Chapter 4

Sarah was barely through the door of their quiet New England home when Eleanor Thompson swept in.

Unannounced.

"Mark called. He said you were upset about something at the clinic."

Eleanor' s eyes, sharp and critical, scanned Sarah, then the takeout containers Sarah had just placed on the counter.

"Still ordering in, Sarah? No wonder you two have had trouble. A man needs home-cooked meals. Builds a strong family."

The implication was clear, another barb about their struggles to conceive.

Sarah bit back a retort. She didn't have the energy.

"And your family... well, you don't have much of one to set an example, do you?" Eleanor continued, her voice dripping with condescension.

Sarah thought of her own mother, emotionally distant, their relationship a fragile, carefully maintained truce.

Eleanor' s phone rang. She answered it, her voice instantly saccharine. "Mark, dear!"

A pause. Then, Eleanor' s tone sharpened. "Yes, she' s here. Still looking rather peaked... No, I don't think she' s being reasonable at all."

She handed the phone to Sarah. "Mark wants to talk to you."

Sarah took the phone, her heart sinking.

"Sarah, just be reasonable," Mark' s voice came through, strained and impatient. "Don't upset Mom. She' s just worried."

"Worried about what, Mark? Appearances?"

"Don't start. I'm swamped at work. Chloe' s ankle is worse than we thought. I can't come home for dinner. We'll talk tonight."

He hung up before she could reply.

Chloe. Always Chloe.

Sarah stared at the phone, then at her mother-in-law, who was now rearranging decorative pillows on the sofa, her disapproval a palpable force in the room.

She reflected on Mark' s increasing distance over the past year.

Fewer shared smiles, more curt replies.

The easy intimacy they once shared had eroded, replaced by a chasm of unspoken words and constant excuses.

"Late meetings." "Client dinners." "Site emergencies."

Now, she knew the truth behind those excuses.

Her mind, numb for hours, began to clear.

The video. The perfume. The protective stance.

It wasn't "just talk." It was a betrayal.