The days after were quieter than I expected. He did not call. He did not send flowers, though he sent one message on the third day, a short apology that I read twice and did not answer. Lena came over and we ate dinner and she did not gloat. My mother called every other day to check in. I began to sleep again, and the sleeping felt like a kind of recovery.
But there was one thing I had not accounted for. Renee called me on the fifth day. I don't know how she got my number, but she had it, and she left a voicemail, and the voicemail said she wanted to talk.
I met her in a park near her office. She was taller up close than she had seemed from my car. She was polite and nervous and direct.
"You're the woman he's been seeing," she said.
"Yes. I'm sorry."
"You didn't know about me."
"I di
