Chapter 11: I Sat in the Lot Across from Westside Fitness
I didn't tell Derek I was going back. I told Jenna, and that was it.
I left the next morning at seven thirty, after he left. Same tote on my shoulder, same pendant at my throat. I drove the route I thought he'd driven, not the three-mile loop to his gym on the east side, but west through town, past the high school, past the highway overpass, out to Industrial Parkway. My odometer ticked up. By the time I reached the storage facility, I'd gone just over twelve miles one way. Twenty-four round trip. Close to his twenty-eight, if you added the little loop to the gas station and back.
I didn't park at the gym. I parked across the street in the gas station lot, in the last spot by the air pump, where I could see both the pumps and the entrance to Westside Community Fitness. I pulled my tote into my lap and waited. I told myself I was just observing. I wasn't confronting. I needed to see the routine before I demanded the truth.
The lot was quiet. A delivery truck came and went at the lumber yard. At 7:51 a woman in scrubs went into the gym with a duffel. At 8:04 a guy in a hoodie came out, phone to his ear. I kept checking the time, matching it to our timeline. 7:48, 8:02, 8:15.
At 8:17 Derek's car pulled in.
My breath caught and I didn't mean it to. I slid lower in the seat.
It was his car, same color, same dent on the rear bumper. He parked not right in front, but two spots down, along the side. He didn't get out right away. He sat with the engine running, just as I was sitting, phone lit in his hand. I could see the glow on his face. He was on a call. He talked, nodded, talked more. At 8:22 he ended the call, sat for another minute, then got out.
He wasn't dressed for the gym. No gym bag. Dark gray t-shirt again, same as the video, jeans, hands in pockets. He walked to the door of Westside Fitness, but he didn't go in. A woman came out to meet him. She was younger, dark hair in a ponytail, wearing black leggings and a zip-up. She smiled when she saw him. He smiled back, an easy smile I hadn't seen at home in days. They didn't hug. They didn't touch. They just stood close and talked, heads together, by the glass door.
I watched them for maybe two minutes. She glanced over her shoulder once, then back to him. He handed her something small and white — folded paper, maybe. She tucked it into her pocket. Then she went back inside and he stood there a second longer, looked at his phone, and walked back to his car.
He didn't go west or north. He drove east, back toward home.
I sat in the lot and my hands were shaking. I hadn't seen an affair. I'd seen a meeting. A routine. A person. The number that had two calls on his log, 7:48 and 8:15, now had a face and a place. A second gym. A woman who expected him at eight fifteen.
I waited until his car was gone before I got out. I walked just to the edge of the gym's lot, close enough to read the hours taped to the door, close enough to see inside: a desk, a single treadmill by the window, a bulletin board with flyers. Ordinary. Not fancy. The kind of place you went if you didn't want to be seen by anyone who knew you.
I drove home with the windows down even though it was cool. I needed the air.
Derek was in the living room when I got back, hands on his knees, elbows resting, looking at the floor. He looked up when I came in.
"You were gone," he said.
"I was," I said. I stood in the kitchen doorway, not crossing to the island yet. "Westside."
He stared. His mouth opened a little, the same cliffhanger look from the video, then closed.
"Who is she?" I asked. It was one short sentence. Quiet. The plea from the plan.
He didn't lie this time. He didn't say "nothing" or "needed air." He just dropped his head.
"Her name is Lisa," he said. "She works there."
I nodded. My throat was dry. I could hear my own breathing.
"How long?" I asked.
He rubbed his hands together the way he did when he was on the counter.
May you like
"Three weeks," he said. "Just talks. I swear. We just talk."
I believed the place. I didn't yet believe the just.
