laugh. “I don’t think I could get that lucky.”
“You never know.” Martha twisted a strand of her dark, silky hair. “Bad things happen all the time.”
Selena moved over to the seat on the other side of the aisle.
“I’ll spread out,” she said as Martha watched with a polite smile. “Give you some space.”
Martha nodded, pulled her tote up off the ground.
“Thanks for the drink,” Selena said when she’d settled. “And for listening.”
“Thank you,” said Martha. “I feel better. I think I know what to do.”
“Sometimes we just need an ear.”
“And a little push in the right direction.”
What did she mean by that? Selena didn’t really want to know. Something about the conversation, the other woman’s tone, the vodka, had her feeling uneasy, and very much wanting the conversation to end. Why had she told this stranger about herself? Something so personal?
She opened her magazine and started flipping through the glossy pages of impossibly slim bodies, flawless faces, enviable lives. When she looked over at Martha again, she seemed to have nodded off. As the train neared her station, Selena gathered her things, but the other woman didn’t stir. She slipped off as quietly as she could, not saying goodbye, not looking back, hoping that they wouldn’t meet again.
FOUR
Geneva
Geneva stacked Crate and Barrel plates in the dishwasher, then wiped down the gleaming quartz countertop, listening to the boys bouncing around upstairs while Graham tried to read a story and get them settled for the night. Jumping off the beds by the sound of it, a heavy thud that caused glasses in the cabinets to rattle slightly. Something neither Selena nor Geneva would ever tolerate. Story time was for winding down, not winding up.