Jackie blinks at Nasira. “You mean Greenbrier.”
Nasira smiles. “That’s it.” She takes a half step toward Jackie, a signal she wants Jackie to move aside so she can leave.
Jackie plants herself more firmly, as if Nasira might make a running tackle. “Greenbrier.” Jackie shakes her head, perplexed that her brain is bothering to search for a different conclusion. There is none. Harlan avoids travel, but makes an exception for work weekends at Greenbrier Resort perhaps twice a year. Jackie had been dating him for two years before she received her first invitation.
Nasira stands patiently in front of Jackie. She doesn’t shuffle her feet or play with her hair. She waits.
Jackie cannot hold back any longer. “With Professor Crispin?”
It’s none of her business. She knows that. But if Nasira is flustered or offended by Jackie’s intrusive question, she hides it beautifully. “I don’t see how it matters.”
“No. No, you wouldn’t.” Jackie is torn between wanting to clear the air, to find out what Nasira knows about her history with Harlan, and wanting to chase Nasira out of the building. Her curiosity wins out, per usual. “Nasira, I honestly didn’t mean to pry. I couldn’t have known you were going to Greenbrier.”
Nasira purses her lips, the first signal that she is perturbed by Jackie’s line of questioning.
Jackie is compelled to explain. “Maybe Harlan hasn’t said, but he and I had a relationship. For five years.” Jackie examines Nasira’s expression, judging whether this is news and whether to say more. It’s like conversing with a concrete slab. “Because of our history, I’m overly sensitive, I guess. I shouldn’t be.” She should stop right there—perhaps she’s already said too much—but Nasira’s stonewalling is provocative. Jackie fears she won’t stop talking until Nasira opens up; the confusion and anger she’s been harboring overwhelm her better angels. “It’s been such a shock, starting with you as the surprise dinner guest . . .”
Nasira’s face reddens slightly as she nods, not in assent, but with resolve. “And you with your husband.” She allows that to sink in for a moment before stepping forward.
Jackie backs into the hall and turns away so Nasira cannot see her shame and regret. She exhales sharply, gathering herself, and turns back to wish Nasira a good weekend, but she is gone.
Jackie returns to her office. It’s only five thirty, and she ought to get to work on revising a paper for the Journal of Child Development, but as soon as she opens the document, she knows she’s too unsettled. Instead, she replays the conversation with Nasira and realizes the woman never confirmed she was going away with Harlan. He could have recommended Greenbrier to her, which is more plausible given his history. The more Jackie reflects, the more she sees how ridiculous it was to jump to the conclusion that Harlan would travel with Nasira so soon. Unfortunately, this revelation also makes Jackie look even more like a self-involved, jealous, meddling jackass.
Excellent work, Dr. Strelitz.
She packs up her laptop and tidies her desk. There’s no point in beating herself up over her missteps. All she can do is vow to be more gracious, generous, and professional going forward. Right now what she wants most is to go home—to her husband.
Jackie dumps her bag by the front door and hurries into the kitchen. Miles is at the stove, stirring the contents of a pot. Jackie rises on her toes to give him a kiss.
“Yum,” she says.
“Me or the risotto?”
“Both of you. What’s going in it?” Risotto is Miles’s signature dish. In fact, it’s pretty much his only dish, with infinite variations. Jackie is not complaining.
“Lots of butter, lots of Parmesan, and roasted shrimp.”
“I had all the kale in the world for lunch.”
“This is the antidote.”
She kisses him again, his cheek this time. “Thank you. Want me to take a turn stirring?”
“Not a chance.” He twists his wrist to show his bracelet, a medical ID and fitness tracker combo. For his birthday last June, Jackie gave him this sleek platinum upgrade from the standard medical emergency bracelet that warned of his penicillin and sulfa drug allergies. “Vigorous stirring counts as steps.”
Jackie laughs.
He tips his head toward an open bottle of red on the opposite counter. “Pour for us?”
“With great enthusiasm.” She washes her hands, pours the wine, and hands Miles his. “To husbands at home.”
He smiles, touches her glass, and sips. “If only the money would fly to me—or at least the clients.”
“If only.”
Miles is leaving again in the morning for a swing through North Carolina colleges, and Jackie wishes he could stay. Although she hasn’t confessed to Miles that she’s still entangled in the Harlan-Nasira business, he might be worried about just that. Maybe that’s what the risotto is about, shoring up the marriage, reminding her how it feels to be loved and cared for. She tastes the sour pang of guilt at the back of her mouth and considers telling him how sorry she is, reassuring him that she’ll detach herself from Harlan and Nasira and return her focus to their marriage. But bringing it up would only ruin this moment in which they are attuned to each other, and she decides to leave the apologies and promises for later.
They drink wine while Miles stirs. Jackie slips off her shoes and asks him about the upcoming weekend, about the clients he hopes to meet with and possibly sign. He’s so animated in talking about his work, about his dreams for these talented young men, that she forgets about her postdoc and her ex. The fact that Miles is not an academic is consistently refreshing, and part of what drew her to him from the start. He respects her work and admires her intelligence and ambition, but appreciates the other worlds that exist beyond campus boundaries. After Harlan and his laser focus on her career, Jackie is grateful for Miles’s ability to swing open the windows of her stuffy academic fortress, even for a view of the arena of professional sports. In Jackie’s experience, universities are conservative—not in the political sense, but in their resistance to change—and it’s easy to become insulated. Jackie loves so much about Miles, but perhaps his openness and broad-mindedness most of all. He can talk to anyone and is always the same person when he does.
After the meal, when the wine is finished, she puts the dishes in the sink and returns to the table. She slides onto his lap and wraps her arms around his neck.
“Fancy a tumble?” It’s an old joke between them, the use of catchphrases from each other’s cultures.
He kisses her, slow and sweet, then touches her cheek. “Absolutely.” His blue eyes sparkle. “More steps.”
She smiles as a thread of warmth unravels down her spine. As she takes her husband’s hand and leads him upstairs, she thinks, Men. Women. Sometimes it really is this simple.
CHAPTER 6
Jackie startles at the knock on her lab office door and looks up to see Vince Leeds, the departmental IT guy. She’s been so engrossed in her work, she forgot he was installing new video cameras in the research rooms.
“Didn’t mean to scare you, Jackie.”
He yanks one sleeve down over his wrist, then the other, self-conscious about his eczema. Jackie can see he’s having a flare-up from the sores on his neck.