I told her everything.
The sister.
The letter.
Diane’s confession.
All of it.
Tessa listened without interrupting, which was unusual for her.
When I finished, she was quiet for a moment.
“So he wasn’t cheating,” she said.
“No.”
“He was hiding something, but not that.”
“Not that.”
She turned the coffee cup in her hands.
“How do you feel?”
“I don’t know.
Angry, still.
But it’s a different kind of angry now.
It’s not — it’s not the same as thinking he betrayed you.
It’s more like finding out the floor plan of a house you’ve lived in for years is completely different from what you thought.”
“That’s a very calm way to describe it.”
“I’m not calm.
I’m just tired.”
Tessa nodded.
“Can I say something without you getting mad at me?”
“Probably not.
Say it anyway.”
“He should have told you.
About Claire, about the test, about his mother — all of it.
The fact that he was trying to protect you doesn’t make the silence okay.”
“I know.”
“But.” She paused.
“The man I watched sit outside that hospital for three days when you lost the baby — that man was not performing anything.
He was not pretending.”
I looked at my coffee cup.
