Matt stared at the windshield while Rachel braced herself for their first argument. But then his breath caught, and he rubbed his face until his skin was red. “You don’t want to talk to me about it, do you. About race.” His voice was low and halting, like the words were painful. And Rachel realized that, for Matt, this wasn’t some social justice debate. This was a part of herself that she’d been withholding, a closed door he’d observed but never tried to open, and instead had waited patiently to be invited in.
Years later, she would wonder if she’d made a mistake that night. Maybe she should have said, “No. I don’t want to talk about it,” because love wasn’t entitlement, and she had the right to decide when and if she had those conversations. But she’d convinced herself it was selfish not to try, so she’d grabbed his hand and spent the rest of the night reassuring him it was okay to ask questions if he had them—saying that she’d rarely dated outside her race before, so she was still learning too.
In hindsight, that night set a precedent for their marriage. Matt felt safe discussing race with the woman he loved, and Rachel didn’t want to discourage it because he was trying and learning. But she never told him it was exhausting, and that his staff would pepper her with questions like she was the only safe Black person to ask why it wasn’t okay to say dreadlocks anymore. And Hailey Dearwood was the worst of them. She scheduled Rachel for every event in Black neighborhoods whether she was needed or not, as if her presence would obscure Matt’s obvious whiteness.
Now, with the additional burden of selling their fake marriage, Rachel thought she’d earned the right to skip the church service. But Matt switched course and agreed that she should be there. He couldn’t look her in the eye when he said it. Neither of them had thought about the way this dynamic of mutually assured destruction would feel: the uncomfortable grossness of forcing each other to do things against their will. He mumbled something about “important depositions” and practically burned rubber leaving the parking lot.
Rachel had her car keys in hand when Hailey informed her they’d scored a last-minute profile that afternoon with the Washington Post. “We need to capitalize on the gala, and Alesha is game, but she wants to focus on the education angle. It’s at OS Elementary West. I need to make a stop, so can you meet us there?”
“Did you say Alesha? As in Alesha Williams? My aunt?”
Hailey’s eye twitched, but her smile didn’t falter. “Yes! And we didn’t even have to beg this time. She called the campaign and insisted on interviewing you herself.”
Rachel had grown up knowing that her father had a sister named Alesha and that they were estranged for reasons he never told her. But she’d never asked for an explanation. Peter Thomas didn’t keep secrets, he revealed information when it was needed. Rachel had always trusted his judgment and she knew their world was held together by the fragile strings he’d woven to ensure she would never have to sacrifice anything. She loved him for it. But when her father died swiftly, without warning, she resented him for it. Because in addition to withholding her family history, he’d never told her about his cancer diagnosis, or his lapsed medical coverage, or the predatory loans he’d been using to pay the bills. She was alone, with a young daughter, and no one to turn to for help. By the time she found Alesha’s phone number in one of Peter’s old books, Rachel and Faith had been sleeping in a car for weeks.
Alesha had sent her an Oasis Springs address, wired gas money for the trip, and told Rachel to arrive as soon as possible because as a journalist who specialized in exposing local political corruption, she didn’t have time to “wait around for visitors” during an election season. Rachel had been so grateful for the possibility of finally sleeping in a bed again, she’d ignored the rudeness of Alesha’s charity. Once they arrived, Alesha made Faith a sandwich and asked what color she’d like to paint her new bedroom. Later, when she showed Rachel the room that she’d be sharing with her cousin Mia—a home office with two austere twin beds shoved against the wall—the reality of her situation set in. While Alesha had fallen in love with Faith at first sight, Rachel was a burden she had no intention of carrying for long.
Their relationship was combative and vicious, a yearlong stream of shouting matches that Rachel struggled to hide from Faith. Once she got married, Rachel had tried to put the woman behind her. But Matt was obsessed with winning Alesha’s approval. Sometimes Rachel wondered if he’d conflated earning acceptance in the Black community with being accepted by a woman who’d made a career out of dismantling privilege. Like he needed her permission to stop flinching at his own reflection.