Borrow My Seat novel · Chapter 2 of 24

Chapter 2: Eight Cameras

The founder keeps her job and shows her the lobby footage; at home Lane and Chantal are drinking champagne in her kitchen, and her savings are gone.

Tobias Ahlgren's office was on the sixth floor, with a long window over the lake and a desk with nothing on it.

He closed the door and stood with his back to the glass.

"Sit," he said.

I stayed standing, because I thought I was about to be fired.

"Mr. Ahlgren, I know how that looked. I'll take my things."

"I watched it from the mezzanine," he said. "The lobby has eight cameras, and they all record sound."

He turned his laptop around.

On the screen I saw myself, small and stiff, in a navy blazer I had bought for this day.

I heard Lane's voice, flat and clear, saying you are the mistress.

I heard Chantal laughing.

"I have ten minutes of her walking in with a banner," he said. "Security is cutting a copy for the police. You'll want it for your report."

"You're not firing me."

"I'm hiring a designer, Ms. Eklund. Not a marriage record."

I sat down hard in the chair.

"I should tell you the certificate is a lie. I mean, I don't know what it is. I never agreed to be anybody's mistress."

"I don't care," he said.

He said it so evenly that I looked up.

"I care that someone walked a camera crew through my lobby to humiliate an employee on her first day. The rule here is one sentence long. Nobody films in my building without asking."

"That's it? That's the rule?"

"It's the only one I've had to say out loud in nine years."

A corner of his mouth moved.

It wasn't a smile, but it was the nearest thing I had seen on anyone's face all morning.

His assistant knocked, set down a paper cup of water in front of me, and left.

I hadn't noticed my hands were shaking until the water rippled.

Tobias saw it too.

He didn't comment, and he didn't look away, and somehow that was kinder than either.

"Take the day if you need it," he said. "Your badge works either way."

"I'd rather work."

"Then I'll walk you to your desk."

He walked me past thirty people who very carefully did not look up.

At my desk there was a plant, a monitor, and a sticky note in a stranger's handwriting that said glad you're here.

I stayed until noon and drew nothing.

At twelve-ten I gave up, because I had not eaten, and because Lane had left four voicemails, and because somewhere in me was a stubborn idea that I should get my things out of that apartment before anyone could stop me.

The apartment was ours, on Brady Street, third floor, with my name on half the lease.

I could hear music from the stairwell.

I opened the door with my key.

Lane was at the kitchen island with a bottle of champagne, in his socks.

Chantal sat on the counter beside him, barefoot, in my gray robe.

Her friends were gone, but her phone was propped against the fruit bowl, red light on.

"Look who made it home," Chantal said.

"Ingrid." Lane set down his glass and lifted both hands, the way you do with a nervous dog. "Come on. It was a bit that got out of hand."

"You told a police officer you were married."

"Because we are," he said, smiling. "I'll explain it later."

"There's a pitcher of mimosas if you want to sit down," Chantal added. "I'm not mad at you. I won, but I'm not mad."

I looked at the robe.

My grandmother had given it to me.

"Take that off," I said.

"Make me," said Chantal, and laughed into the phone.

I walked past them into the bedroom without answering.

I took two suitcases off the closet shelf.

I packed my work clothes, my passport, my laptop, my grandmother's sewing box with the brass clasp, and the one sweater that still smelled like home.

Lane appeared in the doorway.

"You're being dramatic."

"Yes."

"Where will you go? You don't have anyone."

"I have a sister."

"Greta hates me."

"Greta has taste."

He stepped in front of the bed.

"Ingrid, think about this for one minute. Everything's fine. Chantal is a kid. Stay and we'll sort it out tonight, the three of us, like adults."

"The three of us."

"It's not what you think."

"Then tell me what it is."

He opened his mouth, and for the first time in four years, I saw him pick his words.

"Not yet," he said.

I zipped the second suitcase.

Behind him, Chantal sang the first line of a wedding song.

I had already texted Greta from the stairwell, and now my phone buzzed with her answer.

Outside. Green Subaru. Hurry or I'm coming up there.

I dragged both bags past Lane without touching him.

He didn't try to stop me.

That should have warned me.

Greta was leaning against the hood in her scrubs, with her arms crossed.

She threw the suitcases in the back before I got a word out.

"I'm going to kill him," she said.

"Not today. Drive."

She pulled away from the curb, and I opened my banking app, because I wanted to check that my first direct deposit was set up.

My checking account loaded fine.

Then I opened the joint savings.

It had been forty-one thousand, three hundred and twelve dollars that morning, nearly every cent of it mine.

The balance on the screen said twelve dollars and four cents.

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