by Lisa Gardner
In the closet, I find a full lineup of maternity wear, arranged by size and going all the way up to the final trimester. I have a brief, dizzying thought. I’m trapped now. My mother’s going to keep me here, has clearly been planning it all along. I bathed with her soap, used her lotions, and will now put on her clothes. I’ll never get out. I’m like that girl in the Greek myth who ate pomegranates in Hades, then could never fully escape.
Except my mother doesn’t want me. I already know that.
My child, on the other hand, this final addition to my father’s legacy . . .
I lean against the closet door, trying to figure out once more if I’m going to cry or vomit. When I manage to pass a full minute without doing either, I pull on soft gray stretch pants and a matching gray top. Cashmere, probably.
Conrad would laugh if he could see me now. He’d grin and tell me to enjoy the ride. Not having any family left, he couldn’t understand my ambivalence about mine. Clearly she loves you, he’d tell me again and again, which only proved he never understood my mother at all.
Downstairs, my mother is in the kitchen. There is a heaping plate of fresh fruit on the kitchen table and she has the Cuisinart whirring away. She turns it off when she sees me.
“High-protein smoothie,” she announces cheerfully. “Full of antioxidants and healthy fats for the baby.”
Only my mother can work a blender while wearing pearls.
There’s no use fighting it. Years of training kick in. I sit at the table. I pick at the fruit. I obediently sip the green sludge.
I don’t look at the fridge. I never look at the fridge. Not that it’s the same one, of course. After the “tragic incident,” my mother had the kitchen gutted. New cabinets, marble countertops, high-end appliances, custom window treatments. It’s all creamy and soft and Italian. Not at all like the original dark cherrywood cabinets, green-and-gold granite tops. Meaning nothing in here should remind me of my father or that day.
But it does. It always does. I don’t care that the flooring has been ripped out and replaced. Or that the stainless steel refrigerator was exchanged for a wood-paneled model. I see the spot where my father died. I recall the smell. I remember looking at his face, so waxy and still, and thinking it didn’t look like him at all.
I don’t know how my mom still lives in this house. But I guess I’ll get to figure that out for myself now. How to go back to the home Conrad and I shared. How to pick up the pieces of a life, where I’m still not sure where we went wrong.
I notice for the first time that all the lights are on and the curtains drawn, though it’s only midday. I don’t have to think about it for long.
“The press?” I ask.
“You know how they are.” My mother waves an airy hand. At least on this we’re united. The media descended the first time, too. Harvard math professor killed in his own home by his teenage daughter. How could they resist? Initially, my mom had thought she could control the story, the way she controlled every other facet of her highly fictionalized life. Needless to say, the reporters ate her alive.
She retreated. Took up the tactic of letting her grand silence speak for her. As a minor, at least I wasn’t subjected to such abuse. But it was weeks, maybe even months, before we could leave our house in peace. I learned to hate the sight of news vans. I learned not to believe anything I saw on TV. At least I got that education early in life, because I’m definitely going to need it now.
Knock on the side door. The one used only by close confidants. My mother bustles over.
Dick Delaney, my lawyer, is standing there, still wearing the same sharply pressed gray suit from the courtroom. He’s a handsome man with his silver hair and closely trimmed beard. I have countless memories of him. Poker nights with my father. Laughing indulgently at all the math jokes, as one of the only nonacademics in the room. How did he even know my father? What had earned him a seat at the poker table? I don’t know. But he was always part of our household, brilliant and successful in his own right, a fellow Harvard alum, which maybe was all the credentials he needed. I never even thought of him as a defense attorney.
Until, of course, sixteen years ago. Again, the smell, the look on my father’s waxy face.
I have this terrible sense of déjà vu. Here we are again, the three of us, this kitchen.
My mom doesn’t say a word. She simply steps back, allowing Mr. Delaney to enter. In an echo of my own thoughts, her right hand is already clutched protectively to her chest, fingering her precious pearls.
He looks from her to me to her again. The expression on his face isn’t good. “After picking up Evie from the courthouse, where did you go?” he asks my mother.
Her brow furrows. “Here. Straight here, of course. Poor Evie needed to rest.”
“No stops along the way?”
“Of course.”
“Not even a drive by her old house so she could pick up personal possessions, items of clothing?”
“Absolutely not. Evie has everything she needs right here.”
Mr. Delaney stares at me. Slowly, I nod, though I already understand I don’t want to hear what he’ll say next.
“Your house is on fire.” He announces it bluntly.
I try to absorb the statement. I hear the words. I just can’t seem to process them. My house. Conrad’s and my home. My husband’s death scene.
“Total loss,” he continues.
The future life I was going to lead. The photos and personal items that tied me to the past.
“I’m sorry,” he says. “You’re sure you were together all afternoon? Both of you? Right here?”
“Of course!” My mother is outraged.
“The police will be coming,” my lawyer says. Then he takes a seat at the table, and together, we wait.
* * *
—
THIS TIME, THE knock comes from the front door. But we were already alerted to the detective’s arrival by the sudden spike in noise from across the street—the media spotting the official vehicle and descending with a crescendo of questions. No comment, the police will say. That’s what they always say. After all, it’s not their lives being torn apart.
Mr. Delaney gets up, does the honors. My mother and I don’t look at each other. We can’t. I fix my gaze on my half-finished green smoothie, the piece of uneaten pineapple on my plate. Under the table, my hands are shaking furiously on my lap. Again, I’ve never felt myself such a mess. Shock? Pregnancy hormones? My heart is racing like a hummingbird’s and I suddenly want to blurt out everything, anything. Except I honestly don’t know what to say. I just want whatever magic words will give me my life back.
Dead woman walking. If that’s what I’d felt like twenty-four hours ago, then what am I now? Corpse walking? The ghost of a never-realized dream?
I recognize the first detective who walks into the kitchen. The father figure who attempted to question me last night. He still wears his very stern, yet somehow equally concerned expression. Standing next to Mr. Delaney, who is wearing a thousand-dollar suit, the detective appears both slightly frumpy and more human.
My mother is already sitting up straighter, her eyes zeroing in on a target. An older male, reasonably attractive and clearly out of his socioeconomic league. She will devour him alive. And relish every bite.
Behind him comes a second detective. Female. Chin-length curly blond hair. Killer cheekbones. Nearly crystalline blue eyes. She’s wearing slim-fitting jeans and sleek black leather boots that match her swagger.
I have that sense of déjà vu again. Her gaze goes straight to me, narrowing slightly.
Smell hits me first. The memory of gunpowder and blood. The refrigerator. Don’t look at the streaked stainless steel. Don’t stare at the wax-doll version of my father on the floor. Sitting at the table. Except not this table. That table. And not in this kitchen, that kitchen.
She’d b
een the one sitting across from me. Younger. Softer. Kinder, I think. Except maybe because I’d been younger and softer, too. Questions then, questions now.
I look at my mom, Mr. Delaney, the detective, my hands still shaking on my lap. And I can’t help but think, the gang’s all here.
* * *
—
THE BLONDE, SERGEANT Detective D. D. Warren, doesn’t speak right away. She lets the older detective, Call Me Phil, run through the particulars. Warren prowls the kitchen. I wonder if she’s noting all the differences—new cabinets, countertops, appliances. Does she think it’s strange my mother still lives, cooks, eats, in a crime scene? That we are sitting, even now, mere feet from where my father died?
My mother is talking. With Mr. Delaney’s approval. She’s also turning her head a certain way—her best side, while periodically fingering a strand of frosted blond hair above her ear, French-manicured nails lingering on the graceful curve of her neck.
I’ve never seen my mother interact with a man without batting her eyelashes. She remains an attractive woman. Slim, graceful, good bones. Not to mention she’s a fanatic for green smoothies and organic this and organic that. In lieu of yoga, she prefers triple-distilled vodka, served straight up. Still seems to work for her.
My father never minded her flirting. He’d watch, a knowing gleam in his eye as she worked the room. I think he liked the way she sparkled. Others admired her. Others wanted her. But she always belonged to him.
I feel like I can’t breathe. Time is collapsing. I’m sixteen. I’m thirty-two. My father. My husband.
The same detective. Still prowling the expansive kitchen while most likely thinking, How many “accidents” can one person have?
I have a question for her: How many losses can one person take?
My mother is swearing she was with me all afternoon. The detective, politely but forcefully, wants to know if anyone can corroborate. Mr. Delaney intervenes smoothly that if the police don’t believe his client’s statement, the burden is on them to prove otherwise. Do they have anyone placing my mother or myself at the scene of the fire? For that matter, the city is filled with cameras and prying eyes. Surely, if the police had something more concrete, they wouldn’t be wasting everyone’s time with these questions.
Mr. Delaney is fishing. Even I can tell that. Do the police have anything substantial? That’s what he really wants to know. The older detective doesn’t take the bait.
I find it interesting that my own lawyer is curious if the police have evidence that contradicts his clients’ statements. Do all lawyers believe their clients are lying to them? Or is it merely because he’s been a family friend for decades and knows us that well?
“What caused the fire?” When I finally interrupt, the sound of my own voice startles me. I sound hoarse, like I haven’t spoken in years.
The blond detective halts, stares at me. Neither investigator offers an answer.
“You think it was intentional, right?” I continue. “Otherwise, why would you be here? But why would I burn down my own home? I left last night without even a toothbrush. Everything I own . . . everything I had . . .” My voice breaks slightly. I force myself to continue, though I sound hollow even to me. “It’s all gone. My entire life . . . it’s all gone. Why would I do that?”
The blonde speaks for the first time. “This doesn’t look like such a bad place to land.”
Just like that, I’m pissed off. I shove back my chair. Rise to standing. “You of all people should know better. You of all people!” I’m almost yelling at her. Why not? I certainly can’t yell at my mom.
I stalk out of the kitchen. I can’t take the room, with all its creamy wood and expensive marble. A fucking stage setting.
My father was real. His smile, his booming voice, the way he pursed his lips when working a particularly difficult problem, the way he’d sit with his eyes shut and listen to me play the piano for hours.
He loved me. He loved me, he loved me, he loved me.
And Conrad had loved me, too.
The blond detective is following me. Mr. Delaney, too, clearly concerned. Emotional clients are probably a danger to themselves and others. My mother stays behind. With Call Me Phil. She’s probably offering him a glass of water, while briefly touching his arm.
I don’t know where I’m going. I can’t exit the house. Whatever is overwhelming me here is nothing compared to the media that’s waiting to pounce outside. I move into the formal room with the baby grand. Black and gleaming. I spent so much of my childhood sitting on that bench, working those keys.
I haven’t touched it since.
I can’t be in this room. I move into the front parlor instead. I never liked this room. What kid cares about a formal parlor?
“My client needs to rest,” Mr. Delaney is informing the detective.
She doesn’t listen to him but regards me instead. “You remember me, don’t you?” she asks.
I nod. Not sitting, but walking around the small space. It’s taken me years to realize that most people do not live like this, with carefully placed silk-covered wingback chairs and antique sideboards and crystalline decanters.
“Yes.” I finally glance at her. “You looked nicer then. The sympathetic cop. Not anymore.”
The blonde smiles, not offended at all. “I was younger then. Still learning.”
“What did you learn?”
“To ask more questions. To accept fewer answers. That even the most honest person will tell a lie.”
“My client—” Mr. Delaney tries again.
I hold up a hand. “It’s okay. You can go help my mom. Or rather, save the other detective.”
Mr. Delaney gives me a stern look. Though he’s already torn. He does know my mother, and sometimes her manipulations, even done with the best of intentions, can backfire.
I feel stronger now, more certain. I address Sergeant Warren directly. “You’re not going to ask me about Conrad, are you?”
Slowly, she shakes her head.
“Will you tell me about the fire?”
Another pause. She nods. We have a deal. Maybe my lawyer doesn’t understand the terms, but we do.
“It’s okay,” I tell Mr. Delaney again. “Give us a moment, please.”
“As your lawyer—”
“I know. A moment.”
He’s not happy. But I’m the client, he’s the lawyer, and he is worried about my mother. As he should be. Finally, he retreats, leaving Sergeant Warren and me alone. Last time, it had been her and me in the kitchen. My mom and the other detective in the parlor. I like this change of venue. I need it.
She does look harder, as if the past sixteen years haven’t been entirely kind to her. Or maybe she’d been right before; disillusionment was part of the job. After all, sixteen years ago she’d believed me in the matter of my father’s death. And now?
I wonder what she sees when she looks at me. Am I harder? Disillusioned? Angry? I don’t think I feel any of those things.
I’m sad. I’m lost. I am my father’s daughter, and I always saw the truth even when others didn’t. But that doesn’t mean I’ve known what to do with the information. Especially when it involved the ones I loved.
“How are you feeling?” Sergeant Warren asks me. She doesn’t take a seat in one of the washed-silk wingbacks. Neither do I.
“I don’t know.”
She tilts her head to the side. “Are you excited for the baby?”
“Yes.”
“Conrad?”
“We’d almost given up hope. We’d been trying for a bit. Nothing, and then . . .” I don’t have any more words to say. I place my right hand on the gentle swell of my abdomen. Another silent apology. I already have the same relationship with my child as I do with my mother.
“I have a son,” the detective offers. “Five years old. We just got him a puppy.
They’re both crazy.”
I smile. “We were waiting to be surprised. It feels weird now. That Conrad died, never knowing if he was going to have a boy or girl. One of those silly things, because it’s terrible enough Conrad will never get to meet his child, what does it matter the gender?” A pause, and then, in the silence, because it’s weighing so heavily on my mind I just can’t help myself: “I still miss him.”
“Conrad?”
I look at her. Shake my head. “Do you think it will be any better for my baby? That maybe by never knowing his or her daddy, she won’t miss him as much?”
The sergeant doesn’t say anything.
“I didn’t shoot him.”
“Conrad?” she asks again.
Again, I shake my head.
She doesn’t move anymore. Neither do I. We study each other across the small space. Two women who barely know each other and yet are intricately bound by the tangle of so many questions, the weight of too much unfinished business.
“We came home to him,” I continue softly, my voice very low, which is the only tone appropriate for confessing sins. “I walked through the back door into the kitchen, and there he was.”
“Your mother was with you?” The detective asks, her tone as hushed as my own. She glances at the open doorway. Mr. Delaney will return soon enough. We both know it.
“Yes, standing outside.”
“You had blood in your hair,” Sergeant Warren states firmly. “Gunpowder on your hands. If you didn’t shoot your father, how do you explain that?”
“It rained.” I can barely get the words out. Sixteen years later, and still the horror seems fresh. “I walked through the door, and it rained on me.” I touch my short hair self-consciously. “Hot blood from the ceiling.”