A Good Marriage

by Kimberly McCreight

  She shifted out of the living room entryway so more newcomers could tumble in and spotted Maude making sangria at the marble island in their glamourous open kitchen. She was smiling, enjoying the party. Or so it seemed. Once Amanda was closer, though, she saw Maude’s lips tremble.

  Maude’s face brightened a little when she saw Amanda. But her skin was noticeably clammy when she kissed Amanda on the cheek. “So glad you’re here,” she said mechanically.

  “Zach is, too,” Amanda quipped, ashamed that, despite everything, she felt the need to point out this small, sad victory. “I don’t know where he went, but we came in together.”

  “Oh.” Maude smiled distractedly. “Great.”

  “Yes, it’s a big night,” Amanda said, surprised by the depth of her own hostility. She could hardly contain it anymore. “Zach even deigned to tell me what he does all day.”

  “What’s that?” Maude asked. She was focused on cutting up huge hunks of fruit, but with the wrong type of knife so that it was ending up unappetizingly mashed. Amanda wondered if she should offer to take over before Maude cut her own fingers off.

  “Something about people and their connections and him being ahead of everyone. Related to logistics, I’m assuming. It doesn’t matter,” Amanda said, realizing now that Zach really hadn’t told her much of anything. “Is Sarah here?”

  “Yes, she was just updating me on the school email investigation.” Maude pressed her lips tight as her eyes flooded with tears. She squeezed them shut. “I’m sorry,” she said, wiping at her face. “I, um, I just spoke with Sophia a few minutes ago. I’m trying to hold it together here, but it’s not exactly easy.”

  “You spoke with her tonight?” Amanda asked, looking around at the chaos. “In the middle of all this?”

  “I know, right?” Maude nodded with grim exasperation. “But they only just got back from their camping trip and into cell phone range thirty minutes ago.”

  “Are you—Is she okay?”

  “No. She’s not.” Maude’s face was stiff as she sawed at another orange. “It was worse than she … Whoever was threatening to post those pictures if we didn’t pay them also blackmailed Sophia directly. They said they’d post them if she didn’t do more sexual things, live on camera for them. And once she did one thing …” Maude shuddered in disgust.

  “Oh, poor Sophia,” Amanda said.

  Maude glared off into the distance, the knife gripped in her hand. “She told me she snuck away from the group while they were off on this camping trip and walked out into the ocean. Wanted to keep on walking forever, that’s what she said. She woke up on the beach a couple hours later, by some grace of—” Maude’s voice choked out.

  Amanda reached out for Maude, pulling her tight. Amanda didn’t even have time to consider what a person should do in that situation. She was already doing it. Because she was a person and a mother and a friend.

  “She’ll be okay,” Amanda said into Maude’s thick curls. Her friend felt so fragile in her arms. “She has parents who love her, no matter what.”

  Maude shook her head as the two separated. “The camp has a staff member flying home with her. It was faster than us going down there. And so, right now, my daughter is out there, broken apart. And here I am, at a party in my home with a bunch of drunk people having sex upstairs. Fantastic.”

  “Do you want me to help get rid of everyone?” Amanda asked, guiding Maude’s hand down until the knife was safely resting on the counter. “We could tell them you’re sick or something.”

  “It’s okay,” she said. “There’s nothing I can do right now anyway. Not until I find the person who is behind this. Sarah told me they think it’s a parent. Whoever it is could be here, right now.” Her eyes scanned the room. “Brooklyn Country Day isn’t that big. Anyway, I’ll let everyone stay for a bit. Then I’ll have Sebe make himself useful and throw them out.”

  Amanda stepped closer and put a hand on Maude’s back. “She’s going to be okay. When I was younger I had all sorts of—Well, it doesn’t matter,” Amanda said. “Teenagers are very resilient. You’ll see.”

  “But why didn’t she tell me …” Maude’s voice drifted off. “I should have known from the start that there was something more.”

  “We all miss things. I just found emails in Zach’s desk drawer from Country Day from weeks ago about some problems with Case. I had no idea he was having trouble at school. We never even responded to schedule the meeting they requested.”

  “You found scheduling emails?” Maude asked, eyebrows pinched. “From Brooklyn Country Day?”

  “Yeah,” Amanda went on, wishing she could take it back. “They went to Zach, for some reason, though he claims they don’t even have his email.”

  “Then how did he get them?” Maude asked.

  “I don’t know. But I found the printouts in his office drawer.”

  “Printouts.” Maude’s jaw clenched. Amanda knew she shouldn’t have brought it up. It was so silly compared to Sophia’s situation.

  “Maude!” Sebe called from the steps out to the backyard. The back door was wide open. “Can you come out here? We need your expert opinion.”

  Maude glared in Sebe’s direction. “If Sebe and I survive this mess, it will be a miracle,” she said. “He’s always so calm and rational. It’s the doctor in him. He doesn’t care who’s responsible. He just wants Sophia to be okay. I want that, too. But I also need him to be out for blood, like me.”

  “Maude!” Sebe called again with a hangdog look on his face. “Come on. For a second, please!”

  Maude looked aggravated. “Sorry, I’ll be right back.” She headed out of the open kitchen toward Sebe and the backyard with the pitcher of sangria, then paused and turned back. “Oh, and I want to meet Zach. I’d like to talk to him.”

  Amanda looked around until she spotted Zach circling the edge of the crowded living room. Watching everyone. “He’s over there.” Amanda pointed. “I’ll introduce you guys later.” Though Amanda hoped that would never happen. She didn’t love the idea of Zach talking to Maude, not with Maude already so upset.

  “Great.” Maude smiled, though it was strained. “Be right back.”

  As Maude disappeared into the crowd, Amanda’s phone rang in her clutch. She froze. Come on. Not now. It rang again. She braced herself as she dug it out. A blocked number. She could let the call go straight to voice mail. But he’d just call back, wouldn’t he?

  Amanda needed to stop running, once and for all. From everything. And everyone. She clenched her teeth as she answered the phone.

  “Hello?” Silence.

  “Hello?” Still, nothing.

  And then there it was: her spine. So much stronger than she had ever supposed. When she spoke again, her voice was a menacing growl.

  “Leave me the fuck alone, you bastard.”

  Lizzie

  JULY 12, SUNDAY

  I went to Maude and Sebe’s house first thing in the morning, hoping to finally get the whole story. A story I was praying would put Sam fully in the clear. Maude wasn’t under any obligation to tell me anything, of course, but she’d already come close. I felt sure that was why she kept showing up. She wanted to come clean. And now I had actual evidence to help convince her that was the right thing to do.

  It was only by the grace of God that the juice bottle Maude had drunk from in my office was still there, sitting on the corner of my desk, when I’d raced back to Young & Crane the night before. At my request, Millie had called Halo Diagnostics to ask for that one last comparative test. Rushed, in the middle of the night. On a weekend.

  When a disgruntled Halo technician finally emerged, it had been close to 3:00 a.m. He’d been very short and walked with the arm-swinging stride of someone in a military parade. He’d slapped a nine-by-twelve envelope into my hand. “Your sample was a match to the print in the blood on the stair. And the golf bag.”

  “Are you sure?”

  He pulled his chin back. “Of course. This isn’t DNA. Fingerprints
match or they don’t. Period.”

  “Okay. Thank you.”

  “By the way, tell Millie this one is on the house. We’ve all got a soft spot for her, which is why she needs to get better and get her ass back to work, soon.”

  Sebe answered the door. He didn’t look happy to see me, but he also did not seem especially surprised. “She’s in the living room,” he said without asking why I’d come.

  Maude was sitting on the couch, arms wrapped tight around her. She looked up at me, then down at the folder in my hands with “Halo Diagnostics” written in big bold letters across it.

  I held it out toward her. “Your fingerprints were found in Amanda’s blood on one of the stairs in her home and on Zach’s golf club bag. My guess is they’re on the club, too.”

  Maude made no move to take the folder.

  “I’m sorry,” she said finally, and then the tears came, rolling silently down her cheeks at an alarming rate. “I almost told you so many times.”

  “I’m not your lawyer,” I said as I sat on the edge of the chair across from her. “I want to make that clear. Nothing you tell me will be privileged. In fact, I could even be obligated to let the police know I found your fingerprints at the scene, to help Zach. He’s my client. But I’m—I read parts of Amanda’s journal. I know the two of you were really good friends. If there’s something I can tell the police that will help explain what happened when I talk to them, I want to do that, too.”

  This was true. But it was also true I was there for the much more selfish purpose of categorically ruling out Sam. And to do that, I needed Maude to tell me what had actually happened. I needed to hear her say it—that she was responsible. She and not Sam.

  “Maude,” Sebe said sharply. “That’s the second time she’s told you to retain your own lawyer. You should. We should. Before you speak more.”

  Maude closed her eyes and shook her head. She patted the couch next to her, encouraging Sebe to come sit. Once he had, she reached over for his hand and linked their fingers tight.

  “He’s always trying to protect me from myself,” she said to me. “You know, he went back to Amanda’s house to see if he could find something I was afraid I’d dropped there. Almost got himself arrested, or worse, all for me.”

  The test strip. The one I had in a pocket somewhere. Of course, it could have been for glucose monitoring, not ovulation. Maude had said she was diabetic. It was Sebe who had been in the house when I was there; his prints were surely on the back door.

  “I am trying to protect you,” Sebe said. “That’s why I’m telling you to stop talking.”

  “Come on, Sebe.” Maude put a hand on his back when he looked away. “How can we tell Sophia to live her truth, not to be ashamed, if we’re not brave enough to face the mistakes we’ve made? And I made a mistake that night, there’s no doubt. I never should have gone to Zach and Amanda’s house.”

  Amanda

  THE PARTY

  When Amanda hung up, she felt like she could fly. She’d never told anyone to fuck off before, not in her entire life. And her dad, of all people? She’d stood her ground. She’d used her voice. And she was not struck dead. The world did not disappear. Amanda was smiling as she looked down at her phone.

  Maybe Zach could not be changed, but perhaps the world could be. Not with a single conversation or one long scream. But little by little. Like the small clicks of a combination lock, each notch bringing her one step closer to freedom.

  But when Amanda looked up, her heart immediately sank. Sarah and Zach were talking on the far side of the room. Zach was moving his hands around in that way he did when he was explaining something to someone he thought was especially stupid; Sarah’s eyebrows were pinched, in that way they always were whenever she talked to someone she hated. There Zach went, ruining everything again.

  Amanda’s phone vibrated with a text.

  NO FUCK YOU FUCKING BITCH

  Rage pulsed through the screen. Amanda’s hand felt scalded. She almost dropped the phone.

  She looked around for Maude. She couldn’t tell Zach about her dad, but she could tell her friends. They would try to help her. But before she could find Maude, her phone vibrated again.

  Keep looking. I’m here.

  Amanda jerked back, knocking right into a busty woman with short curly hair and a full glass of red wine who was standing behind her. The wine tipped all over the woman’s white blouse.

  “Oh, God, I’m so sorry,” Amanda gasped.

  But the woman only laughed, looking down at the damp stain covering her huge breasts. She was rocking visibly. “Who cares! My kids are at camp. I have all day tomorrow to wash my own fucking shirt.”

  Another pulse in Amanda’s hand.

  Come find me! And try not to spill any more wine.

  Amanda felt light-headed as she scanned the faces in the crowd. He was there, watching her. He was inside that house. But surely he’d stand right out. Was he watching her through a window? Like the peepers Sarah had talked about? If he was outside, that meant it wasn’t safe to leave. Amanda was trapped.

  She needed someplace safe to think.

  There was a couple on the staircase already, drifting up awkwardly. They were talking and laughing. The woman had a spiky pixie cut, the man a shaved head. They made an attractive couple. Not married, though, definitely not. There was a flirtatious bashfulness to the whole thing, and a politeness, as if giving each other space to change their minds.

  Amanda paused, giving them another second to get all the way up, before darting upstairs herself. She peeked carefully down the hall, walking quickly past two closed doors until she found a small open room at the back. On the opposite side of the hall was a big sign taped to one door that read “Off Limits.” Sophia’s room, probably.

  Amanda turned into the open guest room and pulled the door shut behind her. She barely had the door locked when someone knocked. He’d followed her up the stairs. She looked around frantically for a way out—the window, but it was too high; she’d have no way to get down. Amanda tried to take a deep breath. She was starting to feel dizzy. Was everyone there so drunk they’d honestly let her deadbeat dad waltz on in and up the stairs?

  Amanda backed up, away from the door. Almost to the other side of the room.

  “Amanda, it’s me, Sebe.” She recognized his accent. “Are you okay? I saw you race up here. You looked upset.”

  Amanda rushed back to the door, unlocking it. Sebe looked startled when she jerked it open.

  “What’s wrong?” he asked. “Are you okay? You look—You’re pale.”

  When she went to speak, Amanda started to cry. “I’m sorry,” she gasped.

  “Don’t apologize,” Sebe said. He put a hand on her shoulder and guided her over to the bed, glancing back at the door. He moved to secure it open with a doorstop in the shape of Peter Rabbit. “Sit, sit. What happened?” Sebe stayed standing, though, even took a step back.

  Amanda thought about showing him the texts on her phone. But from her own father? She was too ashamed to admit it. Any of it.

  “It’s nothing,” she began. “It’s just—I’m not great at parties. I get overwhelmed.”

  Sebe frowned. “But it’s something more than that, isn’t it?” he asked, more concerned now, and in a clinical, doctorly way. “Because you really don’t seem yourself.”

  Amanda jumped when her phone vibrated once more. But it was only Zach this time: Left party. Have to stop at office. See you later at home.

  “Who’s that?” Sebe asked, even more alarmed.

  “Zach,” Amanda said, her voice hoarse. “He left. Without even finding me to say goodbye or offering to walk me home. What kind of husband does that?”

  “A not very good one,” Sebe said, but delicately. He finally came over to sit down on the bed next to her.

  “Zach is an awful husband actually,” Amanda said. It was the first time she’d ever said anything like that out loud about her marriage: the sad, ugly truth. “He always has been. H
e doesn’t love me. I don’t think he loves anybody.”

  Sebe was quiet for a moment. “I’m sorry,” he said finally. “Do you want me to walk you home?”

  Amanda did her best not to burst into tears again. “Maybe, but I’m not—”

  Her phone had vibrated again.

  Get the fuck away from Sebe.

  Amanda jumped to her feet and bolted. She flew down the stairs as Sebe shouted after her.

  When Amanda hit the living room, there were even more people near the front door. Way too many to push through. She tried anyway. She was scared enough to shove. But everyone was so drunk they didn’t even notice.

  “Go out the back.” A drunken man in a jester’s hat pointed a wavering finger on his way to the bathroom. “There’s an alley with a gate to the street. All the lazy assholes are going out that way. The racist neighbor lady calls the police. But fuck her, anyway.”

  Amanda ran out the back door and raced down the alley, waiting for somebody to yell at her, for hands to grab hold as she sprinted all the way down Prospect Park West in her platform heels. But she heard nothing except the ragged sound of her own breathing, and the desperate pounding of her frantic heart.

  Lizzie

  JULY 12, SUNDAY

  “At the party, I finally started putting the pieces together,” Maude went on. “Everyone was so drunk, and all the confidentiality with the email investigation went right out the window. Before long, I’d learned that the person behind the hacking was possibly a parent, and that it had all started in April. Then Amanda tells me about some printouts of scheduling emails from Brooklyn Country Day she found in Zach’s desk drawer. Even though he claimed the school didn’t have his email. That was how they’d hacked in, the scheduling emails. And why would he have printouts? Then Sarah adds that Zach is bankrupt. All of it together …” She shook her head. “I didn’t know for sure, obviously. That’s why I wanted to confront Zach. I thought I’d be able to tell from his reaction. But when I tried to find him at the party, he was already gone.”