All in all, the party wasn’t bad. It had its moments. I smiled and even laughed when nonverbal cues indicated the appropriate times to smile or laugh, and tried to make eye contact when people spoke, and made the most of elastic good-byes, but my mind was on Raymond and whether he’d back off, and also on Elizabeth, what she was saying and to whom. She traded wine for water shortly after giving her toast, but her unpredictability was distracting nonetheless. So many unpredictable people. I kept an eye on Jonah, too, as he gave polite answers to the same questions asked over and over, and I drew comfort from his capacity to resist doing further structural damage to his hand or my house. Most of our guests left at a reasonable hour. A few stragglers forced aggressive kindness upon us, insisting upon filling our fridge with Tupperware and throwing away every last crumpled cocktail napkin. Having bonded—perhaps over their shared fascination with Luna’s social ineptitude disguised as social savvy—Elizabeth and Bess exchanged phone numbers and made tentative plans to catch an upcoming opening at Guild Hall. The whole evening was what one might consider a success, as these sorts of things go. We raised a few thousand bucks for a suicide prevention program serving our community, someplace Elizabeth tracked down, or Bonnie maybe.

All in all, it was pleasant, and at times, I felt the shackles loosen. After our generous friends left, I slept hard and woke up believing my secret might press itself into the past, smoothing out my bold decision—my brave decision—to fight like hell for my family. I woke up loving people and trusting my secret to blend into what’s behind me.

But my peace hinges on so many conditions: if the detective just takes me at my word; if he resists fact-checking with Jonah; if Jonah forgets all about that pregnancy lie; if Elizabeth reins in her appetite for self-destruction; if my computer hasn’t hoarded an invisible archive of searches so hackers can’t poke holes in my story; if Ray backs off long enough to let me slip out of his life, and if he stays out of mine for a very long time, which will break my heart but serve the greater good; if Simone fears Ray enough to keep her mouth shut, but not so much that she risks tattling; if my nurses forget about the butterfly needles so there’s no trace of Nick at work; and if Nick told no one, absolutely no one, about the diagnosis, then it never happened. I can close this chapter of my life. If Elizabeth only did what she did out of boredom or spite and not out of love, or worse yet, falling out of love, then we can fix this. We can be the couple who survived this episode. We’ll be our own heroes.