“You always get exactly what you want and then some,” Joey said. “Because supposedly you’re a genius.”

“What about you?” Angus spit. “Coasting on your good looks, your charm, your athletic ability. People liked you better. I could never have gotten a girl like Blair if you hadn’t brought her to me.”

“That’s right!” Joey said. “You married a woman who’s too good for you and you’re blowing it!” Joey had Angus’s arms pinned over his head, and he pulled his arm back to punch him. Angus steeled himself and Blair let a cry escape. Joey seemed to reconsider, and then he let go of Angus and got to his feet. “She says you’re having an affair.”

Angus sat up. “If that’s not the pot calling the kettle black, I don’t know what is.”

“You’re lying to your pregnant wife,” Joey said. He turned to Blair. “I would never do that. If you were still my girl, I would be true blue.”

Angus pointed at the door. “Get out.”

“Gladly,” Joey said. He jammed his arms into his suit jacket and bent down to look at Blair. “If you need me, just call the Parker House.”

Blair waited with her head bowed as Joey left. Angus dusted himself off and disappeared into the kitchen. Blair remained on the couch, summoning the energy to get to her feet. She felt oddly glad that Angus had come home and caught her and Joey. She was a catch! She was desirable—even when pregnant!

She hauled herself up and waddled to the kitchen. Angus’s back was to her.

“Who is Trixie?” Blair asked. “And how long have you been seeing her?”

Angus stared at the wall behind the kitchen sink where Blair kept a needlepoint sampler that said AS YE SOW, SO SHALL YE REAP. She nearly laughed at the irony of it.

“You know what I think?” Blair said. “I think you’ve been seeing her since before we were married. I think you were talking to her on the phone on our honeymoon.”

She watched Angus’s shoulders tense. He looked like he was thrumming with the things he wanted to say—a confession, maybe.

“And that day I came to your office? Dobbins told me you had a personal appointment.”

“We’ve been over this,” Angus said.

Blair tried for a haughty laugh like the one her grandmother had perfected, but it came out as a whinny. “I think you were with her. And then the other day on the phone, I heard the two of you, Angus. She said her name. You said you wanted to see her.”

Angus turned around. He was holding his glasses in his hands. They were in two pieces; Joey had broken them. Blair rarely got to look directly into her husband’s eyes the way she did now. His irises were brown and flecked with green. As many times as Blair had cursed his name in the past year, she remained in his thrall.

“You’re right,” he said. “I was on the phone with Trixie while we were in Bermuda. And I went to see her the day you came to my office.”

Blair felt like she’d been blindsided; even though this was what she’d suspected, it came as a fresh pain to hear him say it.

“Now, I’ve told you the truth and I’d like you to return the favor, please. Have you been carrying a torch for Joey all this time?” Angus laughed unhappily. “I mean, I saw the two of you in the act. In our home. So obviously the answer is yes.”

Blair was at a loss for words; she didn’t know where to start. Angus’s confession was straightforward: Yes, he’d been with Trixie. But Blair wasn’t sure what had just happened with Joey. Did she have feelings for him? There was no denying there was a physical connection, but Blair thought that was because she had been so lonely—and so, so angry. Angus had stripped away Blair’s personhood bit by bit. He’d made her quit her job, and now, with this pregnancy, she’d lost not only her body but also her autonomy. Angus expected her to stay home and keep house and prepare the meals. She had faithfully done that while also serving as an incubator for their children. But Angus had given Blair nothing in return—not his time, not his affection, not an apology, not a word of praise or thanks.

“You’re never home,” Blair said. The words sounded pale and limp, but that lay at the heart of the matter. She and Angus never did anything together anymore because Angus was always at work—or, apparently, with Trixie. Someone else was getting the best parts of him—either Trixie or his students or the U.S. government.

“I think you should go to Nantucket and wait out the rest of your pregnancy there,” Angus said.

Blair was too proud to show him how this statement wounded her. “Nantucket?” she said. “How do you propose I get there? I certainly can’t drive in my condition.”

“I’m sure Joey will take you,” Angus said. “Pack your things.”

Joey has taken the entire day off from work and he even brought a picnic; it’s in a basket on the back seat. Near the exit for Plymouth, they pass an older gentleman driving a cherry-red Mustang convertible. He honks at them and gives them the thumbs-up, and Joey waves. Looking at Blair from the shoulders up, no one can tell Blair is pregnant. To the gentleman in the Mustang, Blair supposes, she and Joey look like any other young couple out for a ride.

Joey puts a hand on Blair’s knee and she considers removing it. Is he being a sweet brother-in-law and a good guy by driving her to Hyannis, or is he claiming her? Has she been handed off like a baton from one brother to the other? Blair doesn’t have to wonder what Betty Friedan would think about this; she already knows the answer.

At Blair’s suggestion, they don’t stop for lunch until they’re up over the Sagamore Bridge and on Cape Cod. Joey drives to Craigville Beach, where there are picnic tables overlooking the water. He spreads out a red-checkered tablecloth and then a lunch that was prepared by the chef at the Parker House: cold roast beef, soft rolls, hard-boiled eggs, pickles, coleslaw, sliced strawberries, and pound cake. Blair would like to say that being thrown out of her own home by her unfaithful husband has diminished her appetite, but in fact, she’s as hungry as ever. Joey watches with rapt attention as she devours a roast beef sandwich topped with sliced egg, coleslaw, and pickles—lots and lots of pickles!—and then cuts a thick slice of pound cake and smothers it with berries.

“My kingdom for some whipped cream,” she says.