On the drive home, she intentionally missed calls from Sophie’s parents and Jack. Tom had obviously called them and then in their rage, they would have called Jack. He would be angry too. They were all angry with her but it hurt most that Tom was. It felt like he had chosen Sophie over her. Her mother came into her mind again: her thin lips parted to reveal stained teeth, her voice warbling Rodgers and Hammerstein as if she were trying to sing opera:
I’m gonna wash that man right outa my hair
I’m gonna wash that man right outa my hair
I’m gonna wash that man right outa my hair
And send him on his way.
Margot stopped at the beach, though it was already getting dark. She couldn’t go home yet. She didn’t have the energy. It had all been so unfair. She’d married the wrong man and ever since then, her life had been one disaster after the other. She’d wished that her parents had been like Sophie’s. Her parents had never offered for her to come home! They would have been appalled. It just wasn’t done then. Little Jack would have been from a divorced family and going to school, he would have been teased— stigmatised because of her. It was already hard for him because of the rumours about his father’s affairs with other men. What would they have done for money? It wasn’t like she could just get a job.