I’d planned for this. I wasn’t going to show weakness. I wasn’t going to show just how much I did care. I’d rehearsed this mentally at work while I’d had my headphones in to type up the interminable audio files. “I’m glad he’s happy,” I said. At my expense, though, I thought. How can he be happy, knowing what he’s done to me?

She laughed. “Liar.”

“I am.” I thought about it for a few seconds. “Honestly, I am. I needed to leave home. It wasn’t good for me. It’s a shame it didn’t work out with Harry, but in the end, I got out of my marriage. That’s what I needed to do.”

Most of that was bravado. I didn’t want Sarah or anyone else to feel sorry for me, but when I thought of Harry now, it was almost as though he hadn’t been real, as though I’d conjured him up so that I could leave home. What was more real was his rejection of me. Memories of him being lovely to me faded as I thought of how he’d let me go home to end my marriage, knowing full well he wouldn’t be doing the same.

We sat in silence for a few minutes and then I said, “Did Harry read my letter? Did he say anything?”

She laughed. “I thought you weren’t bothered about him?”

“Just tell me whether he read it, will you?”

“I put it in his top drawer. He didn’t say anything to me about it.” She poured us another drink. “You need to stop obsessing about him, Ruby. He’s history now. Move on.”

I’ve always hated that expression. It always seems to be used to shut people up. But I didn’t have the courage to say anything to Sarah; I needed her friendship. So I drank some wine and said, “You’re right,” and she clinked her glass against mine, happy at her success.

CHAPTER 45

Ruby

We had a great night in the end. We bumped into some people she knew and the night flew by without any further mention of Harry or Emma or that baby of theirs. For a while I was able to forget everything that had happened, though I know the wine helped that along.

At the end of the night we flooded out into the street. Our little town doesn’t have Uber yet and a few black cabs were waiting at the end of the street. There was a rush toward them. Sarah lived in the opposite direction from me; one of her friends was going her way and bagged the last cab.

“Will you be okay?” she asked as she stumbled into the taxi.

“I’ll be fine,” I said. “Speak soon.”

“I’ll call you.”