In her deposition, Brenda had admitted to being only partly conscious of her actions that afternoon. What she said was, I was upset. I was stunned, mortified, terribly confused. I wasn’t thinking clearly. I didn’t know what I was doing. I wasn’t planning on stealing the painting. I just wanted . . .

Wanted what, Dr. Lyndon?

To see the painting one more time, she’d said. To say good-bye to it.

Brenda punched in the security code and unlocked the door to the Barrington Room, ful y prepared to find Mrs. Pencaldron sitting at the Queen Anne table, waiting for her. But the room was empty, hushed, just as it had been in the moments before Brenda’s class al semester long. Brenda felt an enormous sense of loss, the beginnings of mourning. Her career was dead, but the body not yet cold. And it was al her own stupid, stupid fault. Temptation had been placed in Brenda’s path, and instead of swerving around it, she had met it at a bar.

Brenda set her purse and the bottle of water down on the Queen Anne table, and she stood before the painting. She was trying to absorb it, to internalize it, because, certainly, she would never see it again. She wanted to rest her face against its surface, feel its texture under her cheek; she wanted to climb into the painting and lie down.

Brenda heard a noise. She turned to see Mrs. Pencaldron clapping at her, like she was a wayward dog. Mrs. Pencaldron snatched up the bottle of water from the Queen Anne table (it would indeed leave a pale ring).

“What are you doing in here?” Mrs. Pencaldron said. “You don’t belong in here! And this—” She shook the bottle of water and wiped at the table with the bottom of her blouse. “What were you thinking? You know the rules!”

“Sorry,” Brenda said. “I’m so sorry.”

“You know the rules, but you don’t fol ow them,” Mrs. Pencal-dron said. “Sorry does not begin to address your transgressions.”

Brenda held up her hands. “Okay, whatever. I came to get my things. I’m leaving.”

“I wil pack your things properly and send them to your home address,” Mrs. Pencaldron said. “I suggest you leave this room and the department now, otherwise I wil cal campus security.”

“Campus security?” Brenda said. “There’s no need for that . . .” Brenda was dying to address Mrs. Pencaldron by her first name, but she didn’t know what it was. “I’m leaving.”

Augie Fisk appeared in the doorway. He looked at Brenda with a combination of pity and disgust. “We al heard,” he said. “Everyone knows. Did Atela fire you?”

“She didn’t have to,” Brenda said. “I’m leaving.”

“This isn’t going to be something you can walk away from,” Augie said. “This is going to stick. I mean, you can try to find another job, but you won’t be able to work anywhere accredited. Hel , you won’t even be able to teach high school. Maybe you should look into one of those online universities, where they don’t care what crimes you’ve committed.”

“It’s disgraceful,” Mrs. Pencaldron said. “I knew something wasn’t right with the two of you. Couldn’t put my finger on it, though, and certainly never expected that . . . but something, yes, I sensed something from the beginning.”

“We al thought you were a flash in the pan,” Augie said. “A woman as attractive as you, with your boutique subject matter, a specialty that no one else on earth knows about, that has no relevance to the rest of the canon. I knew you weren’t for real. There was something fishy about you, something artificial. We al knew it.”

“Stop it,” Brenda said. Couldn’t they see she was upset enough as it was?

“You stop it,” Mrs. Pencaldron said. She pointed to the door. “Leave, or I cal security.”

Not in her right mind. Terribly confused. And angry. Brenda hated Mrs. Pencaldron. She had never liked her but now she real y despised her.

And Augie Fisk—yuck!—with his thick shock of red hair and his pale, pinched lips. Flash in the pan? He had asked her out again and again, and each time Brenda turned him down, she felt worse. Not in her right mind. Fishy and artificial? An online university? After eight years of graduate school, the thousands of hours of reading and research? Al that work? The slavish devotion? Suddenly, Brenda was furious. She would not be ordered out of this room. She had done a good job; she was a good teacher.

We all knew it. Wel , wasn’t it easy to say so. Now.

Brenda reached into her bag and grabbed a book—one of the nearly impossible to find paperbacks of The Innocent Impostor that she had ordered for her class—and flung it. She threw it, she told the university counsel in her deposition, just to throw something. Have you never thrown anything in anger? Have you never felt that impulse? Brenda was not aiming the book at Augie Fisk or Mrs. Pencaldron or the painting. But hit the painting it did. (Lower left quadrant, three-quarter-of-an-inch “divot” or “gouge.”) Brenda sucked in her breath, horrified, and Mrs. Pencaldron shrieked, and Augie Fisk said, “Oh, shit. You’ve real y done it now.”

Mrs. Pencaldron said, “I’m cal ing security. Block the door, Augie. We are not letting her leave. She has to answer to this.”

Brenda gazed at the painting through her tears. She understood it perfectly now. The splatter, the mess, the tangle, the chaos. That painting was her life.

Settle, she thought. It was a word with multiple meanings. On the one hand, it was comforting. The matter would be settled, final y. Cleaned up, laid to rest. Champion University v. Brenda Lyndon would become another file in the law offices of Brian Delaney, Esquire, closed away in a drawer.

But settle also meant doing without. She would have to settle for a life excluded from academia, and for a life without Walsh.

Her heart longed for him, her body ached for his arms around her. She wanted to hear his voice; it didn’t matter, particularly, what he said. But Brenda couldn’t make herself cal him; her relationship with Walsh was intertwined with the loss of her career, her life’s work. Brenda hurt now, but it would hurt more to talk with Walsh, to relive, day in and day out, the humiliation of that afternoon with Suzanne Atela, Bil Franklin, Amrita, Augie Fisk, Mrs. Pencaldron, and, final y, campus security.

Where was she going to find the money? Could she declare bankruptcy? Would she be forced to ask her parents? In Brenda’s mind, a hundred and twenty-five thousand dol ars was no different from a hundred and sixty—they were both unattainable. She would have to sel her half of the cottage, but she couldn’t drop that on Vicki now—and what if Vicki and Ted, for whatever reason, didn’t have the money to buy Brenda out? Would Brenda force a sale of the whole property? She could just hear the thoughts of Vicki and her parents: Brenda is book smart, yes, but she has no common sense. She is unable to make her way in the world. We always have to bail her out.

How to defend herself? What else could she do? One thing. There had always been only one place for Brenda to hide. Lowly Worm, bookworm, nose always in a book. She pul ed her yel ow legal pad out of her bag, poured a cup of coffee from her thermos, and started to write.

It was nothing he would ever be able to use on his résumé, but Josh was proud of his Wiffle bal pitching ability. Josh gave the bal perfect arc and speed—and in addition, Josh had taught Blaine stance and swing so that Blaine hit the bal nearly every time. Yes, the Wiffle bal was satisfying, it was one of the things Josh would miss most about babysitting, and he was glad that he’d been able to show off his pitching prowess for Vicki.

Vicki was feeling better, she looked healthier and stronger, and Josh found himself wanting to spend more time with her. She was his boss, yes, but she was also his friend and he found her easy to talk to and fun to be with. Josh’s relationship with Brenda had basical y been whittled down to pleasantries and an occasional short conversation about the progress of her screenplay—and Josh’s relationship with Melanie had morphed into a whole, huge, complicated and secret thing. Josh’s feelings for Melanie were running amok; they were growing like some crazy, twisting vine, strangling his heart. He wanted to talk to someone about Melanie—and strangely, the person who came to mind was Vicki. But this was out of the question.

Melanie was thirteen weeks pregnant. Her stomach held the slightest swel —rounded, smooth, tight. She was luminous—always smiling, radiating good, sweet, sexy Melanie-ness. He was crazy about her, he couldn’t wait for the day to pass, for night to come, for his father to switch off the TV and retire to his bedroom, because this was when Josh left the house, driving out to ’Sconset with a sense of fervent anticipation. Melanie.

Since the beginning of August, his longing for her had intensified. One night, she didn’t come to meet him at al . Josh waited patiently in the beach parking lot until eleven o’clock, then he drove, as stealthily as possible, past the house on Shel Street. The house was dark and buckled up for the night. In the morning, Melanie told him in a quick whisper that she had simply fal en asleep.

Simply? he thought. What had developed between them was wel beyond simple.

She admitted to him that she was talking to Peter. Not just the one time and not just to discuss “household matters.” He knew about the baby; she had told him.

“I had to,” she said. “He’s the father. He deserves to know.”