The Marriage Lie. Kimberly Belle

      Will would be so proud. They’re his words, the ones he preached to me when I told him rocky321 is my password for everything. Now they roll right off my tongue.

      I sigh, looking around at the messy piles of papers and binders. There are no more answers in these, that much is certain. I scoot forward on my knees, begin shoving everything back into the cabinet.

      “You know the next place I’d look if I wanted to find my husband’s secrets? And I tell you this at the risk of confirming every stereotype you’ve ever heard about gay men.”

      I reach for another binder, glancing over my shoulder at my brother, and we say the words in unison.

      “His closet.”

      * * *

      Will’s closet is a neat, orderly world where each item is organized by color and grouped by category. Work shirts, pressed and starched and buttoned. A row of pants with pleats sharp enough to slice bread. Jeans and T-shirts and polos, every hanger matching and perfectly spaced. I pull on the top drawer handle, and it opens to reveal his boxers, rolled into tight Tootsie Rolls and stacked in even rows.

      This is Will’s domain, and he’s everywhere I look. I stand here for a moment, drinking him in like wine, feeling a quivering ache take hold in my stomach. I sense him in the orderliness, in his preference for soft fabrics and rich jewel tones, in the scent of spicy soap and mint. Like I could turn around and there he’d be, smiling that smile that makes him look younger and older at the same time. The first time he aimed it at me in a rainy Kroger parking lot, I liked it so much I agreed to a cup of coffee, even though he’d just rammed his car into my bumper.

      “You could have just asked for my number, you know,” I teased him a few days later, as he was walking me to the door after our first official date. “Our fenders didn’t have to take such a beating.”

      “How else was I supposed to get your attention? You were driving away.”

      I laughed. “Poor, innocent fenders.”

      “A worthy sacrifice.” He kissed me then, and I knew he was right.

      “You okay?” Dave says now, his tone gentle.

      I nod, not trusting my voice.

      “Are you sure you want to do this?” He searches my face with a concerned gaze. “You don’t have to help, you know.”

      “I know, but I want to.” He doesn’t look convinced, so I add, “I need to.”

      “Okay, then.” He points back toward the beginning, to where Will’s sweaters are stacked in perfect piles in the cubbies. “I’ll start on that end and you on the other. We’ll meet in the middle.”

      We work mostly in silence. We check every pocket on every pair of pants, shorts and jeans. Dave shakes out every sweater, and I dump out every drawer. We peer inside every single shoe, reach into every single sock. It’s a good hour’s work, and in the end, we find nothing but lint.

      “I know your husband is meticulous, but this is insane. At the very least, we should have found some trash. Old business cards, receipts, some spare change. Is there a spot somewhere where he emptied his pockets?”

      “We keep a spare change jar in the laundry room, but as for the other things...” I lift both shoulders high enough to brush my earlobes.

      My brother and I are seated cross-legged on the closet floor, surrounded by messy piles of Will’s clothes and shoes. The closet looks like a tornado came through it, whipping clothes off the hangers and out of the bins and dumping everything onto the floor. I pick up one of Will’s sweaters, a baby-bottom-soft cashmere I bought him last year for his birthday, and hold it up to my nose, inhaling the familiar scent.

      In that moment, I feel Will so strongly that it stops the breath in my throat and prickles the hairs on the back of my neck. Hey, sweetness, he says in my head, as clearly as if he’s standing right beside me. Whatcha doing?

      I shake the image off, drop the fabric onto my lap. “Now what?”

      Dave pauses to think. “His car?”

      “It’s at the airport.”

      He nods. “Dad and I will figure out how to get it back. In the meantime, what about social media? When’s the last time you checked his Facebook page?”

      Dave’s question stuns me. Will and I share a home, a life, a past. Our relationship has always been built on trust and honesty. He gives me leeway, and I give him a long leash.

      “Never, and stop looking at me like that. Snooping is not something we do, ever. There’s never been any reason for either of us to be jealous or suspicious.”

      Dave inhales, but he doesn’t say the words both of us are thinking.

      Until now.

      James’s voice comes around the corner. “Hey, Dave?”

      “In the closet,” Dave calls out.

      James’s laugh beats him to the closet doorway, where he appears clad in head-to-toe lululemon and clutching a white gift bag. His blondish hair is plastered to his forehead with rain and sweat, and his breath comes in quick, hard puffs. “There are so many jokes I could make right now.”

      Dave rolls his eyes. “Did your run take you by the mall?”

      James looks down at the bag like he just remembered he was holding it. “Oh, right. It’s for Iris, I guess. I found it hanging on the front doorknob. There’s no note.”

      I take the bag and pull out a brand-new iPhone 6, one of the big ones with more gigabytes than I could ever use, still in the sealed box.

      “Why would somebody give you an iPhone?” James says.

      “Because she feels sorry for me, and she knows I broke mine.” I drop the box back into the bag and hand everything back.

      “Do you want me to set it up for you?” Dave says.

      “No, I want you to take it back to the store, get a refund and then buy me a different one with my own money.”

      “Wouldn’t it just be more efficient to write this person a check?”

      As usual, my brother is right. I do need a new phone, though I’ll be damned if anybody but me pays for it. “Okay, but you’ll need my laptop to install it. I think it’s in a kitchen drawer somewhere. And while you’re at it, look up what that thing costs, will you?” I’ll have to log on to the school system to find Claire’s address, then I can drop her a check in the mail.

      “Sure thing.”

      That settled, James leans a shoulder against the doorjamb, taking in the shambles we’ve made of the closet. The rows of askew hangers, the mountain of sweaters and shirts on the floor, the clothes hanging out of the drawers like a half-off bin at Target. “Do I even want to know?”

      “We’re snooping,” Dave says.

      “And?”

      “Nothing. Not even a gas receipt.”

      Dave’s tone is heavy with meaning, as is his expression. A hard knot blooms in my belly at the silent conversation that passes between the two men. What kind of person leaves nothing, not even a gum wrapper or a forgotten penny, behind? The kind who doesn’t want his wife to know what he’s up to. Their words come across so clearly, they might as well have said them out loud.

      “He wasn’t cheating,” I say, my voice as unyielding as I feel. There are some things you know to the very core of yourself, things you would bet your life and very last penny on. This is one of them. “He wasn’t.”

      Dave gestures all around him, to the piles of clothes and shoes. “Sweetheart, no man is this vigilant. There’s got to be something going on here.”

      “Of course there’s something going on here. Will got on the