There’s a small crowd waiting for the elevator, and she decides to take the stairs to her office on the third floor. She’s unlocking the door when Elisabeth Mitchell, the dean of the department, steps out of her office three doors down.
“Annie,” she says. “What are you doing here?”
“I have office hours,” Annie says.
“I know, I mean . . .” Dr. Mitchell hesitates. “I saw the article about Sam.”
“Oh, that,” Annie says.
“You don’t need to be here,” Dr. Mitchell says. “You could have—”
“My dad was from a long line of industrious Irish Catholics,” Annie says. “I’ve learned to work through my pain.”
“Well, if you need some time . . .”
“Thank you,” Annie says, stepping into her office, keeping her door slightly ajar as she checks the clock. One hour. She can do this. She sits at the desk and takes out the sandwich she bought before class, at the café in the student union. A pressed turkey with Swiss cheese and extra jalape?os, the same sandwich she gets before office hours each week. It’s a habit of hers, ordering the same thing again and again. It drives Sam crazy. Back in New York, when they first started dating, they’d meet at the same restaurant at least twice a week: Frankies 457, a block away from her apartment. Sam would stare at her, incredulous, as she placed the same order, every time—sausage cavatelli and a green salad.
She can picture the bewildered expression on his face. “You’re not going to try anything else?”
“I know what I like, and I’m okay asking for it,” she told him. “Get used to it.”
But today the sight of the sandwich turns her stomach, and she drops it into the trash can and digs for her phone in her bag. She opens FaceTime and calls Maddie, who answers right away. Her brown curls are pulled into a bun, and she’s wearing earphones.
“What are you doing?” Annie asks.
“About to go for a jog,” Maddie says, and just the sound of her voice calms Annie’s nerves.
“You hate jogging.”
“I know I do, but everyone at the restaurant’s doing some stupid 5K, and— Wait.” Maddie stops walking. “What happened? I can tell by your face.”
Annie stands and shuts her office door. “Some bills came for Sam,” she whispers.
“What do you mean, bills?” Maddie asks.
“Credit cards.” The first arrived yesterday: Chase Sapphire Preferred, maxed to its credit limit of $75,000. She was stunned, but tried not to read too much into it. The move, the new house—she knew things were adding up. But when she checked the mailbox earlier today, she found another: Capital One, with a $35,000 balance.
“What the hell did he buy?” Maddie asks.
“What didn’t he buy is more like it.” It’s ridiculous, what he spent on things. She sat in her car in the faculty parking lot, going through the list. Three hundred for running shoes. Five grand for a rug for his office. Six coffee cups at $34 apiece.
“Did you know he had these cards?” Maddie asks Annie.
“No, but Sam’s a forty-year-old man. He’s going to have credit cards. We haven’t joined our money.” She paces the office, eight steps back and forth, then collapses in the chair, hit by a sudden wave of exhaustion. “I guess this explains why he was so distracted.”
“Distracted?” Maddie says. “You didn’t tell me that.”
“We moved to a new town and he’s starting a practice while his mother deteriorates,” Annie says, defensively. “It would have been weirder if he wasn’t distracted.”
“Annie, do you think—” Maddie stops, her face pinched.
“What?” Annie says.
“I don’t know. It’s weird he didn’t tell you this.”
Annie swallows a rising lump in her throat. “I know it is,” she manages, hearing steps in the hallway outside. She waits, and they pass by. “I have to go,” she says, composing herself. “I’m at work. I’ll call you later.” She hangs up, opens her door a few inches, and returns to her desk, where she opens one of the books she’d assigned for the next class. It’s no use: thirty seconds later she grabs her bag from the floor, reaches inside for the bills, and scans the items again. “Sam, you idiot,” she whispers. “Seven hundred dollars on steak knives?”
“Dr. Potter?” A student is standing at the door. Annie hunts for her name. “Sorry, the door was open.”