Page 5 of Pretender

Not budging.

I rub my hands on a kitchen towel, then I grab the lid firmly and get into a good opening position.

And—go.

No luck.

Warm water?

Nope.

Knife under the lid’s edge?

It slips up, and I hit my knuckles on the side of the jar.

“Pickle-fuck!”

I use all my strength to brute-force this jar from man-made hell open. But it’s no use.

Letting out a long sigh, I slump. Defeated by the pickles yet again. The rain thundering on the conservatory is deafening as it reverberates off the art-covered walls and hardwood floors.

“Screw you, then,” I mutter to the mini gherkins.

Crackers it is.

I fill a large glass of wine—a tad more than a normal amount, but something has to make up for the lack of pickle—and saunter upstairs. Henry would never have let me leave our kitchen with a glass of red. But this is my house, and I’ll bloody well drink my wine and eat my crumbly crackers anywhere I want to.

I reach the landing and pass the shoe room on my way to the library (aka the second bedroom), where I usually spend the brief hour that’s left of a day after work. This is my little space, my slice of time carved out just for me. A comfy reading chair, a glass of wine, and a book. Or business planning, in tonight’s case.

My friends say I work too much. That there’s more to life, etcetera. But I’ve got something to fight for that makes it meaningful to me. It’ll be worth the sacrifice.

My company. My team.

I can do this without Henry—I know I can.

Without relying on anyone. Me, my skills, and a healthy dose of determination.

Just me.

I stare at the words on the tablet, trying to remember what I was meant to be doing.

Maybe I can call my friends now? I glance up at the clock on the wall; it’s nearly 10 p.m., which means it’s close to 5 p.m. in New York. Jamie and Sophie will still be at work, or maybe on the train home. They’ll soon be laughing and talking while cooking together, reading books on the couch after putting their kids to sleep.

Hm.

I grab my phone from the table; I’ll listen to their voice note again instead.

Sophie’s voice fills the library. “Hey, sorry we missed your call this weekend. We’re just back from a trip to the city. We stayed at a hotel, took the kids to the zoo, and I can definitely not recommend that with a six- and three-year-old when it’s this hot. And there were so many tourists. Bloody hell.”

“Boring, Soph,” Jamie butts in, exaggerating her American accent, and I laugh just as I did the first time I listened to this. “What did you do this weekend? Not just work, right? Please tell us you called to brag about all the vitamin D you’re getting, and you know I don’t mean the sun.”

“Oh my god, Jamie,” Sophie breathes. “Stop it.”

“It’s been almost a year, Soph. Linnea, tell us there are new penises.”

“If you miss penises so much, why did you marry me?”

There’s giggling, and Jamie’s probably poking Sophie, tickling her for being sassy.