He looks up as I approach.
“Hi!” My voice is too bright.
He nods at me. “Hello,” he says, but it comes out more like a question.
“Um, it’s me, Jessica! What are you doing here?”
I’ve seen a lot of bad acting, and I know my performance isn’t going to fool anyone.
He smiles, but his forehead wrinkles.
“Nice to see you . . . How do we know each other again?”
The couple at the next table is clearly eavesdropping. I’m terrible at this. I look down at the patterned rug with its floral design and notice a tiny threadbare patch. Then I make myself meet the man’s gaze again. Here’s the tricky part.
“Didn’t we meet at, ah, Tanya’s wedding a few months ago?” I say.
He shakes his head. “Nope, must have been some other good-looking guy.” But he says it in a self-deprecating way.
I give a dry little laugh.
I can’t just walk away, so I try again.
“Sorry,” I say softly. “The truth is I was at the bar and this guy was bothering me and I just needed to get away.” Maybe the desperation I’m feeling comes through in my eyes, because he stretches out his hand to shake mine.
“I’m Scott.” I can’t place his accent, but it sounds Southern. He gestures to the empty chair across from him. “Want to join me? I was about to get another drink.”
I slide onto the chair and a few seconds later my phone buzzes. I glance down at it on my lap: Well done. Keep going.
I’m supposed to get this polite businessman to flirt with me. So I lean forward and put my elbows on the table, aware that the sticky tape only covers so much.
“Thanks for rescuing me,” I say, looking directly into his eyes.
I can’t sustain the eye contact for long; this feels so artificial. Flirting is fun when it’s natural, and when I’ve chosen the guy, like with Noah the other night.
But this is like dancing without music. And even worse, there’s an audience.
I echo the question David just asked me: “So where are you from?”
As Scott and I continue to talk, I puzzle over why Dr. Shields needs me to have a conversation with him instead of with David. They seem almost interchangeable. It’s like those tests in the backs of magazines: Spot the difference in these two images. But I don’t see any significant differences: late thirties, clean shaven, dark suits.
I can’t relax, knowing Dr. Shields is watching me, but by the time I’ve finished most of my wine, the conversation is flowing surprisingly easily. Scott is a nice guy; he’s from Nashville and he owns a black lab that he clearly adores.
Scott lifts up his glass tumbler and takes the last sip of amber Scotch.
That’s when I realize the difference between the two men, the tiny detail in the pictures that doesn’t match up.
David’s ring finger was bare.
Scott is wearing a thick platinum wedding band.
CHAPTER
TWENTY-TWO
Friday, December 7
She leans forward in her black dress and touches his hand. Her dark hair tumbles forward, nearly obscuring her profile.
A smile spreads across his face.
At what moment does a flirtation become a betrayal?
Is the demarcation line drawn when physical contact occurs? Or is it something more ephemeral, such as when possibilities begin to infuse the air?
Tonight’s setting, the bar at the Sussex Hotel, is where it all began.
But the cast was different.
Thomas stopped by for a drink during that evening, back when our marriage was still pure. He met an old friend from college who was in town for the night and staying at this very hotel. After a few cocktails, the friend explained that he was suffering from jet lag. Thomas insisted he go up to his room while Thomas paid the check. My husband’s generosity has always been one of his many appealing qualities.
The bar was busy, and the service was slow. But Thomas was seated at a comfortable table for two, and he was in no rush. He knew that even though it was barely ten o’clock, the blackout shades would be down in our bedroom and the temperature set to a cool sixty-four degrees.
It was not always this way. In the beginning of our marriage, Thomas’s arrival home was met with a kiss and a glass of wine, followed by engaging conversation on the couch about a recent class lecture, an intriguing client, a weekend getaway we were considering.
But something had shifted during the course of our marriage. It happens in every relationship, when the first heady months yield to a more serene cohabitation. As work exerted more and more demands, the pull of a silk nightgown and crisp, 1,000-thread count Egyptian cotton sheets proved more irresistible than Thomas on some nights. Perhaps this rendered him . . . vulnerable.
The dark-haired woman reached my husband before the server delivered the check. She claimed the empty seat across from him. Their encounter did not end when they left the restaurant; instead, they went to her apartment.
Thomas never said a word about his indiscretion.
Then the errant text landed on my phone: See you tonight, Gorgeous.
Freud postulated that there are no accidents. Indeed, the argument could be made that Thomas wanted to get caught.
I didn’t go looking for this. But she threw herself at me. What guy in my situation could resist? Thomas pleaded during one of our therapy sessions.
It would be so comforting to believe this, that his response wasn’t a referendum on our marriage, but rather a yielding to the hardwired fragility of males.
Tonight the booth in a far corner provides a satisfactory vantage point. The man with the platinum wedding band appears to be falling under your spell, Jessica; his body language has grown more alert since your arrival.
He is not nearly as alluring as Thomas, but he fits the basic profile. In his late thirties, alone, and married.
Was this how Thomas first responded?
The temptation to move closer to the scene now unfolding just two dozen yards away is almost unendurable, but this deviation could invalidate the results.
Although you know that you are being observed, the true subject, the man in the blue shirt, must remain unaware that he is being scrutinized.
Subjects typically modify their behavior when they recognize that they are part of an experiment. This is known as the Hawthorne effect, named after the place where this result was first encountered, the Western Electric’s Hawthorne Works. A basic study to determine how the level of light in their building affected the productivity of laborers revealed that the amount of luminosity made no difference in the employees’ productivity. The workers increased output whenever the light was manipulated, whether from low to high or vice versa. In fact, a change in productivity occurred when any variable was manipulated, which made the researchers postulate that the staff altered their behavior simply because they were aware that they were under observation.
Since subjects have this predisposition, all researchers can do is attempt to factor this effect into the research design.
Your flirtations appear convincing, Jessica. It seems impossible that the target would know he is part of an experiment.
The test must proceed to the next stage.
It is difficult to type the instruction—a wave of nausea briefly delays its transmission—but it is a vitally necessary one.
Touch his arm, Jessica.
The scene with Thomas also followed this progression: a brief caressing of the arm, another round of drinks, an invitation to continue the conversation at the woman’s apartment.