Judgment

2

The next afternoon, waiting for an Uber home from Logan Airport in Boston, she found herself in a reverie, replaying moments in her mind from the night before. She couldn’t remember when she’d last been touched like that, by Duncan or by anyone else. It was as if he’d found her reset button; even now, her body hummed. At one point she had seen tears in his eyes, and she had wondered whether he was thinking of his late wife, making up for lost time.

Sitting on a corner of the king-size bed, she’d said, “I have a family.”

“I understand,” he’d replied, his voice gentle. “It can’t happen again.”

They were agreed.

She briefly wondered whether Duncan’s “dalliance,” as she thought of it, three years earlier, had played a role in her decision to go to Matías’s hotel room. She didn’t think so; she’d come to accept what had happened with him, and she wasn’t a petty person. She didn’t believe there was a balance sheet in a marriage, a ledger of rights and wrongs. In any case, the problems in their marriage, if she were being honest, were bigger than that one incident.

No, she had done something she’d never done before. She had taken a risk. She’d had a second drink. That wasn’t her at all, that woman in the bar at the Peninsula. She was the A student, the obeyer of rules. Judge Juliana Brody: sensible, prudent, and cautious. Unlike her mother (and because of her mother, who lived in her own dream world), she had always been a planner, always been careful to put her foot right, choose the next step thoughtfully.

And then she had gone and done one single incautious, impetuous thing.

And was it so bad? It had been a lovely evening, actually. Maybe she needed to let go more often.

Now, an e-mail flashed her phone alive, and she glanced at it despite herself. The reality of daily life was beckoning, haranguing. Her Uber was arriving. She had a couple of texts too, a voice mail, and a shit-ton of e-mails to sort through.

An ordinary, prudent life to get back to. She greeted that prospect with some relief.