Something Borrowed (21 page)

We move over to my bed. He sits on the edge, and I am crosslegged

beside him.

"I just want you to know," he says, staring intently into my eyes,

"that I would never do this if I didn't deeply care for you."

"I know," I say.

"And I'm you know taking this whole thing very seriously."

"Let's not talk about it until the Fourth," I say quickly.

"That was

the deal."

"Are you sure? Because we can talk about it now if you want."

"I'm sure. Positive."

And I am positive. I am afraid of any leads he might give me about

our future. I can't bear the thought of losing him, but have yet to

consider what it would be like to lose Darcy. To have done

something so huge and all-encompassing and wrong and final to

my best friend.

He tells me that it scares him how much I mean to him, do I know

how much I mean to him?

I nod. I know.

He kisses me again, more intensely this time. Then I experience

my first truly unbelievable make-up sex.

The next morning Hillary visits me on the way to her office. She

asks me how my date went. I tell her it was great. She plops down

in one of my guest chairs, placing her bottle of Poland Spring

water and her sesame bagel on my desk. She leans back and slams

my door with her elbow. Her face is all business.

It turns out that Marcus did indeed opt for the no-name Italian

restaurant in his neighborhood. The same no-name Italian

restaurant that for whatever reason also struck Hillary's fancy last

night. A city of millions, and Marcus and Hillary were seated two

tables apart, over identical plates of ravioli on a random Monday

night. Welcome to Manhattan, a smaller island than you'd ever

think.

"The only thing you didn't lie to me about," Hillary says, shaking

her finger at me, "is that Marcus was, in fact, on a date.

Just not

with your lying ass although the girl resembled you in the mouth

and chin region."

"Are you mad?"

"Not mad, no."

"What then?"

"Well, for one, I'm shocked. I didn't think you were capable of

such deceit." She looks impressed by this revelation.

"But I'm also

hurt that you feel you can't confide in me. I like to think of myself

as your best friend not some figurehead, a throwback from your

high school days your present-day best friend. Which brings me

to my next point" she says knowingly. She waits for me to fill the

silence.

I look at my stapler, then my keyboard, and then my stapler again.

Although I have pictured getting busted many times, it is always

Darcy doing the busting. Because after all, if you're going to let

your mind wander, go for the worst scenario, not some intermediate level of doom. It's like worrying about your

boyfriend getting into a drunk driving accident you don't think

about him hitting a mailbox and splitting his lip. You picture lilies

beside an open casket.

So I've had images of Darcy catching us. Not caught-in-bednaked-

in-the-act kind of busted that is too far-fetched, particularly in a doorman building but something more subtle.

Darcy stops by unexpectedly, and Jose sends her up without

buzzing me first (mental note to self: tell him never to do that). I

answer the door assuming it is only the Chinese delivery guy

bringing cartons of wonton soup and egg rolls to Dex and me, as

we are understandably famished from our escapades (mental note

to self, number two: always look through the peephole first). And

there she stands, her big eyes taking it all in.

Speechless in her

horror. She flees the scene. Dex dashes into the hall in his

gingham boxers, bellowing her name, like Marlon Brando in A

Streetcar Named Desire.

Next scene: Darcy amid cardboard boxes packing her CDs with

the ever-supportive Claire offering her Kleenexes at every turn. At

least Dex would get all the Springsteen albums, even Greetings

From Asbury Park, which someone had given Darcy as a gift. Most

of the books would stay, too, as Darcy brought few books into the

union. Just a few glossy coffee table numbers.

I read once ironically, in one of Darcy's magazines that you

should engage in this visualization exercise when you're having an

affair, that you should imagine getting caught and the grim

aftermath. These images should snap you back to reality, get you

thinking straight, make you realize what it is you'd be losing. Of

course, the article presupposed a lust-driven affair, and the article

was not directed at the unattached person in the triangle, but

rather the participant in the committed relationship.

Then again,

the article also assumed that the third party was not the maid of

honor in the upcoming wedding of the other two persons. Clearly

our circumstances do not fit your typical adulterous mold.

In any event, I don't know exactly how I'd feel if Darcy busted us

and my friendship with her ended. I can't really get there

mentally. The fact is, Darcy is one hundred percent clueless, and

she and Dex are still very much engaged. And likely, it will stay

that way; they will get married and she will never discover the

truth about our affair.

Hillary is a different story.

"Well?" she asks.

"Well, what?"

"Who were you really seeing last night? Who really sent you

those?" She points at my roses.

"Someone else."

"No shit."

I swallow.

"Okay, look, I wasn't born yesterday. You get in a fight with Dex at

the Talkhouse, you both clam up when I arrive on the scene. Then

you leave the Hamptons early the next day, all down in the

dumps, with false claims of imminent deadlines I know your

work schedule, Rach, and you had nothing due yesterday. And

then these flowers arrive." She points at my roses, still in full

bloom. "You name Marcus, whom you basically ignored over the

weekend. Which is odd, even if you did decide to play it low-key.

Then you tell me you have a date with Marcus, and I see him out

sans you with another woman!" She finishes her catalog of

evidence with a jubilant smile.

"Was she cute?" I ask.

"The woman?"

"Yeah. Marcus's date."

"Actually, yes, she was quite attractive. As if you care."

She is right I don't.

"Now quit stalling and address my point," she says.

"What point is that?"

"Rachel!"

"It certainly does look bad," I say, still reluctant to confess.

"Rachel. Who do you think I'm going to tell? I'm your friend. Not

Darcy's. Hell, I don't even like her that much"

I pick up my tape dispenser, pull out two inches of tape, and hold

it between my index finger and thumb. For some reason, this is a

harder confession than the one to Ethan. Maybe because it is faceto-face. Maybe because her past has not been as dicey as Ethan's.

"Okay." Hillary tries again. "Let me say the words for you, and you

can just nod your head." Her voice is like that of a mother to a

child.

I nervously play with the tape, wrapping it around my thumb. She

is about to spell it all out, and I have two choices admit or deny.

An admission might be a huge relief. A denial will have to be

accompanied by a suitably indignant expression and a barrage of

"How could you think that? Are you crazy?" et cetera. I am in no

mood for that charade.

"Dex is cheating on Darcy," she says. "With you."

Drum roll.

I raise my chin and return her gaze. Then I nod the smallest of

nods, my head barely moving.

"I knew it!"

I consider telling her that I don't want to talk about it, but in

truth, I do want to talk about it. I want her to tell me that I'm not a

terrible person. I want her to expound upon her earlier statement

that I would be better suited to him than Darcy. And most of all, I

just want to talk about Dex.

"When did this all start?"

"The night of my parry."

She stares at the ceiling for a second and nods as if everything

makes sense now. "Okay, start from the beginning.

Leave nothing

out." She settles into her chair and tears off a piece of her bagel.

"The first time I slept with him was an accident."

"The. first time? You've slept with him? Multiple times?"

I give her a look.

"Sorry, go on. I just can't believe this!"

"Okay. So yes, the night of my party, we were the last two out we

went for drinks, one thing led to another, and we slept together

back at my apartment. It was an accident. I mean, we were both

drunk. I was, anyway."

"Oh, I remember. You were a little bit out of it that night."

"Yeah. I was. But, interestingly, Dex says he wasn't that drunk."

This detail not only shifts the responsibility his way, but

simultaneously makes the genesis of the affair more meaningful.

"So he, what, took advantage of you?"

"No! I didn't mean to imply that I knew what I was doing."

"Okay." She motions for me to go on.

I tell her about waking up the following morning, Darcy's frantic

messages, our panic, and Dexter using Marcus as his alibi. "So

that's it," I say.

"What do you mean, 'that's it'? Clearly not." She gives my roses a

purposeful glance.

"I mean, that was it for a while. We both felt regretful and '

"How regretful?"

"Regretful, Hillary! Obviously!" To myself, I recall that first day,

and my complete lack of penitence. "So that was it. In my mind, it

was over."

"But not in his, right?"

I choose my words carefully and tell her about his Monday call to

me and the things he said. And then everything that happened in

the Hamptons. And about our first sober kiss. The turning-point

kiss. Sleeping with him for the real first time.

She takes another big bite of her bagel. "So is this what? A purely

physical thing? Or do you really like him?"

"I really like him," I say.

She digests this. "So is he going to break off the engagement?"

"We haven't talked about it."

"How can you not talk about it? Wait was that what you were

fighting about in the Talkhouse?"

I tell her that we weren't exactly fighting, but that I was upset

about him having sex with Darcy. Hence the roses.

"Okay. So if he's sorry for sleeping with his fiancee, that sounds

like he's headed in the direction of breaking up with her, right?"

"I don't know. We really haven't discussed it yet."

She looks confused. "When are you going to?"

"We said we'd talk about it around July Fourth."

"Why then?"

"Arbitrary. I don't know."

She takes a swig of water. "Well, you do think he's going to dump

her, right?"

"I don't know. I don't even know if I want that."

She gives me a nonplussed look.

"You are forgetting an important piece of this whole thing, Hillary.

Darcy is my longtime, lifelong friend. And I am her maid of

honor."

She rolls her eyes. "Details."

"You just don't like her."

"She's not my favorite person in the world, but Darcy is not the

point."

"She's a major point, in my opinion. She's my friend.

And besides,

even if she weren't, even if she were a random woman, don't you

think I would have to confront the bad karma aspects of this?"

I wonder why I am arguing against myself.

She straightens in her chair and speaks slowly. "The world is not

that black-and-white, Rachel. There are no moral absolutes. If you

were sleeping with Dex for the sheer thrill of it all, then maybe I'd

worry about your karma. But you have feelings for him. It doesn't

make you a bad person."

I try to memorize her speech. No moral absolutes. That is good

stuff.

"If the tables were turned," she continues, "Darcy would do the

same thing in a heartbeat."

"You think?" I ask, considering this.

"Don't you?"

"Maybe you're right," I say. Darcy does, after all, have quite a

history of taking. I give, she takes. That's the way it has always

been.

Until now.

Hillary smiles and nods. "I say go for it."

More or less what Ethan said. That's two votes for me, zero for

Darcy.

"I'm going to keep seeing him as much as I can. We'll see what

happens," I say, realizing that just "seeing what happens" is my

version of "going for it."

Darcy and I are flying home to Indianapolis for Annalise's baby

shower, and I am stuck in the dreaded middle seat.

Darcy was

assigned the middle, but of course she wangled her way into my

window seat, saying that if she can't look out the window she gets

airsick. I wanted to tell her that this principle of car travel does

not apply in a plane, but I didn't bother, just surrendered to her

demand. In the past I would have done so mindlessly, but now I

feel resentful. I think of Ethan and Hillary and their recent

statements about Darcy. She is selfish, plain and simple. And this

is the truth, regardless of my feelings for Dex.

A forty-something man with a crew cut has the aisle seat to my

left. He has glued the entire length and width of his right forearm