My Husband Kissed Her on the Kiss Cam, So I Left novel · Chapter 1 of 24
Chapter 1: Six Seconds
Hallie comes back from the concession stand and watches her husband kiss his best friend on the arena's giant screen, then sets the beers down and walks out, and Colby texts that Delaney's bag is already inside her house.
My husband kissed his best friend in front of eight thousand people while I stood in the aisle holding his beer.
The Falcons had just scored the winning goal, and I had missed it.
Northline Arena went off, and blue towels flew over every head.
Someone's elbow hit my ribs as I hurried down the steps with two plastic cups.
Colby had sent me up to the concession stand during the last timeout.
"Take your time, Hal," he'd said. "Nobody's going anywhere."
Delaney had leaned across him and tapped my arm.
"Get the good one this time," she said, grinning. "He's paying."
She was wearing her blue number nine jersey, the one she wore to every game.
She had screamed that player's name every time he touched the puck, and she tapped the thin chain under her collar whenever he did.
"Callaghan owes me a drink if he scores," she'd said as I left.
I was six rows above them when the big screen over center ice turned into a pink heart.
Colby and Delaney sat inside it.
The crowd around them started chanting.
"Kiss! Kiss! Kiss!"
Delaney saw herself on the screen and threw back her head, laughing.
She grabbed a handful of Colby's jersey and hauled him up beside her.
Colby shook his head, laughing too.
For one second, I thought he would sit back down.
He didn't.
Delaney hooked one arm around his neck and pulled his face down to hers.
I watched his hands.
I waited for them to go up, palms out, the way you push away a joke that has gone too far.
His right hand went to her waist.
His left arm went around her shoulders.
He held her while she kissed him.
A man behind me whistled.
Someone yelled, "That's a couple!"
I gripped the cups so hard the beer jumped over the rims and ran down my wrists.
I tracked every second because it was something to do with my mind.
I reached six.
When Delaney finally pulled back, her fingers were still twisted in his jersey.
She leaned against his chest and waved at the screen.
Colby waved too.
His hand stayed on her waist.
It stayed there while the camera cut away.
It stayed there while I walked down six rows of strangers who didn't know I belonged to him.
Delaney spotted me first.
Her smile slipped, and she looked at the beers, and then she nudged Colby with her elbow.
He turned around with the grin still on his face.
"Hal! Did you see that? We were on the jumbotron."
"I saw."
"It's the kiss cam, babe. Everybody does it." He reached for his beer. "Don't make that face."
Delaney laid a hand on her heart.
"Oh my God, Hallie, it was nothing. He's like my brother. You know that."
I knew that.
That was what I had been told for six years, at every birthday and every Thanksgiving, in my own kitchen.
I looked at Colby's hand, which still hadn't left her.
"Take your hand off her," I said.
He looked down at it.
Then he took it away, slowly, and gave me his easy, reasonable smile.
"You're being dramatic, Hal."
The people in the row behind us had their phones out.
A woman was filming. A teenager was filming. A man in a Falcons toque said, "Oh, this is gonna be good."
I looked at the two cups in my hands.
I put them down on the armrest, one at a time, so I wouldn't spill.
Then I took off my wedding ring.
It came off easily, because it had been loose since the summer.
I dropped it in Colby's beer.
It sank through the foam and settled on the bottom.
"Hallie," he said. "Come on."
Delaney was already saying my name in a soft, sad voice.
"I'll see you at home," Colby called, as if I hadn't heard him.
I said nothing.
So I stepped out.
I climbed all the way to the top of the section while eight thousand people sang along to the goal horn, and I didn't look back at the screen.
In the parking structure my phone buzzed against my hip.
It was Colby.
I figured it would be an apology.
It was one line.
"Delaney's bag is already at the house, so don't lock her out, okay? Her place has a leak. She needs to stay a few days."
I stood very still beside my car.
Her bag was already at the house.
He had put it there before the game.
He had known all day.
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