When My Ex-Husband Brought His Young Mistress to Our Son’s Pool Party to Humiliate Me, I Introduced Everyone to My Handsome New “Boyfriend” — He Laughed and Called It Pathetic, Certain I’d Hired an Actor, Until the Man Opened a Small Case and Said One Sentence That Drained the Color From His Face

“What the hell are you talking about?” Daniel didn’t answer right away.

He reached inside his jacket, unhurried, and drew out a small flat case, and held it out across the space between them.

“I brought you something.” Luke stared at it.

Around the pool, forty suburban parents held their breath.

“What is this,” Luke sneered, trying to recover his footing, “a consolation prize?” And he snatched the case out of Daniel’s hand, and flipped it open, expecting — I don’t know what he expected.

A joke.