Chapter 3: Everything He Left Out
I set the photo on the coffee table between us.
Face up.
Graham looked at it for a long moment.
He didn't reach for it.
"Start from the beginning," I said.
"All of it."
He exhaled slowly.
"Anna and I were together for four years.
We got engaged.
We put an offer on a house — that house." He nodded at the photo.
"The sale went through eight months before I met you."
"So the house we're saving for—"
"Is not the first time I've tried to buy it." He rubbed the back of his neck.
"When Anna left, I couldn't go through with the purchase alone.
I pulled out of the contract.
Lost the deposit.
The house went back on the market."
I stared at him.
"And now we're saving to buy the same house."
"I should have told you."
"Yes," I said.
"You should have."
He finally looked up.
"I didn't know how.
Every time I tried, it felt like I was dragging you into something that had nothing to do with you."
"It has everything to do with me, Graham.
I'm your wife.
I've been putting money aside every month for a house that used to belong to your ex-fiancée's future."
The word landed between us.
He didn't correct it.
I reached into the box and lifted out the next item.
A folded piece of paper.
I opened it.
It was a lease agreement.
The address was different — an apartment across town.
The name on the lease was Graham's.
The date was fourteen months ago.
Three months after our wedding.
"What is this?" My voice came out quieter than I intended.
Graham's jaw tightened.
"That's not what it looks like."
"Then tell me what it looks like, because from where I'm sitting it looks like you signed a lease on a separate apartment while we were married."
"I signed it for Anna." He said it fast, like ripping off a bandage.
"She called me.
She was in trouble — her landlord had evicted her and she had nowhere to go.
I co-signed so she could get the place.
That's all."
"That's all." I set the paper down carefully.
"You co-signed an apartment for your ex-fiancée three months into our marriage and didn't tell me."
"I knew you'd react like this."
The room went very still.
"Graham," I said.
"How I'm reacting right now is the calmest I'm going to be about this.
So I need you to think carefully before you say another word that sounds like this is my fault."
He opened his mouth.
Closed it.
I looked back into the box.
There was one more thing at the bottom.
A phone.
An old one — a model I didn't recognize, the kind people keep as a backup.
I pressed the power button.
The screen lit up.
It had a charge.
Someone had kept it charged.
I looked at Graham.
His face had gone the color of old paper.
"Whose phone is this?" I asked.
He didn't answer.
May you like
I turned the screen toward him so he could see what I was already reading.
The last message in the thread was dated six days ago.
