I step out of my car and walk across the street, approaching her home. Then I take a deep breath, climb the stairs, and knock twice before I can change my mind. The door swings open almost immediately, and I register the shock on her face when she sees me standing there, my arms dangling awkwardly by my sides.
“Isabelle,” she says, trying to mask the surprise in her voice. “What are you doing here?”
“I was wondering if we could talk. Just for a couple minutes.”
“How do you know where I live?”
I’m quiet, trying to decide how to answer that. Because I followed you here doesn’t sound like the best way to convince her to let me in, so instead, I keep talking.
“There are some things you should know,” I say. “Things about Ben.”
“I’m … I’m sorry,” she stutters, clearly trying to shake off the shock. “I’m sorry, but I think you should leave.” She starts to close the door, but before she can, I stick my foot over the threshold, wedging it open.
“It’s important,” I say. “I’m worried about you.”
“You’re worried about me?” she asks, her eyes growing wide. “Isabelle, no offense, but I think you should be worried about yourself.”
“Is that what Ben told you?” I ask, leaning forward. “That we weren’t happy for a long, long time? That he tried to help me but he could never get through? That he’s a good person and deserves to be happy, too?”
I see her expression waver, just for a second, and I know I’ve hit a nerve. I imagine Ben showing up to therapy, alone, eyes misty as he described me to her the same way he had described Allison to me on the side of that house: my hands on his cheeks, heartstrings pulled so tight they felt like they might snap. Painting a picture of me that cast me in the worst possible light: a broken woman, a lost cause. Someone he had tried to save.
Valerie’s eyes are on mine now, and I can see the questions swirling in her pupils. The questions I know she wants to ask. She’s curious about me the same way I had been curious about Allison. I think back now on that moment when Valerie and I first met—the moment I had stumbled into that room in the church and taken her by surprise. I think about the way she had looked at me and invited me to stay, almost as if she wanted to know my side of it, too.
“He’s not who you think he is,” I continue. “I just want to talk.”
I try to put myself in her shoes, wondering: If I had found Allison on my doorstep one morning, offering herself to me the way I am now to Valerie, would I have taken the opportunity? Would I have betrayed Ben for just the smallest peek into their lives together—a glimpse behind that carefully closed curtain that he would never allow me to push aside? After all, I had imagined it so many times: her, them, the way I’m sure Valerie has imagined us.
I think of Allison’s fingers on my arm, her lips on my ear. The goose bumps that erupted across my skin, the intrigue of being so close to someone I had spent so much time daydreaming about, wondering about. Obsessing about.
I would have done it. I would have let her in.
“Valerie,” I say, resting my hand on hers. She flinches, like she had expected my touch to burn, but after a few more seconds of silence, I can see her resolve melt. Like wax turning to liquid, malleable in my fingers, the curiosity overcomes her, the way I knew it would.
Then she cracks the door back open, her eyes on the floor, and gestures for me to come inside.
CHAPTER FIFTY-SEVEN
I step into the living room and take a seat on the edge of a slipcovered couch. The house is small but homey: a fireplace with a cluttered mantel, string lights illuminating a collection of candles and books stacked high in both corners. There’s a glass coffee table in the center of it all and a series of pictures clipped to a string with clothespins against the back wall.
She seems fun, eclectic. So incredibly young.
Valerie sits in a chair on the opposite side of the table, eying me from across the room. She doesn’t seem scared or suspicious; instead, she seems a little on guard, like I’m some kind of rabid animal she isn’t quite sure how to handle.
Like I might lash out and bite.
“First of all,” she says, crossing one leg over the other, “I just wanted to say that I’m sorry, Isabelle. I told Ben that it felt too soon…”
She stops, diverts her eyes to the floor, fully aware of the role she holds in this relationship of ours.
“You just have a lot going on,” she continues. “And I’m sorry if the addition of me is making it worse.”