My Husband Kissed Her on the Kiss Cam, So I Left novel · Chapter 2 of 24

Chapter 2: Four Million Views

On Bridget's couch Hallie watches the clip spread, and Delaney posts a rough-night photo from Hallie's own kitchen wearing Hallie's robe.

My sister opened her apartment door at eleven forty with a metal bat in one hand and a slice of cold pizza in the other.

"Oh," Bridget said, and lowered the bat. "I thought you were the guy from 4B."

"I need your couch."

She looked at my face, then at my bare ring finger, and stepped aside without asking one question.

That is the whole reason I love her.

She put me on the couch under the green blanket and put the pizza on my knee.

I held it for twenty minutes without eating any.

My phone lay face down on the cushion and shook.

Colby had called a dozen times.

He had also texted, and I turned the phone over to read them because I couldn't stand not knowing.

"Hal, call me."

"You left before the end. I pushed her off right after, the camera cut away before you could see."

"Please don't be like this."

I had counted six seconds.

I had watched his hand the whole time.

He had not pushed anyone anywhere, and the only thing the camera cut away from was me.

Bridget came out of the kitchen with two mugs and sat on the coffee table facing me.

"Do you want tea or do you want to say it?"

"Say what?"

"Whatever you walked in here not saying."

I told her the whole thing, in order, in short pieces.

The beers. The pink heart. The hand on the waist. The ring in the beer.

When I got to the ring, Bridget laughed so hard she had to put her tea down.

"Sorry," she said, wiping her eyes. "That's the best thing I've ever heard. Sorry. Go on."

I told her about the text, and Delaney's bag.

She stopped laughing.

"Delaney has a key to your house?"

"I gave it to her three years ago. She was watering the plants when we went to Colby's cousin's wedding."

"And she kept it."

"She's always had it."

"Hal." Bridget's voice was gentle in the way that meant it was about to be blunt. "She's had it for three years and you have never once had it back."

I didn't answer.

My phone buzzed again, and this time it wasn't Colby.

It was a text from a number I didn't know.

"Is this you?"

Under it was a link.

I pressed it, and it opened a video.

It was the kiss cam, from the seat behind us, shot by someone with a steady hand.

Someone had cut it down to the moment I appeared at the edge of the frame, carrying two cups of beer and looking at the screen.

Over the top, a caption in white letters said, "WIFE WALKS IN ON KISS CAM, DROPS HER RING IN HIS BEER."

Then I saw the number under it.

Four million views.

I read the comments, because I am a person who does that.

"Why is she still holding the cups, I'm dying."

"The way she set them down so carefully. This woman is a saint."

"He didn't even try to stop the kiss. Six seconds. SIX."

"Who's the blonde in the 9 jersey? She looks very comfortable."

Bridget took the phone out of my hand and set it on the arm of the couch.

"No more," she said. "You can look at the internet when you have a lawyer and a sandwich."

She went to run a bath for me, and I lay there in the quiet looking at the water stain on her ceiling.

It was shaped a little like a heart, which felt like the universe being funny at the wrong moment.

I thought about the six rows.

I thought about the way Colby had said "Take your time, Hal" before I left.

My phone buzzed again, and I almost didn't look.

It was a notification from Delaney's account.

She had posted a photo, just minutes before.

She was sitting on a kitchen island with a mug of tea in both hands, her hair in a messy knot, a soft lamp turned on behind her.

"Rough night," the caption said. "Sending love to anyone who gets caught in the middle of the internet. Friends are family. xo"

Forty thousand people had liked it.

I looked at the island.

Gray quartz. A bowl of green apples. The ceramic rooster my grandmother gave me when I bought the house.

It was my kitchen.

She was sitting on my counter, in my kitchen, in my house, drinking from my favorite mug.

Then I looked at the robe.

It was gray, with a torn left pocket that I had meant to mend for a year.

It was my robe.

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