He finally looked up with that expression he always wore when I was about to inconvenience him with questions.
“Why do you need my sister at your high school reunion instead of your actual wife?”
He sighed like I was being exhausting, like I was the one who just said something insane over pasta.
“Because I told everyone I married her,”
he said.
“Back when we first started dating, my buddies met her once at that barbecue and they assumed she was my girlfriend. I never corrected them.”
I stared at him. I kept staring at him. I was waiting for the part where he laughed and said he was kidding, where this became some weird joke I didn’t find funny but could at least categorize as humor.
That part never came.
“You told your friends you married my sister,” I repeated slowly, making sure I understood the words coming out of his mouth.
“It’s not a big deal,” he said, picking his fork back up like we were done discussing this. “It was easier than explaining. And honestly, babe, you know how those guys are. They’re shallow. They remember Nikki being hot and they’ve spent ten years thinking I locked that down. I can’t show up with someone different and explain that actually I married the other one.”
The other one.
I’d graduated top of my class at law school. I’d made partner at thirty-three. I’d bought us this house, the cars in our driveway, and every piece of furniture Damen was currently sitting on. And I was the other one.
