Infidelity
Something was amiss tonight.
This was the only thought playing, over and over, in Lea’s head as she breathlessly exited through the heavy glass doors of her office building. Moonlight bounced off treetops and new, polished sedans, coloring the space a ghostly silver as she strode out purposefully, intently, towards the parking lot nearby. Glancing at the gold-plated watch she’d acquired recently due to her exploits at the office, she pursed her lips.
01:17. Slightly late, but eh, who cares.
She couldn’t yet put a finger on what the issue was. Something work-related? That was unlikely, considering that she’d had her appraisal the previous day, and everything was in order. She was, in fact, on track to win the Employee of The Year award.
Something personal? That should be it…but what?
Lea’s phone buzzed. She took it out, saw who the sender was, and snapped it shut again. She never opened office chats after hours as a matter of principle. It was the only way she could keep her two lives from crashing into each other.
It was while stuffing the phone back in her purse that she realized what was bugging her. Still, just to be sure, she drew out her phone again and swiped through the messages.
There was no message or call from Shane. Not one, in the last sixteen hours. Interesting.
No day went by in Lea’s life without receiving at least three messages from her boyfriend. Five, if she was running late and hadn’t let him know. In their early days together, she used to think it was sweet; the passage of time and the constancy it had engendered steadily turned it into something resembling resentment. That feeling had been exacerbated when once Shane showed up to Lea’s office with his yellow Chevrolet at midnight because she wasn’t picking up calls. He’d proceeded to question security about her whereabouts and wouldn’t leave until she showed up in person to dispel his fears. To this day, that incident was a sore point for both of them.
Lea didn’t think much of it. Her mind was elsewhere, buzzing with the events of the day and from the anticipation of the coming morning. She hardly noticed what she was doing until she swung around in front of the main gate of her house, expertly parked the car in the driveway and rang the doorbell.
She stood at the door for a minute and waited. No answer. She rang the bell again, more insistently this time. As she did, a crow suddenly took flight from a branch near her head, cawing loudly and startling her. She watched its jet-black plumage flap away noisily, disrupting the stillness of the night.
The door clicked and swung open. “Lea,” said a tired voice from the hallway, “it’s you. Come in.”
“Yeah, hi — what happened to you?” exclaimed Lea. “You’re a bloody mess!”
“It’s nothing,” said Shane, waving his hand dismissively. “Take a shower, have something for supper and then we’ll go to bed.” He turned and started limping away towards the living room, a large glass in hand.
“Shane! Stop right there and tell me what’s going on!”
Shane paused. Without turning to face her, he said, “Told ya, it’s nothing.”
“You stand there in a torn shirt, a large bruise on your eye, a bloody nose, a bandaged hand, and you tell me there’s nothing wrong? You’ve got to tell me, baby. This isn’t a joke.”
Shane took a gulp from the glass and staggered slightly as he raised it, leading her into the living room and gesturing her to sit.
“Alright, I’ll tell you.”
Taking a deep breath, he began speaking. “I — I got into a brawl after work. That’s it. That’s all.”
“With whom? Where? Why?” Lea pressed on.
“At Tilbery’s. It was an old colleague, someone I used to know well at my previous office. Decent chap, but a bit too lazy for the boss’s liking. So they fired him and appointed me to his post.
“He was with some men I didn’t know. I assumed they were from his workplace, and I didn’t want to intrude, so I sat at a different table. He called me over…made me sit down beside him, saying that we’d been friends of old, and he bore me no grudges. I thought nothing of it. He bought me one drink after another, toasting the good times gone by, and all…
“I was already a bit tipsy when the conversation turned to politics. Now, this fellow, he had some opinions that he felt very strongly about, and I happened to oppose his views. The argument got a bit too heated, and, long story short, he and his cronies beat me up before the owner threw all of us out of the restaurant.
“That’s not all, though,” continued Shane as Lea stared at him with her mouth open in horror, “as I lay on the sidewalk, groaning from my injuries, he sidled up and whispered into my ear that it wouldn’t be the last time we’d met.
“I then somehow got to the ER, had my wounds dressed, and came home. As a matter of fact, I returned only around an hour ago.”
A long silence fell between them as Lea absorbed the story, blinking at the ceiling and biting her nails. Finally, she looked at Shane again. “Do you want to take this to the cops? Get a restraining order or something?”
“No. No. The law’s more trouble than it’s worth. I’ll work something out for myself.”
“Are you absolutely sure? This guy sounds dangerous.”
“Yes. Don’t involve the cops. I’ll be fine.” He tried to flash a reassuring smile, but one cannot very well pull smiles off with a black eye and a bandaged nose, so it came off as an unconvincing grimace.
“Well, if that is what you want, then…” Lea trailed off. “Tell me one thing, though: why a sudden visit to the restaurant? Didn’t you have a board meeting tonight?”
“It got…postponed. So I thought it’d be better if I got myself a nice, quiet supper before I turned in for the night.”
“I see. Also, just out of curiosity, what’s the name of this ex-colleague of yours?”
“Why would you wanna know anyways?” Shane looked dubiously at Lea. “It’s Alan. Alan Georgewood. Just — ”
Lea had taken a sharp breath when he uttered the name, and Shane noticed this. “Do you know this guy?”
“No — I don’t. At least not personally. But yeah, there’s a guy with that name in my office.”
Shane sat up straight on the sofa, his face draining of what little color the whisky had put into it. Setting the glass down on the table, he leaned forward and asked, “Does he have gray eyes and messy black hair parted down the left side? Does he walk with a slight limp in his right leg?”
Lea nodded stiffly. For some reason, her eyebrows were raised high, like they always got when she was angry. Shane was, however, too wrapped up in his own musings to register this. “That’s the one.”
Shane cradled his head in his hands and let out a slow whistle. “What is his designation? Do you know?”
“Senior Executive Secretary. His office is on the top floor, with those of the top brass of the company’s American branch.”
“Great. Just great. Of all the places he could’ve been, it’s the damn office of my girlfriend, with a higher post to boot. Brilliant.”
“That is not important,” Lea continued in clipped tones, but Shane was still too oblivious to take note. “What is important is what you were doing at Tilbery’s in the evening instead of attending your supposedly scheduled board meeting.”
“What on earth are you on about? Didn’t I mention that my meeting had been postponed? I — ”
“Shane. Please stop with this string of lies. There was no board meeting at all. It was a date at Tilbery’s with Alan’s wife. Am I correct?”
“What the — how did you even — ” began Shane again, but the look of abject shock on his face, which had turned whiter than a sheet, told Lea all she needed to know.
“You had this romantic candlelit dinner planned and set up, Alyssa had arrived, and she was flicking through the menu, commenting on the wonderful ambience, while you stared dreamily at her and wondered what you’d been missing out on since so many years. Suddenly, out of nowhere, Alan arrived, and seeing the two of you, he took you outside the restaurant and beat the living daylights out of you. Then he told you in no uncertain terms to leave his wife alone henceforth. You went to the hospital, came home, and assembled your piteous tale just in time for me to listen to and sympathize with your plight. Tell me to my face that this is not true, and I’ll believe you and apologize to you.” Her breathing was rapid, her face taut, her teeth clenched.
Shane had always been a terrible liar, and the suddenness of being faced with such a stinging account of his own infidelity rendered him unable to speak for a while. He just stared at Lea.
Lea stood up and Shane cowered. She let out a singularly mirthless laugh. “Don’t worry, I’m not gonna beat you up again. I have just one question for you.”
Shane raised his head with trepidation. “Yes?”
“Don’t you wanna know how I know all of this?” enquired Lea, tilting her head to one side and staring at her faithless soon-to-be-ex-boyfriend.
He looked at her blankly.
“It so happens that this game can be played by more than one. You know why Alan was at Tilbery’s tonight?”
Shane shook his head in bewilderment.
Lea laughed that same laugh again. “You see, Alan had gone to Tilbery’s to make a reservation for the two of us. We were to have our first proper date tomorrow night. Your untimely presence in the restaurant today put to rest that little plan of ours. He isn’t happy about it, given that he had to skip an actual meeting tonight to make that reservation. Unlike you.”
