The Life Lucy Knew. Karma Brown

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СКАЧАТЬ was speaking fast now, clearly wanting to get it all out as quickly as possible. It made me dizzy, trying to hold on to all the details as they arrived rapid-fire from her. “He got married two years ago. I wanted to tell you. Said we had to tell you. But, well, it was suggested maybe you weren’t quite ready to hear that.”

      I wondered, flickers of anger moving through me, who had made that suggestion.

      “And honestly, we all thought things would have settled by now. That you would have, you know, remembered everything.” She cringed at this last part, tried to say it quietly as though my memory lapses were less significant if discussed in hushed tones.

      “I guess I shouldn’t be surprised,” I finally said, hating how high and squeaky my voice was. “To be honest, I’m an idiot for not considering that.” Do not cry, Lucy. Do not cry. I dug my fingernails into my palm, relished the pain there because it shifted my focus from the pain elsewhere.

      “No! Don’t say that,” Jenny said, grabbing my one hand still resting on the table. “How could you have known? I should have told you.” Her mouth turned down in a scowl. “It wasn’t right to keep it from you for this long. I’m sorry.”

      I let her hold my hand, pressed my other hand harder against my stomach as I tried to take a few deep breaths. “So, who did he marry?”

      Is this what it feels like to be cheated on? A sense of sickness spread out from my belly, threatened to take over my whole body. It was quickly followed by the trifecta of doom, embarrassment and regret for any decisions that had led me to this place. Whatever I was experiencing in this moment, I never wanted to feel it again.

      “Yeah, so, here’s the other thing.” Jenny gently squeezed my hand a few times. “He married Margot. Margot Hendricks. Well, I guess she’s now Margot London. Unless she didn’t take his name. She probably didn’t take his name. She was kind of a dick about it at your engagement party. Remember?” Jenny looked stricken, her eyes scanning my face as she watched me take in the news. “I’m so sorry, Lucy. I know this has to be a massive shock.”

      My breath came out in a rush, along with my words. “He married Margot? Our Margot?”

      “Yes,” Jenny said with a sigh. “Our Margot is now his Margot.”

      I had met Margot Hendricks at university, in social studies class. Though we’d never been close the way Jenny and I were, she was someone I had looked up to. An outspoken feminist who didn’t only give lip service but actually showed up at protests and marched and made her voice heard. She spoke three languages fluently, thanks to her Swedish mother and Spanish father, and talked of becoming a professor before one day joining the United Nations. Whip smart as she was, Margot Hendricks never made you feel like you were anything but equal to her, even though we all knew she was the brightest of our group. And most relevant to this particular conversation today in the café, she never—in the four years we were at school together—had a boyfriend or even a whiff of a relationship.

      We had stayed in casual touch after graduation, when I went to work and she started grad school, and she had come to Daniel’s and my engagement party—but that was the last time I remembered seeing her.

      “Were we still friends?” I asked Jenny. Margot seemed someone I would have stayed in touch with, even if only through happy birthday posts and the occasional liking of a photo on social media. At least until she married my ex-fiancé.

      Jenny shook her head. “I don’t think so.”

      “You don’t think so?” I asked, frustrated by this noncommittal answer. “Or no?”

      “No. You are not friends. As far as I know.” Jenny and I had been best of friends since we were eighteen years old, and I spoke to her nearly daily. She would know if Margot and I had stayed in contact.

      “Are you friends with her?” She shook her head slowly. “And you still don’t know why Daniel and I broke up?” Was it because of Margot? I wondered.

      Jenny looked surprised, her eyes widening—my tone clearly suggesting I thought she might have omitted that truth, as well. “I swear to you, Lucy, I don’t know why.”

      I nodded. The headache was back and I needed to go home. But I continued to push my brain, trying to grasp on to memories of Margot. How had she ended up with Daniel? They had known each other only casually, and only because he and I were dating.

      What the hell had happened, to all of us, since then?

       11

      “You know, I’ve never had sex in the water,” Lucy said to Daniel, shifting her body between his legs and leaning back against his chest, the hot water in the bathtub pushing up the sides, threatening to spill over the edge. There were pink rose petals floating on the surface of the water, the heady floral scent enveloping them, seeping into their pores. Two glasses of red wine, nearly empty, were on the tub’s ledge. Daniel wrapped his arms around her, kissed the side of her face, her outstretched neck. She shivered and goose bumps prickled across her exposed arms.

      “Really?” he murmured, still nibbling her neck. “How did I not know this?”

      She shrugged against him. “You don’t know everything about me,” she said, smiling back at him. “I still have some secrets.”

      “I’m sure you do,” Daniel said. “This revelation is giving me so many—” He stopped talking to take his mouth lower, onto the delicate skin of her collarbone. Lucy closed her eyes, felt the way his body changed under hers and wished they had more time.

      In about an hour a room full of their closest friends and family would toast their engagement with champagne and far-too-pricy appetizers, and choosing this bath over quick showers had already guaranteed they were thirty minutes behind schedule. “So, so many ideas.”

      “Oh, yeah? Like what?” Her heart beat quickly. She knew they needed to get out of the bath and into party clothes, but she didn’t want to. Not quite yet. Lucy moved one of Daniel’s hands lower, until it sank under the water and settled between her legs. “Maybe something like this?”

      “Exactly what I had in mind,” Daniel murmured, moving his hand with precision, the gentle pressure and warm water a delicious combination. She sucked in a breath, opened her legs wider so they pressed against the sides of the bathtub, her left kneecap connecting hard with the overhanging faucet. Later, visible because of her above-the-knee cocktail dress, a crescent-shaped bruise would form on her knee, but the pain barely registered now because of what Daniel was doing to her. “I think this will get us in a more celebratory mood, don’t you?”

      She couldn’t speak, was too focused on what was building between her thighs, throughout the rest of her body. As his fingers became more purposeful, she arched against him and moaned, no longer caring about the water that now splashed over the edge of the tub. Afterward, she lay breathless against him, eyes closed. “You were right,” she murmured. “I definitely feel like celebrating now.”

      “Good,” he said, his mouth close to her ear. “But if we’re already late, why not a few minutes more? We could do something about your bucket list right now.” He slapped his palm down on the water’s surface gently, causing a few ripples. “We have water, and I’m sort of an expert.”

      “An expert?” Lucy laughed, twisted her neck so she could look at СКАЧАТЬ