Free From Scratch by Rachel Goodman

she’s standing makes her look small and fragile, as if she’s on the verge of crumbling like a cake that doesn’t have enough eggs to bind it together.
    In an aisle nearby, a group of women point and whisper. I watch as a store employee tiptoes around Wes, straightening a rack of red and blue polo shirts, no doubt hoping to appear invisible.
    A beat later, I’m beside Annabelle. For a moment, they both seem confused as to why I’m there.
    “Hey, guys,” I say, my gaze darting back and forth between them. “Everything okay?”
    Wes flinches but stays quiet.
    Blinking back tears, Annabelle takes a deep breath and says with false bravado, “Everything’s great. We were . . . catching up.”
    Wes shifts on his feet. “Whatever,” he mumbles, his attention focused on the group of women not even trying to hide their eavesdropping. He looks like he wishes the floor would open up and swallow him whole. “This is such bullshit.”
    “Hey, knock it off with the attitude, Wesley,” I say.
    I can see a battle being fought behind his eyes, as if he’s contemplating whether or not to challenge me. Finally, he shakes his head and says, “I gotta go.” Then he glares at Annabelle, and without even a good-bye to me, stalks away.
    Annabelle’s shoulders slump and her body seems to collapse in on itself.
    As I watch him flee the bookstore, I wonder where the old Wesley went, my protective older brother who can consume twenty hard-shell tacos in less than seven minutes and cringes when people use the word “panties.” The Wes that gave Annabelle bouquets of irises because they matched her eyes and mouthed lines to her from the front row of the Highland Park High School auditorium when she landed the female lead in Macbeth .
    This Wesley is bitter, jaded.
    When we get back into the car, Annabelle refuses to meet my gaze. She starts the engine and fiddles with the radio, her fingers shaking as she switches from station to station at lightning speed.
    I place my hand over hers and wait. After a long moment, she hits the power button. The silence is heavy around us.
    “How long have you known?” she says finally.
    “A couple of days,” I say, hesitant. “I ran into Wes at the diner. He told me—”
    “Everything?”
    I shake my head. “Only that you guys broke up.”
    “I thought he would’ve told you sooner,” Annabelle says. “Every time you called I kept expecting you to bring it up, but you never did.”
    “It’s been awhile since Wes and I have talked,” I say. “I guess this is why.”
    She nods. When she doesn’t respond, I squeeze her shoulder. “I’m trying to understand why you didn’t tell me.”
    Annabelle tugs on her seat belt and stares out the window, her eyes locked on a plastic shopping bag skittering along the sidewalk. “Because you never asked.”
    My mouth drops open. That can’t be right. I think back to our conversations over the past few months and all the things we talked about—when her event planning company was featured in InStyle Weddings, how she adopted a cocker spaniel puppy named Finley, when she signed the papers on a newly built condo in the heart of Uptown.
    The truth hits me like a slap across the face. I assumed Wes had been a part of those milestones, but all that time Annabelle had been alone and heartbroken. And I had never asked.
    “Annabelle,” I start, then falter. “I’m . . . I’m so . . .”
    “I slept with someone else,” she says, her voice breaking. “Only once, but it was enough.”
    My mind fills with questions. Never in my wildest dreams would I imagine that Annabelle would cheat. On Wes, no less. I want to offer support, but the words dry up in my throat.
    She tells me she waited two months to confess, until the lies and the guilt became so unbearable that she spilled the beans one morning in the grocery store, smack dab in the middle of the frozen dinner aisle. Wes simply said nothing. Not when Annabelle cried and begged his