Page 2 of The Accident

I find my mother’s gaze across the room. She gives me a tiny, unreadable smile.

I tell myself, again, that I am a grown woman, with a job, an apartment, and, at least in theory, a working self-esteem.

I watch as Trevor and his date say hello to my mother and Henry. There’s a pause, a little ballet of head-tilts and air kisses, and I realize with horror that I’ve drifted close enough to be within the blast radius. Maybe I want to hear what Trevor’s voice sounds like tonight, or maybe I’m just a moth who never learned. He smiles, that same even, unhurried smile, and introduces his date as Cassandra. I watch Victoria’s lips move around the name, a polite moue, and then the next second she’s in on the secret—Trevor knows what the room is thinking.

“Cassandra,” he says, just loud enough to carry, “please meet my lovely stepmother, Victoria, and Henry, my father.” The names are deliberate, like he wants to remind everyone whose family this is. “And Kayleigh, my stepsister.”

Cassandra looks me over, her gaze skipping down to my dress, up to my hair, and then straight into my eyes. There’s a glimmer of recognition—amusement, maybe. “Hi, Kayleigh. Call me Cassie, no one says Cassandra,” she adds with a breathy giggle.

I say something—“Nice to meet you,” probably—but my voice has gone damp and unreliable. Cassie’s smile doesn’t linger on me. She’s looking at Trevor again, and he is looking at her, like a beast surveying its prey.

Henry’s handshake is brief, almost clinical, but his eyes take in every millimeter of Cassie’s skin and his lips barely twitch. “Welcome,” he says in a low, gravelly voice that gives nothing away. “It’s nice to meet you.”

Victoria tries. She really does. She says something about the color of Cassie’s dress (“stunning on you, darling”), and Cassie simpers, and the whole thing is so staged that for a second I feel like I’m watching from outside my own body. My mother’s laugh is light, and her hand rests on my shoulder like I’m her favorite accessory.

I don’t realize I’m staring until Trevor glances down, meets my gaze, and holds it. His eyes are the precise blue of a June lake under morning sun. He doesn’t smile, doesn’t even nod. The moment passes like a current between us, one I am absolutely, humiliatingly sure only I can feel.

Then Trevor leans down, his mouth close to Cassie’s ear, and murmurs something. The movement is subtle, just the dip of his head and the way his palm slides a little higher on her hip. Cassie’s laugh is low and unguarded, not pretty at all—almost dirty, if I’m honest. She touches his chest with both hands, fingers spread, and for one dizzy second I imagine how that must feel, the muscle and heat under fabric.

I snap out of it. Back up, one step. I pretend to check my phone, then circle to the table where Victoria and Henry are now fielding a parade of aunts, uncles, and other assorted guests. I plant myself between a speaker and an arrangement of peonies, and for the next hour I do everything I can to pretend Trevor isn’t even in the room.

I answer questions about my job at The Fig Leaf. “It’s a plant store,” I say, “I’m learning about succulents.” One old lady wants to know if that means I’m the one who did the centerpieces. (I did not. I could only dream.) My mom wanders over, and interjects with a smile. She keeps the conversation bright, steering any awkwardness away from me, but every now and then her hand squeezes my arm, a silent message I can’t decode.

I refill my champagne glass. Twice. The second time, I catch a glimpse of myself in the mirrored panel behind the bar. There’s a flush on my cheeks, and my lips are wine-dark, a little smudged. I reapply, and think of nothing.

But I keep glancing—because how could I not?—to the far side of the room, where Trevor is seated with his porn star date tucked neatly against his side. His arm is draped along the back of her chair, and the way she leans into him is like she’s daring the room to comment. Cassie is laughing, always, and touching him, always, and for a second I swear his hand disappears behind the curve of her chest to fondle a big breast. Are you serious? Is my stepbrother groping a woman at a family wedding? OMG, gross! My ears burn. I look away.

The rest of the reception is a blur of polite conversation, speeches, the slow click of glassware and laughter, but it’s as if the room orbits Trevor and his date. No matter how many times I promise myself not to care, I can feel every particle of the air between us, like a rubber band stretched taut. Whenever my eyes stray back to him, I find him perfectly composed, the picture of indifference.

At one point, as the servers clear the main course, I glance up and find Trevor staring right at me.

This time, he doesn’t look away. His mouth curls—fractionally, knowingly, not a real smile but the ghost of one. He holds my gaze, and the force of it is so overwhelming that I almost drop my fork. When he finally looks back at Cassie, I feel something loosen inside me, like a circuit breaking.

I set down my champagne glass. My fingers are shaking.

“I’m just—” I say to my mom, not even finishing. She nods, like she understands. Maybe she does.

I push back from the table, smoothing my dress over my hips, and make for the corridor at the far end of the hall. The lights out here are cooler, less theatrical, and the hush is instant. My heels make soft, hollow clicks on the marble.

I try to breathe. I try to remember who I am, or at least who I’m supposed to be.

For now, I just need to get away. Even if it’s only for a minute. Even if it’s just to stand in the dim mirror of the restroom and gather the pieces of myself back into place, one by one.

2

OOPS, I WASN’T SUPPOSED TO SEE THAT

Kayleigh

The air outside the ballroom is cold and weightless, like the world after a thunderstorm. The corridor runs wide and empty, a marble artery lined with sconces that flicker against the dusk. My heels click like a metronome. The noise of the reception is muffled now—just bass, laughter, the faraway clatter of glassware. I tell myself I’m taking myself to the bathroom, but really I’m just wandering, letting each step carry me further from the heat of my own humiliation.

My chest is tight and my mouth is dry. Champagne and jealousy—what a potent mix. I reach the first intersection in the hall, a place where the ambient light goes honeyed and soft. Somewhere deeper in the building, someone is crying—maybe some sad bridesmaid, or maybe it’s just the sound of pipes flexing in the walls. Either way, I don’t care. All I want is a cold sink, a minute alone, a new face in the mirror to replace the one that just watched Trevor fuck his date with his eyes from across a crowded room.

There’s a turnoff to the right, a discreet alcove with a brass plaque reading “Powder Room.” I’m halfway there when I hear it: a noise too wet, too animal, to be a malfunctioning faucet. I freeze, ears sharpened, and listen. The sound comes again—a high, keening gasp, cut off by a sharp impact. Flesh against flesh, then a laugh, then a string of syllables that dissolve into another moan.

My whole body goes hot. I should keep walking. I shouldn’t stop, not now. But I do.

The source is obvious: a door, cracked open, spilling a wedge of amber light across the marble. I drift toward it, each step slower than the last. My skin prickles with anticipation or dread, I can’t tell which. When I reach the threshold, I stop and peer in, careful as a cat.