The Deepest Secret

by Carla Buckley

  “Yeah.” He doesn’t look at her.

  Her children are unhappy, and Eve needs to reassure them. She’s always found the words before and been rewarded with a hug or a quick smile, but now she falters. She doesn’t trust herself to say the right thing. She glances at her watch and sees with cowardly relief that dawn’s twelve brief minutes away. “It’s time.”

  Without a word, he scrapes back his chair.

  “I’ll be up in a minute,” she tells him.

  Melissa’s in the kitchen, her long hair falling forward as she bends to fit things in her backpack.

  “What do you want for breakfast, sweetheart?” Eve asks, going to the pantry.

  “I’m not hungry.” Melissa taps papers together on the kitchen counter. “Did you sign these?”

  “You have to eat something.” Eve scans the bare shelves. When was the last time she went shopping?

  “I’ll get a demerit if you don’t sign.”

  She takes the pen her daughter proffers. “Where?” she asks, and Melissa stabs the bottom of the topmost sheet. She skims the contents—all the rules about using the Internet at school—and Melissa groans. “Mom.”

  So Eve signs her name, over and over, while Melissa waits impatiently. Her daughter hasn’t said a word about Amy, not a single word. “Is there anything you want to talk about?”

  “I’m fine.”

  Of course she’s not fine. “Let me find someone you can talk to. I’ll call around, find someone who’s cool—”

  Melissa takes the papers. “Like you did for Tyler? No, thanks.”

  “Well, what about your guidance counselor? I’m sure she’d have some good advice.”

  “Mom, really? All she’d want to talk about is Tyler. What does it feel like for me? Do I feel cheated? Have I ever cut or used drugs? Do I feel pressure to be perfect, to make up for everything?”

  The XP moms all talk about this. Their warnings go round and round. “Honey—” Eve begins.

  “You want to know what I really feel? Do you?” Melissa zips her backpack and stands. “I wish it was me who was sick.”

  Where is this coming from? “Melissa,” Eve says, horrified. “Don’t say that.”

  “Why? Because if it was true, you wouldn’t have had Tyler?”

  This is true. This is absolutely, devastatingly true.

  Melissa has a look of twisted triumph on her face. “I have to go. Perfect children aren’t late for school.” She wrenches herself from Eve’s grasp and stumbles away, slamming the kitchen door behind her.

  The mechanic hadn’t even looked at her as he tapped computer keys. Saturday, he’d pronounced, scribbling the date on a piece of paper and pushing it across the counter toward her, and that’s rushing it. Something had broken in her. She’d just stood there, not moving. Lady, are you all right? he’d asked, and she couldn’t even answer. If she opened her mouth, she’d start telling him everything. It would burst out of her and she’d never see Tyler again. Tell you what, he’d said. Have a seat. I’ll see what I can do.

  What he’d done was perform magic, in six hours. Eve had sat in the waiting room, thick with the smell of rubber and oil, watching without seeing the small television set in the corner. The mechanic had kept coming out to check on her. Go get something to eat, he’d said. I’ll call you when it’s ready. But she knew that if she moved a muscle, the magic would stop, so she sat there, as the phone rang and the TV played on, and finally, the car was ready.

  Even before she turns onto her cul-de-sac, she knows something’s happened. There are media vans parked along the shoulder, still more thronging her street. She drives slowly, her fender new and shining. No one looks at it. They’re all staring at Charlotte’s house. She pulls her car all the way into the garage and goes back out again, into the crush of reporters. She pushes her way through them. Felicia opens the door the instant Eve knocks. “I’m so glad you’re here.”

  “What is it?” Eve steps into the foyer, and Felicia slams the door. Charlotte and Gloria stand by the window, looking out. “What happened?”

  “The police called. Someone reported finding a body.”

  Eve feels the wall bump her back. She doesn’t want to know. Once the words are said, they can’t be unsaid. “Amy?” she manages. The word slips out, oily.

  “They won’t tell us,” Gloria says.

  “It isn’t,” Charlotte says. “I’d know it. I’d feel it somehow.”

  “Of course you would,” Gloria says.

  “Come away from the window, Charlotte.” Felicia says it softly. “You don’t want your picture showing up on the news.”

  “I don’t care.” Charlotte’s gripping the window frame, staring out at the reporters who aim their cameras and wave their arms.

  “Eve, take Charlotte outside,” Gloria says. “Felicia and I will answer the phone if it rings.”

  Charlotte shakes her head, but Felicia looks pleadingly at Eve.

  “Come on,” Eve cajoles. “Keep me company.” And Charlotte allows herself to be led across the kitchen and out the back door.

  It’s hot outside, unyielding. The chairs stand around the glass-topped table as if they’d been pushed out in haste. The broad umbrella stands furled. There is no refuge.

  Eve has spent hours here, days, weeks. She knows the seasons of this yard, how fog collects in winter, and every spring one azalea bush blooms a discordant red among the pink. The only constant is Amy’s old baby swing hanging straight from the tall oak, its blue plastic seat like a cup, grayed with age, the safety bar dangling askew from the rope.

  Charlotte paces barefoot. “Why haven’t they called?”

  “They will. They know you’re waiting.”

  “How hard can it be to confirm? They should know right away.” It’s impossible to think about the reasons why. “It’s not Amy. It can’t be. It’s just another false alarm.” Charlotte steps off the patio and onto the grass.

  This is a mistake, being here instead of home with Tyler. The police will be showing up. They will have news. They might know something. Eve could be trapped here. She might not be able to get home.

  Charlotte wanders among her flowers, orange helenium, purple verbena, pink resurrection lilies, white phlox, yellow roses. She grows sturdy, colorful varieties, cuts them and arranges them in glass vases, and takes them to the open houses she holds. Flowers can make a sale, she says. As long as Eve’s known her, Charlotte has brought by flowers. In winter, it’s pine and holly twined around white candles.

  Eve joins Charlotte at the back gate. They look out at the yards of people they don’t know. Meandering between these yards is their walking path. This is where Charlotte told Eve about the terrible night that Owen moved out. This is where Eve told Charlotte about her miscarriage, the baby conceived before they knew. This path crosses the road and leads down to the river, steep in places. They have always been careful following this path.

  “I keep thinking of the last thing I told her,” Charlotte says in a low voice.

  “Don’t,” Eve says, but Charlotte goes on.

  “ ‘Go to your room,’ I said. ‘I don’t want to see you right now.’ That’s what I told her. I told her to get out of my sight.”

  “Everyone loses their temper.”

  “Not you. I’ve never once heard you raise your voice.”

  “My situation’s different.”

  “Tell me something happy. You must have something.”

  The truth. Eve has the truth, which is so sad and so terrible that words can’t contain it. She looks off into the trees. She makes a decision. “I’ve heard from Dr. Abernathy.”

  “From Hopkins?”

  This is the sort of friend Charlotte is, that she would remember that. The trees and sky blur, a wash of blue and green and black. “He thinks he might be onto something.”

  “Really? Like what?”

  “A cream containing the enzyme Tyler’s missing.”

  “So he’d use it like sunscreen?”

  “Exac
tly.”

  “So, wait. Is this a cure?”

  “It could be.”

  Charlotte stares with wide eyes. Pink touches her cheeks. Then she throws her arms around Eve, pulls her close. She is so slight in Eve’s arms, skeletal. “Oh, honey, why didn’t you tell me? This is wonderful news. What does David say?”

  “I haven’t told him yet.” David’s lost hope. Or maybe he never had any to begin with. It only makes Eve more determined to keep it.

  “Did you get Tyler’s name on the list?”

  “It’s too early.”

  “This will be the one! I know it.”

  “Charlotte?”

  They turn at the sound of Gloria’s voice. She’s standing in the kitchen doorway, her hand on the frame. Detective Watkins stands beside her, sympathy radiating from every inch of her, the softness in her eyes, the way she tilts her head. “Mrs. Nolan,” she says, and Charlotte moans and clutches at Eve’s arm. “I’m sorry to inform you that we’ve recovered a body in the river. We need you to come down and make the positive identification.”

  Amy had been in the river, twisting downstream until she slid beneath that old boathouse, and her hair had snared on the piling. Another storm could have come along and swept her away, but it hadn’t. Her hair could have eventually pulled free and let her loose among the river currents. But that hadn’t happened, either. Amy had been floating while they all waited, a mere mile away.

  Don’t leave me, Charlotte begs, and so Eve gets into the back of Detective Watkins’s police car. Charlotte leans against her, her face buried in her hands. Her weeping is low and endless. It coils around Eve, who fishes through her pockets for a tissue. At the police station, she goes into the ladies room and unwinds a length of toilet paper, coming out and pressing it into Charlotte’s hand.

  Charlotte’s face is drained of color. She is two-dimensional. Only her green shirt gives her any substance.

  Charlotte goes into the room to make the official confirmation that yes, this body recovered from the river is her daughter. Eve waits in the corridor. She feels the weight of every stranger’s gaze on her. There will be an autopsy and they’ll see that Amy fell. An accident. Just a terrible accident. The police will stop treating Charlotte as a suspect, and everything will begin the slow slide to normal.

  Owen arrives. He’s come from the store, his collar unbuttoned. He’s raked his hands through his black hair and it stands up in stiff peaks. He looks around, past Eve. “Where is she?”

  Does he mean his wife or his daughter? Eve points, and he goes through the door. Something’s buzzing, an irritating sound in this echoing hallway. It’s her cell phone. She pulls it free. It’s Tyler, wanting to know where she is. She leans against the wall, the firm coolness against her shoulder, and texts back. Be home soon.

  It feels as though she’s been gone for days. The longest she’s ever been away from Tyler without any fear had been the four or so hours when she and David had driven to the Amish furniture store to pick up Tyler’s big-boy bed. If she’d known it would be their last date together, she would have ordered a bed online and taken David out for dinner instead, somewhere candlelit, with linen tablecloths and real butter in small dishes.

  The door opens, and Charlotte steps into the hall. Owen comes after. Charlotte looks around for Eve. Her face crumples when she sees her, and Eve holds out her arms.

  “I’ll find an officer to drive you home,” Detective Watkins says, and Charlotte rests her head against Eve’s shoulder.

  They wait outside. Clouds have rolled over the sun, erasing all shadow. The world feels free-floating.

  “You let this happen,” Owen says. “This is your fault.”

  Charlotte sobs and nods, her head moving against Eve’s shoulder. “I know. I know.”

  “You are the worst thing that’s ever happened to me.”

  “Owen,” Eve says, but he steps around her and goes right up to Charlotte. She cringes.

  “You’re a shitty mother.” His lip is curled. He doesn’t look like himself. “You’ve always been a shitty mother.”

  He wheels away.

  It’s a long ride home, to where everyone is waiting to hear. How will she tell Melissa and Tyler? They’d loved Amy, too.

  DAVID

  Tyler had been born on a sultry evening like this. The heat had clung to David’s skin as he walked with Eve into the emergency room, the sun casting long shadows into every corner. The woman across the hall had shrieked for hours, but Eve had remained grimly silent during delivery, focused, her hair damp at her temples. Then they’d held their infant son, marveling at his perfection. They didn’t notice how ruddy his cheeks were. No one had.

  He ties his laces and stands, stretches. Sometimes he feels that the only time he’s truly himself is when he’s pounding the pavement. He sees things clearer, finds patience, a keener understanding. Eve hadn’t wanted to begrudge him this time to himself, he knows, but it had been a source of irritation between them. She’d be waiting for him to come home to hand over the baby or to watch the children so she could run errands. Can’t you run during your lunch hours? she’d complain, which of course had been out of the question. Moving to DC had had its costs, but the freedom to run had been an unexpected benefit.

  “Ready?” he says to Renée, and she nods.

  The C&O Canal is peopled with shoppers and lovers, bikers, and other runners. He and Renée dodge strollers and laughing groups of teenagers. They don’t talk until it’s all fallen behind them and they’re alone. It’s a narrow canal, and shallow. Dying sunlight filters in through the branches that arch overhead.

  “Guess where we’re going for our honeymoon?” she says.

  “The Caribbean.” She’s told him that she loves the idea of motoring from island to island.

  “Vegas. Ugh.”

  “Vegas is nice.”

  “No, it’s not. You know it’s not.”

  “Tell Jeffery.”

  “I have. He got a deal.”

  “Doesn’t really matter where you go.” He says this jokingly. He wishes they’d stop talking about it, though.

  “Doesn’t what I want matter?”

  Yes, it does. He and Eve hadn’t had much of a honeymoon, just a long weekend on Lake Erie. He’d been in graduate school, and she’d been working small jobs. They planned to do it right, after he graduated, but then Melissa had come along. Still, he hadn’t given up. He wanted to take Eve to Greece, to crystal white sand and crisp blue skies. Even after Tyler came along, they’d made their plans, gotten as far as booking the flights when they’d received Tyler’s diagnosis. Eve never mentioned Greece again, and he’d quietly contacted the airlines and canceled their trip.

  “I wonder if it even matters who he’s marrying,” Renée says.

  They’re going up a hill. He tries not to show how breathless he’s getting. His calves are beginning to ache, a welcome feeling.

  “We can’t agree on where to live,” she says. “He wants a new build, out in Fairfax.” She’s getting breathless, too, but she’s matching him stride for stride. “You ask me, they all look alike.”

  “Adams Morgan’s nice.”

  “Exactly. Or Old Town.”

  They’re leveling off now. Old Town Alexandria’s right on the river. But Eve wouldn’t be happy there. She’d want someplace hidden from streetlights and traffic. Someplace like Fairfax. They haven’t spoken since he’d gotten back to DC. He should call her when he gets home this evening, check in with her and the kids, but he has to admit he’s welcomed the distraction of work. It’s kept him from thinking too deeply about what he knows he has to do. “You could walk for coffee.”

  “The restaurants. Museums.”

  A flock of swallows sails past, small black shapes against the orange sky.

  “Maybe I’m making a mistake,” she says. “Maybe I should’ve waited.”

  I want a family, she’s told David.

  “How did you know Eve was the one?” she asks.

  Sud
denly, and with great certainty, Halloween their senior year in college. Eve had worn a pink flannel bunny suit, and he’d dressed as a dirty old man. When he went to pick her up, his cheeks peppered with black marker and his bathrobe hanging open, she’d started laughing. She laughed so hard she couldn’t stand up. Every time she tried to stop, drawing in her breath and straightening, she’d look at him and collapse into laughter all over again. He began to laugh, too. They finally ended up on the floor, sitting side by side. She wouldn’t look at him as she giggled and giggled. He looked at her, those silly floppy pink bunny ears perched on her gleaming black hair, the tip of her nose pink from laughing, and he’d been overcome with a wave of love and desire that left him shaking. All he could think was, Will she have me? “I guess I just knew.”

  “I do love Jeffery. But it’s hard.”

  Love isn’t always enough. “Ready to turn around?”

  They reverse direction on the gravel path and head back toward Georgetown.

  Their footsteps sound on the stones. The path winds beneath stone bridges. Ahead, the brightly lit brick buildings of Georgetown cluster on the banks. Leafy tree branches are black lace against the dark sky. They slow to a walk. He can tell she’s still upset. “You’ll work it out,” he says.

  “It’d be easier if he were more like you.” She laughs. “Could you tell him that?”

  He feels something bloom inside him. It’s been a long time since he hadn’t felt that everything he did was wrong somehow.

  “Have time for a drink?”

  He’s in no rush to get back to his quiet apartment. “Sure, as long as I’m buying.”

  “Deal.”

  They’re being seated at a table by the water when his cell phone buzzes. He glances at the caller ID. It’s Eve. He accepts the menu the waiter’s handing him and sets down his phone. He’ll call her back later.

  STAR LIGHT, STAR BRIGHT

  Zach texts him in the middle of fifth period. Then Tyler gets a bunch of texts, all scrambled. Tyler holds his phone below the computer monitor so the teacher can’t see. Every time she turns to face the board, he texts back, trying to sound as surprised as everyone else. What he really wants to know is, do the police know who made the call?