My Husband Told His Ex in French I'd Never Find Out novel · Chapter 1 of 24
Chapter 1: Elle Parle Comme une Serveuse
At Aimée's own dinner table Solène mocks her accent in French and Preston adds that Nantucket is not for her; she finds the Les Douze chat on the iPad, takes the test, and books Monday at nine, giving him one chance.
Eleven people laughed at my dinner table on Wednesday night, and my husband was one of them.
I was setting down the crawfish étouffée when his ex said it, in French, to the whole table.
"Elle parle comme une serveuse de bayou."
She talks like a bayou waitress.
His ex is Solène, and she has sat on his right at every dinner for eight years.
Solène added, "C'est pour ça qu'on ne l'emmène pas à Nantucket. Elle ne saura jamais."
That's why we don't take her to Nantucket. She'll never know.
More laughter. Glasses clinked.
My husband caught my wrist as I passed and squeezed it, warm and quick.
"Best étouffée in Boston," he said in English. "Isn't it, everyone?"
Solène handed my husband her wine glass without a sip, and he finished it for her.
She had been drinking sparkling water all night.
Only Mireille, at the far end of the table, kept her eyes on her plate.
They laugh at Mireille's Québécois accent too, just less.
I smiled.
"There's more rice in the kitchen," I said, and went to get it.
"Thank you, Aimée," Solène called after me in English. "Everything is wonderful."
They call themselves Les Douze, the Twelve.
Five couples from the summers of my husband's boarding school, plus Preston and Solène.
I am not one of the twelve.
They speak French at dinner, at the club and in the car.
They do it because eight years ago they decided I couldn't follow it.
Here is what none of them ever asked.
I grew up in Breaux Bridge, Louisiana.
My mawmaw spoke Cajun French at her stove.
Our parish ran a French school from first grade through eighth, with teachers from Paris and Brussels.
I read Le Monde faster than Preston does.
The night we got engaged, at his mother's house, someone asked if I spoke any French.
I answered in Mawmaw's French, slow and warm.
The table went quiet. Then Solène smiled over her wine and said, "So, no."
Everyone laughed. Preston laughed.
I haven't spoken French in Boston since.
They left at eleven. Preston kissed my cheek and went up to shower.
I stayed down to clean.
His iPad stands on the kitchen counter, where I keep my recipes open.
A banner slid across the top of my gumbo recipe.
Les Douze. 12 members.
I counted the names twice. I wasn't one of them.
My hands were wet. I dried them on my apron, and I opened it.
The chat went back years. Ski trips, birthday dinners, who was bringing the wine.
A weekend on Nantucket for Columbus Day, with boats and cabins.
Near the bottom was a voice clip. I pressed play.
It was my voice.
Last spring I practiced how Preston's mother says "pecan."
Pe-CAHN, not PEE-can. I recorded myself to hear it back.
I must have sent it to Preston by mistake.
Somebody had cut it into a loop. Pe-CAHN. Pe-CAHN. Pe-CAHN.
Under it ran a row of laughing faces.
Solène had written, "Elle parle comme ça au lit aussi?"
Does she talk like that in bed too?
My thumb was shaking. I made it stop.
I took a screenshot, and then thirty more, and sent them all to my own phone.
The little whoosh was the loudest sound in the house.
Upstairs, the shower shut off.
I put the iPad back on its stand with my gumbo recipe open, exactly where it had been.
Then I went into the downstairs bathroom and locked the door.
For two days a pregnancy test had been riding at the bottom of my purse.
I had been waiting for a good night to take it.
This was not a good night. I took it anyway.
Two pink lines.
I held it in both hands.
I thought about a baby growing up at that table, learning to laugh when the grown-ups laughed.
My phone buzzed. Preston, from upstairs: "Coming to bed, babe?"
"In a minute," I wrote back.
Then I opened my doctor's page and booked the first open slot.
Monday, October 13, nine a.m.
I would ask him to come. I would tell him I was scared, and I would watch what he did with it.
So I gave him one chance.
I went back through my screenshots one more time, from the bottom this time.
The last message in the chat had been sent at 10:52, while I was upstairs finding the good coffee cups.
Preston had written it to Solène, in French.
"Elle ne se doute de rien. Après Nantucket, je lui dirai."
She suspects nothing. After Nantucket, I'll tell her.
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