Page 70 of Wrong Mail

I nod. "I wouldn't mind if I knew where all the pieces were."

Julia laughs.

Chris reappears near the bar, scowling at someone as he makes his way back.

I tip my head toward him. Julia stiffens.

"Sorry about him," she says quietly. "He's in a foul mood. Something to do with money he lost day trading. I wouldn't mind, except it was my money."

"Oh, Julia."

"I know. I'm a fool. I shouldn't have brought him."

"You didn't have a choice."

"No." She squeezes my hand, quick, then lets go. "I'd better get back to it."

That is the whole of what passes between us.

There's no signal in it. She doesn't pull me aside or lower her voice to tell me there's something I have to hear. On the night of my thirty-ninth birthday, Julia is exactly what she appears to be. A woman spending the evening keeping a dangerous man level among a crowd of people.

As the night unfolds, the cake comes out.

That’s followed by the singing, the awful stretched horror of it, and Yvette filming every second. I blow out a single candle because Lil decided one was elegant. David finds me through the crowd, puts his arm around me, and kisses my temple. "Happy birthday, Mal," he says into my hair.

For one second, it’s real.

He’s my husband. I’m glad. I lean into the size of him and let it be true.

Then Chris says, from too close and too loud, "Go on. Kiss her properly. Show us how it's done. Julia knows you can do better than that."

And the evening tips over.

It happens fast. With Chris on my right and my good ear turned toward the terrace, the first thing I catch is David going still against me, the same way he did when I questioned him about the gun.

Then his arm comes off my shoulders.

"Looks like you've had enough to drink, Chris," David says. "How about you get an Uber home."

“Oh, yeah, you would love that." Chris is swaying and grinning. His good looks have gone slack with drink, and wine slops over his knuckles. "I see how it is. You want me off the property. Out of the way." He turns to everyone, opening his arms to make sure they’re listening. “You all know. Don't you? You've all seen it. Doctor Grant and his little runs down to my place when I'm out of town." He points the glass at Julia and the wine goes over the rim. "Ask her. Go on. Ask Julia where the good doctor's been."

The terrace falls into the silence of forty people deciding at once not to have heard.

“Enough, Chris," Julia says, sharply. It's the careful voice I recognize, the one I've used in my own kitchen. "We're going home."

"Nonsense. Tell the truth. He's been in our house." Chris isn't looking at her. He's looking at David, and something has curdled in his face. The drink, the humiliation, whatever else lives in him, all of it turning into something dangerous. "Haven't you, Doc? While I'm gone, you've been cozying up to my gal. Of course, if anyone asked, you were just walking the dog, isn't that right?"

“How dare you.” David steps forward, jabbing a finger at Chris. He doesn't raise his voice, and that's somehow worse. I can hear what it costs him to stay calm. But it's too late. Everyone has heard the accusation. "You don't get to stand here at my wife's birthday and make accusations like that. Especially after what you've done to Julia."

My stomach sinks.

It’s the wrong thing to say, and yet the truest thing anyone has said all night. That’s why it lands the way it does. It's David's way of throwing a punch without getting physical. Not that he would have any trouble with Chris. Angry confrontations are nothing new to him at the hospital.

But that kind of confrontation requires de-escalation, and David has just thrown fuel on the fire.

“What did you say?” Chris asks.

Julia tries to intervene, but he brushes her off like she’s nothing more than a fly. He starts toward David.