I Played Their Affair at His Family Party novel · Chapter 1 of 24
Chapter 1: The Navy Dress
On New Year's Eve Theron texts that he is stuck at the office, and Ciara finds his second girlfriend on TikTok at her parents' party. Her sister-in-law tells her not to do anything stupid before Ciara has said a word.
The text came in at six, while I was holding the navy dress.
It was the one Theron liked, the one he said made my eyes look darker.
I had ironed it that morning and steamed the hem again an hour ago.
"Stuck at the office, babe. Happy New Year," he wrote, with a black heart.
I read it twice and set the phone face down on the dresser.
Five years, five New Year's Eves, and this one was supposed to be different.
Tonight his parents and mine would sit at one table for the first time.
He had promised me we would stop being a someday couple and start being a soon couple.
I hung the dress back in the closet and pulled on jeans and a sweater.
A second text buzzed, with a champagne glass and a promise to make it up to me.
I didn't answer it.
I locked my door and drove to my parents' house.
The party was already loud when I walked in.
My brother Orin was opening wine in the kitchen, and my father was telling a story I had heard three times.
My sister-in-law Shelley sat on the arm of the sofa with a glass in her hand.
She had the look she always wore when she had been waiting for me.
"Ciara!" She stood up with her arms open. "Where's Theron?"
"Working," I said, and I smiled.
"Again?" She tilted her head and lowered her voice into the soft tone she used before she said something cruel.
"Honey, I don't want to worry you. But he's been doing that a lot, hasn't he?"
"He's busy."
"I'm sure." She sipped her wine. "But you know how men are. When they stop making time for you, they're making time for someone else."
Orin looked over from the kitchen and said nothing.
Shelley leaned closer. "Maybe you hold on too tight, that's all. Some men need a woman who keeps their attention."
I nodded and smiled again and said I was going to sit down.
On the couch I took out my phone, because I wanted noise and I wanted my head empty.
I opened TikTok and scrolled past cooking videos, a dance trend and a puppy in a sweater.
Then a short clip of a woman leaning against a man on a couch.
His face was turned away from the camera.
I saw a shoulder, an arm, and his hand resting on her knee.
The caption said, "my favorite way to spend New Year's."
The account was @goldie.everyday.
Goldie was a creator I had followed for months, because she made me laugh while I folded laundry.
Then I looked at the man's wrist.
He wore a rose-gold Audemars Piguet, the same one Theron had worn on our first date and every day since.
I made myself look at the rest of the frame.
A gray throw pillow with a geometric pattern sat in the corner of the couch.
The kitchen light behind it fell at a strange low angle, the way it did in only one apartment I knew.
That was Theron's apartment.
My chest went tight, and I sat very still.
Then I tapped on Goldie's profile and began at the newest post.
A morning-after vlog showed Goldie in an oversized men's shirt, laughing at the camera, with Theron's bedroom behind her.
A dinner date was filmed at the Linden Room, where Theron had taken me for our first anniversary.
A waiting room at a cosmetic clinic held Goldie whispering, "Doing this for my man. Gotta keep him interested."
A "get ready with me" showed her smoothing on foundation.
"Some girls just don't even try," she told her followers. "Babe, put on concealer before your man starts looking elsewhere."
I scrolled back for months, and every date she posted was a night Theron had told me he was working.
My father's story reached its punchline and everyone laughed.
I laughed a half second late.
Then a new video appeared at the top of her page, posted four minutes ago.
Goldie sat on that same couch and held up a champagne glass.
"Big news," she said to the camera. "He finally said yes. I'm meeting the family at the Preston party on the eighteenth."
The Preston party was where Theron had told me he would propose.
He had asked me to keep that night free three weeks ago.
I did not cry, and I did not stand up and shout.
I opened the screen recorder and saved every video from the first one to the last.
When the last file finished, I put my phone in my pocket and decided I would not wait for Theron to tell me anything.
So I stepped out onto the back porch for air.
The door opened behind me.
Shelley came out and shut it softly.
She stood close to me in the cold, and her voice was not sympathetic at all.
"Whatever you just saw on that phone," she said, "don't do anything stupid."
I had not said a word to her about what I saw.
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