Aaron turned. His dark eyes were wet and furious and tired in equal measure. "You hurt me in public the second Lily said he already picked her up. You hurt me the second the teacher asked if we changed the list. You hurt me every month you answered his texts while I thought our marriage was the place we told the truth."
Simone stood. The camel cardigan hung open. "I know."
"Do you love him."
The question hung between them like a wire.
Simone's mouth trembled. "I don't know how to answer that without making it sound simpler than it is."
"Try."
"I love you," she said. "I have loved you through Lily's birth and your father's funeral and the year you worked seventy-hour weeks and the year I almost quit my firm. What I felt with Isaiah was not a replacement. It was a door I opened because I was lonely inside a life that looked, from the outside, complete. That is not an excuse. It is the only accurate sentence I have."
Aaron sat down in the chair where he had laid his jacket. He put his face in his hands. For a long time the only sound in the room was the HVAC whispering through the vent and, faintly, downstairs, the cartoon Lily had turned on too loud.