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“No, that was before my time.”

“Well, one day Beck helped me make a virtual mouse. I got really excited; when I went home I kept messing around with it, and I figured out some things on my own. It was the first time I did any creative programming by myself. The mouse was white, and I turned it blue; it was cruising around as though it was on wheels, and I made the arms and legs move—a few simple tricks like that. The next time I saw Beck, I showed her and she was so pleased. She let me put the mouse into the Museum, and she programmed a home and some tunnels behind walls for it, so it could run around and taunt Isadora. It was called Blue Mousie, and that became my programming alias. When we started over in Detroit, Blue Mousie had to vanish, too.” Nadia sighs. “Here is where I made the mistake. A few weeks ago, I started teaching my younger daughter how to code. My oldest isn’t interested, she’s a skateboarder and wants to be outdoors all the time, but Ami wants to make movies, and I was showing her how to animate. And I resurrected Blue Mousie, to show her my own first try. I sent Blue Mousie into our apartment and let her run around for a while—not long, maybe five minutes? She wasn’t even the exact Blue Mousie that Isadora would have known; she was eight or ten iterations along, but she was on the Interstices for five minutes, and that left a trace, and that trace must be what Isadora followed. She knew Blue Mousie was me.”

I nod. “Do you know someone named Oliver? Chinese guy? Long hair, dresses oddly?”

“No,” Nadia says. “Should I?”

“Isadora came here to deliver a message for Alba, from Oliver. I’ve met him; I thought he was a friend. I can’t figure out how he knew about you, unless Alba told him.”

“That must be it,” Nadia says. “I would have thought Beck sent Isadora. No?”

“I don’t know. I wish Alba was here,” I add, trying not to sound as miserable as I feel. “She might know what the hell is going on.”

“Do you know when she’ll be back?”

“No.”

“I’d love to see Alba,” Nadia says wistfully, “but I think I’d better go home.”

“Sure,” I say. “That’s a good idea. Do you know if you have a car nearby?”

She does her spooky thing with the Interstices and says that she does. It’s not raining as hard as it was earlier. I take an umbrella and usher Nadia to her car, which is parked around the corner. Her purse is sitting on the hood, full of rain. She tips the water out of it without comment and climbs into the back seat.

As she’s about to shut the door she says, “Thanks, Zach.”

“Goodbye, Nadia,” I say. “Take care.”

The car pulls away. I watch until it turns onto Ridge Avenue and disappears. She doesn’t look back.

I go inside. Now I’m stuck with myself and my new knowledge: I’m the other husband. I’d thought I was the husband. But no. I don’t want to imagine them together, but images keep intruding. It’s the idea of them being married: somehow there’s domesticity involved, somewhere Alba and Oliver have a life together that equals the life Alba and I have here. Now my life seems not just lonely but foolish and pathetic. Where is Alba now? Is she in another time, or just elsewhere? Is she with him? If she had to choose between us . . . I can’t imagine that going my way. I’m sure she’d pick another time traveler over boring me. In the kitchen the lunch dishes are still in the sink. I squirt dish soap at them and begin to run the hot water. I wash the plates and silverware, stack it all neatly in the drainer. I want to throw everything on the floor, I want to destroy the house, just pulverize it all and leave. But where would I go? I imagine Alba returning to our ruined house and feeling terrible. I pick up a wet plate and imagine opening my hand and letting it smash on the floor. I put it back in the drainer and feel stupid. How could I not have known?

I think about things Oliver has told me about his wife (his wife) over the years, and now I realize that he was trying to prepare me for this without ever quite telling me that his wife was my wife. I remember things I’ve said that made him uncomfortable (I really want you to meet Alba, you have so much in common is the least of it), and I burn with shame at my own obliviousness. I wonder what time frame this marriage is happening in—is this some future where I’m dead and Alba has remarried? This notion at first gives me hope, but then it seems too convenient; wishful thinking. I remember certain habitual deflections of Alba’s: her stories are sometimes too detailed and other times embarrassingly shambolic, as though she’s editing them as she goes along. I see the gaping hole she’s been avoiding all this time, the space that her other husband occupies, her other life that she can’t tell me about, won’t tell me . . . How much of Alba’s life is hidden from me? How much of what I think I know is lies?

The rain pelts down again. I can’t bear to be alone in this house; I even wish that Nadia hadn’t left. Then I remember Isadora saying, Beck is my mother. I put on my jacket, grab my keys and am out the door.

Over at Clare and Beck’s, Clare seemed startled to see me.

“Is Alba here?”

“No,” she says. “Hey, are you okay?”

“Not really,” I tell her. “I actually came to see Beck. I just had a very strange experience.”

“Come on in,” Clare says. She takes my jacket. I leave my shoes by the door. I always feel like a teenager here. Clare fusses over me, offers me beverages, snacks. I decline. In the kitchen, Clare and I stand in front of a camera, the buzzer sounds, Clare opens the basement door and we go downstairs.

Beck sits next to a floor lamp in her otherwise dimly lit island of empty space surrounded by worktables full of monitors, keyboards, VR headsets and other equipment recently made obsolete by bioware. It’s warm down here from the heat coming off the servers. I can smell solder. Beck has a small prayer book in her hands, which she closes and puts aside when she sees us.

“Hey, Zach,” Beck says. We hug briefly. Beck gestures toward the sofa and pulls her office chair over. We all sit. I wonder why we don’t just go upstairs, but I don’t ask. Beck says, “What’s up?”

“I met a woman today who insisted that she was your daughter, Beck.”

Beck and Clare exchange glances. “Tell us more,” Beck says.

“She said her name was Isadora. She was looking for Alba,” I say. “She had a message from someone named Oliver.”

“A human person said this?” Clare asks.

I show them the message. “Does that date mean anything to you?”