“Mind if we join you?” It was the couple they’d met the night before, Alec and Jill were their names, Abigail thought, and both she and Bruce nodded and said, “No,” as the couple settled in across from them. Alec was wearing fancy-looking distressed jeans and a black T-shirt with leather stitched into the neckline.
The T-shirt hugged him at the waist. As had happened the previous night, they instantly broke into conversations along gender lines, Alec and Bruce starting to compare notes on what they’d had for dinner—“That Wagyu beef, I mean, fuck me”—and Abigail asked Jill how her day had been.
“We were going to go sailing on the pond, but, you know, the weather.” Jill, who was wearing a white cocktail dress that fell just above her knees, shivered and added, “Honestly, I didn’t know it would be so cold here, did you?”
“Have you been to the pool yet?”
“God, yes, it’s the best, but …”
“But what?”
Jill bit her lower lip, and Abigail noticed that beneath her very artful makeup she looked tired and pale. Jill leaned in while breathing out and Abigail could smell the alcohol on her breath.
“So, thing is,” she whispered. “There’s this guy, also here on the island, totally by random chance, who I was involved with a while ago, and twice now I’ve run into him at the pool.”
Abigail, stunned by the strange coincidence, managed to ask, “Does Alec know that he’s here?”
“God, no. Alec doesn’t even know about this guy. At all. And if he found out about him, I think it would totally wreck our honeymoon. So, I’m just letting it wreck my honeymoon and trying to keep it to myself.”
Abigail was about to tell Jill about her very similar situation, but instead she asked, “Are you sure it’s random that he’s here? You don’t think he …”
Jill’s jaw tensed, the tendons in her neck popping out, and Abigail had a sudden vision of what she would look like in about fifty years—rail-thin, still blond, and very tightly wound.
“I wondered about that, but, no. It’s just an accident, I think. I hope. The thing is, he and I, we were engaged two years ago, and then it ended really badly. I didn’t tell Alec about any of this because I didn’t want him to freak out—he’s the jealous type, and this guy—”
“Is he black?” Abigail asked, without really thinking.
Jill’s eyes widened, and she swiveled her head. “Why? Is he watching us?”
“No, no,” Abigail said. “I think I might have met him this morning, in the pool. Is he from Bermuda?”
“Yeah, that’s him. He’s in the pool every morning.”
“He seemed nice, actually,” Abigail said.
“He was nice. He is nice. I used to be in Bermuda all the time because I was in the chorus on a cruise ship that went back and forth from New York to Hamilton. Let me tell you, not as much fun as you’d think, and he rescued me from all that, at least I thought he had.”
“So, what happened?”
“Ugh. We got engaged and then I got a job in Vancouver for three months and he couldn’t get away from work, so we were apart from one another. And, you know, it turned bad.”
“Why don’t you just tell Alec that he’s here? I mean, it’s not your fault, and it’s not like he thought you’d never had any boyfriends before he came along.”
Jill breathed in through her nose, then took a long sip of her white wine, finishing the glass. “Walk with me to the bar,” she said, standing up.
Abigail stood, still holding her untouched Baileys. The two men stopped talking and looked inquisitively at them. “We’re going to the bar,” Abigail said. “What can we get you?”
Alec and Bruce, each with a beer, declined, and Jill put her arm through Abigail’s as they walked the twenty feet toward the bar.
They stood about three feet back from the line of men waiting for drinks, and Jill said, “Sorry. I was getting paranoid that Alec could hear everything I was saying. I talk too loud when I drink. Am I talking too loud?”
“No, you’re whispering. I can barely hear you.”
“Good. Here’s the thing. I told Alec that I was a virgin when we first met. I know, I know. It’s ridiculous, but he was a virgin, at least that’s what he said, and it was very clear that he wanted me to be as well. I didn’t feel good about lying, but I did it, and then we started to get serious, and I couldn’t get out of it. And here’s the other thing—God, I can’t believe I’m telling you all this, but it feels so good. He is super-insecure about sex. It did not go well at all on our wedding night, and it’s very obvious that he, uh, feels inadequate not just in his performance, but I think he feels inadequate in his size.”