Second, my mother is at peace with herself. She doesn’t act like a woman who’s betraying her husband, like she’s hiding anything, like she’s lying. She’s as relaxed as I’ve ever seen her. Like her conscience is completely clear, so much so that I feel doubt bubbling up again, that what I saw on Monday morning was real.

But it was real, I tell myself.

I know what I saw.

So Mom being so completely chill about it means that either she’s a magnificent actress (which I know she isn’t) or that the affair has been going on for a long, long time, so long that it feels normal to her. She doesn’t feel like she’s doing anything wrong.

“Are you okay?” she asks as we wander, loose-limbed and woozy, out of the yoga studio.

I really wish people would stop asking me that. Especially if they’re not really interested in finding out.

“I want you to know, I heard what you said to me before, about the child labor thing. I have been taking you for granted. I’ll stop doing that.”

“It’s fine. I like hanging out with Abby,” I say.

We reach the front desk of the wellness center. “Will you be paying with a card?” the woman there (who’s wearing a name tag that reads Malia) asks my mother.

“Can you charge it to the room?” Mom asks.

Malia nods and takes down our room number, and Mom signs to accept the charge.

Her signature, like most doctors, is an illegible, hurried squiggle. Pop calls it her “chicken scratchings.” I’ve seen Ruthie sign it for her a bunch of times, just the big loop of the A for Aster and another shape that could be a B for Bloom.

“Be sure to take a brochure and check out the services that are available from our spa.” Malia hands the brochure to my mom.

“Services?” I take the brochure out of Mom’s hand and scan down it.

“We offer massages, facials, waxing, threading, eyelash extensions, a full hair and nail salon, body scrubs, cleanses—you name it, we’ve got it. Plus if you pay for a service, you are allowed access to our exclusive relaxation area and hot tubs.”

“No, thank you,” Mom is saying to Malia, but then I blurt, “Yes, I’m interested.”

Mom turns to look at me, frowning quizzically.

“I’d like a . . . massage,” I say brightly.

If Mom knew me, really knew me the way a mother is supposed to know her child, she would be suspicious. I’ve had exactly one massage in my life, and vowed never to do it again. I was so weirded out by the feeling of a stranger touching me that I giggled through the entire thing and ended up weirding out the masseuse.

But Mom has never heard that story.