The Wife Between Us

by Greer Hendricks

  Why had he moved it down here? I wondered.

  I studied his father’s lanky build and full lips, his mother’s piercing eyes that Richard had inherited, and her dark hair curling around her shoulders. The date of their marriage was written in ornate script at the bottom.

  Richard’s father’s arm was around his wife’s waist. I’d assumed Richard’s parents had had a happy marriage, but the wedding photo was so posed it didn’t provide any insight. In the absence of any real information, my mind had filled in the blanks, creating the picture I had wanted to see.

  Richard had never told me much more about his parents. When I asked, he always said it was too painful to think about them. Maureen seemed to subscribe to the same unspoken rule of focusing on the present with Richard, instead of their shared past. Maybe they talked more about their childhood when they were alone on their annual ski trips or when Richard went to Boston on business and met her for dinner. But when Maureen came to visit us, our conversations always revolved around his work and hers, their running regimes, travel plans, and world events.

  Talking about my father made me still feel connected to him, but I’d been able to say good-bye to him, and to tell him I loved him in his final moments. I understood why Richard and Maureen might want to block the memories of the sudden, violent deaths of their parents in the car accident.

  When it came to the darkest and most painful pieces of my own past, I also edited a few of the details while sharing the stories with my husband. I’d shaped my narrative carefully, leaving out the bits I knew he might find sordid. Even after Richard discovered I’d gotten pregnant in college, I never revealed that the professor was married. I didn’t want him to think I’d been foolish, that I was somehow to blame. And I hadn’t been truthful about how my pregnancy ended.

  As I knelt in the storage unit, I considered whether that had been a mistake. I recognized marriage didn’t guarantee a storybook ending, the happily ever after stretching past the final page, the words echoing into infinity. But wasn’t this most intimate relationship supposed to be a safe place, where another person knew your secrets and faults and loved you anyway?

  A sharp, tinny sound to my left jerked me out of my thoughts.

  I twisted my head around and peered into the dim light. The unit next to Richard’s was packed with furniture; it blocked my vision.

  This was an old prewar building, I told myself. The noise was only a pipe clanging. Still, I shifted so that I faced the opening of the storage unit. That way I could glimpse anyone who might be approaching.

  I quickly folded the newspaper back around the wedding picture. I’d found what I had come here for; I should go. But I felt compelled to see what else was tucked away, hidden from the orbit of Richard’s everyday life. I wanted to continue digging through the stratum of Richard’s past.

  I reached into the bin again and pulled out a small wooden plaque with a heart and the word Mom etched by the top. Richard’s name was on the back; he must’ve made it for his mother, perhaps in a woodshop class at school. There was also a crocheted yellow blanket, and a pair of bronzed baby shoes.

  Toward the bottom of the bin was a small photo album. I couldn’t identify any of the people, but I thought I recognized his mother’s smile on one of the girls holding the hand of a woman in pedal pushers and a halter top. Maybe the album had belonged to her, I’d thought. The next item I touched was the white box that held our wedding-cake topper.

  I lifted the lid and picked it up. The porcelain felt delicate and smooth; the colors were soft pastels.

  Ever think he’s too good to be true? Sam had asked the day I showed her the cake topper. I wished she’d never asked that question.

  I looked down at the handsome groom and the flawless bride with her light blue eyes. Absently, I caressed the figures as I turned them over and over in my hand.

  Then the figurine slipped from my fingers.

  I frantically fumbled for it, desperate to prevent the cake topper from shattering against the concrete.

  I caught it two inches from the floor.

  I closed my eyes and released my breath.

  How long had I been down here? A few minutes, or had it been closer to an hour? I’d completely lost track of time.

  Perhaps Richard had texted me back. He’d be worried if I didn’t respond. Just as the thought struck me, I heard a faint noise, again to my left. The pipe? Or maybe it was a footstep.

  I suddenly became aware that I felt trapped in this metal cage. I’d left my cell phone upstairs, in my purse. No one knew where I was.

  Would sound even travel up to the doorman in the lobby if I screamed?

  I held my breath, my pulse quickening, waiting for a face to appear from around the corner.

  No one came.

  Only my imagination, I told myself.

  Still, my hand shook when I began to return the topper to its box. As I laid it flat, I noticed some tiny numbers embossed on the bottom. I looked closer, squinting to make out the numerals in the dim light. A date: 1985. That must have been when the topper was sculpted.

  No, that couldn’t be right, I thought.

  I pulled out the figurines again and peered more closely at the numbers. They were unmistakable.

  But Richard’s parents had already been married for years by then. He would’ve been a teenager in 1985.

  Their wedding was held more than a decade before the cake topper existed. It couldn’t have belonged to them.

  Maybe his mother had simply found the figurine at an antiques store and had purchased it because she’d thought it was pretty, I reasoned as I rode the elevator back up to Richard’s floor. Or maybe this was my fault. It could be I’d simply misunderstood Richard.

  I could hear my cell phone ringing inside the apartment as I fit my key into the lock. I rushed to grab my purse, but it fell silent before I could dig it out.

  Then the apartment line began to shrill.

  I ran into the kitchen and snatched it up.

  “Nellie? Thank God. I’ve been trying to reach you.”

  Richard’s voice sounded higher than usual—stressed. I knew he was on the other side of the world, but the connection was so clear, he could have been in the next room.

  How had he known I was here?

  “I’m sorry,” I blurted. “Is everything okay?”

  “I thought you were at home.”

  “Oh, I was going to, but then I was so tired—I just thought—I figured it would be easier for me to stay at the apartment,” I blurted.

  Silence crackled between us.

  “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  I didn’t have an answer. At least not one I felt I could share with him.

  “I was going to…” I stalled. For some reasons tears filled my eyes and I blinked them away. “I just figured I’d explain tomorrow rather than send you a long text while you’re with clients. I didn’t want to bother you.”

  “Bother me?” He made a sound that wasn’t quite a laugh. “It bothered me far more to imagine that something had happened to you.”

  “I’m so sorry. Of course, you’re right. I should have told you.”

  He didn’t respond for a beat.

  Then he finally said, “So why didn’t you answer your cell? Are you alone?”

  I’d made him angry. His clipped tone was the giveaway. I could almost see his eyes narrowing.

  “I was in the bath.” The lie just shot out of me. “Of course I’m alone. Sam went out dancing with her roommate but I didn’t want to, so I just came here.”

  He exhaled slowly. “Listen, I’m just glad you’re safe. I should probably get back to the golf course.”

  “I miss you.”

  When he spoke again, his voice was gentle. “I miss you, too, Nellie. I’ll be home before you know it.”

  Being in that basement—and being caught in my deception—had unsettled me, I realized as I changed into my nightgown, then double-checked that I’d secured the dead bolt on the front door.<
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  I went into Richard’s bathroom, using his toothpaste and extra washcloth as I prepared for bed. The smell of lemons was so strong it unnerved me, until I realized Richard’s terry-cloth robe, the one he always stepped into after showering, was hanging on a hook directly next to me. The scent of his soap lingered on the absorbent fabric.

  I turned off the light, then hesitated and flicked the switch back up, closing the door partway so it wouldn’t shine in my eyes. I pulled back the fluffy white comforter on Richard’s bed, wondering what he was doing at that exact moment. Probably socializing with important business associates on the greens. Perhaps a cooler of cold beers and bottled water would be in the golf cart, and an interpreter on hand to facilitate conversation. I could picture Richard concentrating on his chip shot, his face creased, his expression an echo of the one he wore when he was a little boy playing baseball.

  I’d searched the bins to better understand Richard. I was still yearning for more answers about my husband.

  But as I climbed between the crisp, ironed sheets in his king-size bed, I realized he understood me well enough to guess exactly where I was when he hadn’t been able to reach me at home.

  He knew me better than I knew him.

  CHAPTER

  TWENTY-SIX

  THE LETTER TO EMMA feels heavy in my hand, its weight disproportionate to its actual material heft. I fold the note again, then look for an envelope in Aunt Charlotte’s room, where my aunt likes to sit at a rolltop desk to do paperwork and pay bills. I find an envelope but ignore the stamps. I need to hand-deliver this; I can’t rely on the mail to get it there in time.

  Atop the pile of papers on her desk, I also see a photograph of a dog. A German shepherd with soft brown and black fur.

  Gasping, I reach for it. Duke.

  But of course, it isn’t him. It’s only a promotional postcard from a group that provides guide dogs for the blind.

  It just looks so much like the picture I still carry in my wallet.

  I need to get this letter to Emma. I need to investigate ways to help Aunt Charlotte. I should be moving forward right now. But all I can do is collapse onto her bed as the images come hard and fast, crashing over me like waves. Dragging me into the undertow of memory again.

  * * *

  My insomnia returned when Richard came back from Hong Kong.

  He found me in our guest room at two A.M., the light on and a book splayed open across my lap. “Can’t sleep.”

  “I don’t like being in bed without you.” He stretched out his hand and led me back to our room.

  Feeling his arms wrapped around me and his steady breaths warm in my ear no longer helped, though. I began to wake up most nights, easing myself out of bed quietly, tiptoeing down the hall to the guest room, then I’d sneak back into our bed before dawn.

  But Richard must have known.

  On a bone-chillingly frigid Sunday morning, Richard was reading the Times Week in Review in the library and I was searching for a new recipe for cheesecake. We were hosting my mother and Maureen for dinner the following weekend to celebrate Richard’s birthday. My mother hated the cold and had never before come up north during the winter months. Instead, she visited every spring and fall to see me and Aunt Charlotte. During those trips, she spent most of her time touring art galleries and walking the city streets to soak up the atmosphere, as she put it. I didn’t mind that we spent so little time together; being with my mom required deep reservoirs of patience as well as unlimited energy.

  I was unsure of her motivation for changing that pattern.

  But I suspected it was due to a conversation we’d had in a recent call. She’d caught me on a bad day—a lonely day—when I hadn’t even left the house. The streets were crusted with old snow and patches of ice, and since I had no experience driving in winter weather, I wasn’t comfortable taking out the Mercedes Richard had bought me. When my mother phoned in the early afternoon and asked what I was doing, I was honest. I’d let down my guard with her.

  “I’m still in bed.”

  “Are you sick?”

  I realized I’d already revealed too much. “I didn’t sleep well last night.” I thought that would appease my mother.

  But it only made her ask more questions. “Does this happen often? Is there anything bothering you?”

  “No, no. I’m fine.”

  There was a pause. Then: “You know what? I was thinking I’d like to come up for a visit.”

  I tried to talk her out of it, but she was resolute. So finally I suggested she time it for Richard’s birthday. Maureen would be joining us to celebrate, as she did every year, and perhaps her presence would help dilute my mother’s focus.

  When the doorbell rang that Sunday morning, my first thought was that my mother had decided to surprise us by arriving a few days early or had gotten the dates wrong. It wouldn’t have been out of character.

  But Richard put down his paper and stood up. “That’s probably your present.”

  “My present? You’re the one with a birthday coming up.”

  I was a few steps behind him. I heard Richard greet someone, but his body blocked my view. Then he bent down. “Hey there, boy.”

  The German shepherd was massive. I could see his shoulder muscles rolling as Richard took his leash and led him into the house, followed by the man who’d delivered the dog.

  “Nellie? Meet Duke. This big guy is the best security you could ever ask for.”

  The dog yawned, revealing his sharp teeth.

  “And this is Carl.” Richard laughed. “One of Duke’s trainers. Sorry about that.”

  “No worries, I’m used to Duke getting top billing.” Carl must have noticed my unease. “He looks fierce, but remember, he’s going to look that way to everyone else, too. And Duke knows it’s his job to protect you.”

  I nodded. Duke probably weighed almost as much as I did. If he stood on his hind legs, he’d be my height.

  “He spent a year at the Sherman Canine Academy. He understands a dozen commands. Here—I’ll tell him to sit.” At Carl’s word, the dog sank down on its haunches. “Up,” Carl instructed, and the dog rose fluidly.

  “Try it, sweetheart,” Richard urged.

  “Sit.” My voice sounded scratchy. I couldn’t believe the dog would obey, but he fixed his brown eyes on me and touched his bottom to the floor.

  I averted my gaze. Rationally I knew the dog had been trained to follow orders. But hadn’t he also been trained to attack when he perceived a threat? Dogs could sense fear, I remembered, shrinking back against the wall.

  I was fine around little dogs, the fluffy breeds that were common in New York City, sometimes tucked into purses or dancing along on the end of brightly colored leashes. I even stopped sometimes to offer them a pat, and I’d never minded sharing the elevator in Richard’s apartment with Mrs. Keene and her bichon frise with the matching hairstyle.

  Big dogs like this one were rare in the city; apartment sizes simply didn’t make them practical. I hadn’t been near one in years.

  But when I was a child, my next-door neighbors in Florida had owned two rottweilers. They were kept behind a chain-link enclosure, and whenever I rode my bike past their yard, they lunged at me and crashed into the fence as if they wanted to break through it. My dad told me they were just excited, that the dogs were friendly. But their deep, throaty barks and the sound of that rattling metal terrified me.

  Duke’s unnatural stillness was even more unnerving.

  “Do you want to pet him?” Carl asked. “He loves being scratched behind the ears.”

  “Sure. Hey there, Duke.” I reached out and gave him a quick stroke. His black-and-brown fur was softer than I’d expected.

  “I’ll go grab his supplies.” Carl headed back to his white truck.

  Richard gave me a reassuring smile. “Remember what the security guy told us. Dogs are the number one deterrent to intruders. Better than any alarm system you can buy. You’ll sleep well when he’s around.”


  Duke was still sitting on the floor, staring up at me. Was he waiting for me to tell him he could stand again? I’d only ever owned a cat, back when I was a child.

  Carl returned, his arms full of a bag of food and a bed and bowls. “Where would you like me to set him up?”

  “The kitchen’s probably best,” Richard said. “It’s through here.”

  At another clipped word from Carl, the dog followed them, his big paws padding almost soundlessly on our wood floors. Carl drove off a few minutes later, leaving behind his card and a laminated list of the words Duke knew—Come. Stay. Attack. He’d explained that Duke would react to those words only when they were directed at him by Richard or me in a commanding tone.

  “He’s a smart boy.” Carl had given Duke’s head a final rub. “You picked a good one.”

  I’d smiled weakly, dreading the next morning when Richard would leave for work and I’d be alone with the dog who was supposed to make me feel safe.

  I kept to the other side of the house for the first few days, only entering the kitchen to grab a banana or dump some food into Duke’s bowl. Carl had instructed us to walk him three times a day, but I didn’t want to fumble with the leash’s catch around Duke’s throat. So I simply opened the back door and told him to Go—another of his commands—and then I cleaned up after him before Richard came home.

  On the third day, as I read in the library, I looked up and saw Duke standing silently in the entryway, watching me. I hadn’t even heard his approach. I still feared meeting his gaze—didn’t dogs interpret locked eyes as a challenge?—so I stared back at my book, wishing he’d go away. Richard, right before he went to sleep every night, took Duke for a short walk. Duke had plenty to eat, fresh water, and a comfortable bed. I had no reason to feel guilty. Duke had a great life, with everything he could possibly want.

  He padded over and flopped down next to me, putting his head between his big paws. He looked up at me and sighed heavily. It was such a human sound.

  I snuck a peek at him over the top of my novel and saw furrows form above his chocolate-brown eyes. He looked sad. I wondered if he was used to being around other dogs, to being surrounded by activity and noise. Our house must seem so strange to him, I thought. Tentatively I reached down and patted the spot behind his ear, the way his trainer had said Duke liked. His bushy tail thumped once, then stilled, as if he didn’t want to make too much of a commotion.