The Dead Husband

by Carter Wilson

  The sergeant hadn’t outright agreed, but he hadn’t dismissed Colin’s request either. He’d said he’d take it to the captain for review, which was the best thing Colin could have hoped for.

  Now, two days later, Colin got his answer in an email from Brennan with the subject line McKay Case.

  Approved. Two nights max. Pick the cheapest hotel you can find. Ditto airfare.

  Colin gave the top of his desk a satisfying pound with his fist. It was the first time he’d be traveling out of state to interview a person of interest, and he was going to make the most of those two days.

  He tried to do what detectives were taught. Follow the facts. Don’t make assumptions. Be objective.

  But there was that little voice, the one all people have, and with detectives, that voice is even stronger. Louder. And Colin’s voice hadn’t quieted since he read J. L. Sharp’s last novel.

  She did it, the voice said, over and over again.

  The wife did it.

  Twelve

  Bury, New Hampshire

  First day of school and I think I’m more nervous than Max.

  We sit in silence as I drive my father’s black Suburban, the tank of a car he designated for my use. It’s been a month back in Bury, and I’m already regressing to my childhood. Living in my father’s house, grocery shopping with his credit card, driving the car he provided for me.

  I glance over as Max gazes out the window, and I see his ghostly image reflecting back, as if he’s staring at me and the rest of the world at the same time.

  “What are you thinking about?” I ask.

  He doesn’t say anything, and it looks like he’s slipped into one of his fugues. Or maybe he’s just nervous about today. That’s to be expected. New school, and he doesn’t know anyone except his cousin, with whom he shares nothing in common. Max always struggled to make friends among kids he knew for years, and I can only imagine how isolated he’ll feel at Middleton Prep.

  But when he answers, he doesn’t voice any of these things.

  “Before Dad, had you ever seen a dead person?”

  My stomach knots as I grip the steering wheel until my knuckles strain. “Why are you asking me this?”

  “Because of what Grandpa said. That I was the youngest to see a dead person. So I wondered if you ever had.”

  I feel him looking at me. I don’t look back. If I do, he’ll know I’m lying.

  “No,” I say. “I never had before.”

  “What about your mom?”

  “I was too young to remember, but I don’t think so.”

  Max offers a soft mmm and looks out his window again. “I wonder how many more I’ll see in my life.”

  “Can we not talk about this?” I say.

  “Okay.”

  How casual my son is about death. I sometimes wonder if the detachment with his own experiences is part of his grieving process or if it’s just that. Detachment. I think of what he told Willow when she asked what it was like to see his dead father.

  He didn’t look angry anymore.

  And that’s true. Riley didn’t look angry in death. But there’re other faces of death that aren’t nearly so calm. Twisted faces of rage, pain, and mind-shattering fear.

  I pray my son never has to see any of those.

  * * *

  Four blocks later, we arrive.

  Middleton Prep is an exclusive private school for sixth through twelfth grades, and my father insisted on Max going there as long as we live back home. I wanted to take some kind of noble stand and insist public school was just fine, but I didn’t consider this for long. I won’t sacrifice a better education for my son out of principle. Max struggles with school enough as it is, and I can’t argue against sending him somewhere the teachers are paid fairly and the average class size is fifteen.

  We bypass the drop-off lane and park; I want to escort Max in on his first day of sixth grade. I start to open my door when he says, “You don’t need to come in.”

  “You sure? You don’t want me to come inside?”

  “No, I’m okay.”

  I want to ask him why, and I don’t want to ask him why. I don’t want to make him second-guess himself, make him crack this delicate shell of courage that he’s apparently been able to build.

  He sees my struggle and pushes his glasses up the bridge of his nose.

  “Gotta grow up some time,” he says.

  This simple statement breaks my heart. I reach out, touch the side of his face, and force back the tears. A few still escape, but I don’t break down.

  “You’re a strong kid, you know that?” I say.

  “I suppose.”

  I lean in and kiss him on the head, then Max reaches down, picks up his backpack and lunch, and gets out of the car. I decide to get out anyway, if only to watch him walk inside, because driving immediately away feels too much like abandonment.

  I call out after he crosses the drop-off lane and reaches the sidewalk. He turns and offers a wave, and for a moment, I think I see a trace of a smile, though perhaps the glare of the early sun is tricking me into thinking so.

  “Morning, Rose.”

  The vaguely familiar voice comes from behind me, and I turn and see Alec. He’s walking my way, packaged neatly in a crisp, blue button-down shirt and thin olive slacks. A little boy holds his hand.

  “Hi, Alec.”

  “That your son heading in over there?”

  “Yes,” I say. “Max. Just starting sixth grade.”

  “Well, this is Micah,” he says, then looks down at his son. “Looks like you’ll have another friend, buddy. Max just moved here from…” Alec looks over to me.

  “Wisconsin,” I say.

  “Wisconsin. That’s right.” Alec smiles, and everything around me warms a degree or two. “Micah’s starting sixth grade, too. It’ll be nice for him to meet Max. Micah, this is Rose.”

  Micah looks a lot like Alec, just with lighter skin and thoughtfully chaotic hair. Looking at this boy, I can already imagine what a striking man he will someday become. He reaches out his right hand and offers it to me.

  “How do you do?” he asks.

  In a thousand years, Max would never offer his hand and a how do you do to a stranger. I take Micah’s small hand and give it a shake. His grip is stronger than I expected.

  “Well, I’m just fine, Micah. Nice to meet you.”

  The pleasantness of this little exchange is ended by another voice, this one also distantly familiar, but not in a comforting way.

  “There you are.”

  I turn and see a bullet of a woman walking with a brisk huff directly toward us. Her gaze is drilled into Alec.

  Tasha Collins.

  Like my sister, she hasn’t aged as much as she’s been maintained, like a car whose owner keeps applying wax in hopes of hiding the wear from all those miles. Her long, lush hair looks unnaturally black, as if it were dipped in a giant inkwell, and her face has a plastic sheen to it, no doubt the subject of a lengthy, daily makeup routine. But otherwise Tasha looks just like she did in high school. Tall, pale, and slim, a beautiful, brittle mannequin, ever unsmiling, as if doing so would wrinkle some of the smooth.

  “You’re late,” she says, coming up a few feet from us and stopping with still no acknowledgment of Micah or me.

  Alec sighs lightly, perhaps a micromeditation necessary before any conversation with his ex.

  “Good morning to you as well,” he says. His voice takes on an edge, the kind that conveys his desire to scream at Tasha were he not around others. I picture him angry, realizing it’s not hard to do. Nostrils flared, forearms tensed, veins in his temples pounding. I’ll bet Alec and Tasha have had some epic arguments.

  “You know I wanted to talk to his teacher before class started.”

  “Hi, Mama,” Micah says.

&nb
sp; Tasha finally notices him, bending down and giving him a swift, almost aggressive kiss on the forehead. “Hi, sweetheart. Ready for your first day?”

  “Uh-huh.”

  Tasha straightens and faces me. Blinks a couple of times with owl-like wonder. “I know you,” she says. “How do I know you?”

  “Hi, Tasha,” I say. “Rose Yates.” I don’t extend my hand. I don’t have Micah’s manners, at least not in this moment.

  The wonder breaks and a wave of excitement washes over her face, as if she’s been told a terrible secret about one of her enemies. “Rose Yates. I heard you were back in town. Wow, it’s been so long.”

  She moves in for a hug. For a half second, I consider stepping back but then realize I have no real reason to hate this person now. Sure, she called me Pancake Tits back in high school, but I don’t even know the Tasha Collins of today. People change.

  We hug. It’s like embracing a lamppost, minus the warmth.

  “I heard about your husband. I’m so, so sorry.”

  I’ve heard this enough that I can rate someone’s empathy on a scale from one to ten. Alec was about an eight when he told me this. Tasha clocks in somewhere around a two. Maybe one and a half.

  “Thank you,” I say.

  “I mean, I can’t even imagine,” she adds. Then Tasha throws a quick glance at Alec and adds, “Well, I can’t say there weren’t times I didn’t fantasize about it.”

  She seriously says this. Right in front of her son.

  Tasha follows up with “You have a child here?”

  “My son, Max. Sixth grade.” I nod over to the school. “He just walked in. Said he wanted to do it on his own.”

  Tasha puts a hand on her chest. “Bless his heart, sweet thing.” Then the hand moves to the top of Micah’s head, and he looks annoyed by it. “We wanted to go in with him on the first day. Meet the teacher, establish a connection, you know, make it a little more…special and supportive. But how brave for your son just to trot right in there all alone.”

  I glance at Alec and his eyes contain half apology, half amusement, as if he’s given up trying to figure out why Tasha is so evil and now just accepts the dark humor of it all. I feel sorry for him. He still has to share raising a child with this woman, which must be like constantly scooping water out of a sinking life raft.

  Even more, my heart goes out to Micah.

  “He’s brave all right,” I say.

  “Tasha, weren’t we in a rush?” Alec says.

  “Yes, yes. Only because you were late.” Back to me. “Well, Rose, great to see you. We’ll have to get together for some wine. I can introduce you to some other parents. I’m sure…social activity is important at a time like this for you.” Tasha doesn’t bother waiting for a response. She simply grabs Micah’s hand and leads him away.

  “I guess we’re going in now,” Alec says, leaving me with a smile that nearly lifts the haze of unpleasantness left in Tasha’s wake. “See you around, Rose.”

  “See you,” I say, watching him leave. My gaze moves from him to Tasha, from Tasha to the front door of the school, and finally to a lone window, behind which I imagine Max sitting all by himself in a classroom as other children cluster together in their pre-established friendship groups.

  Goddamn me.

  I should have walked in with him.

  Goddamn you, Riley.

  Why did you have to be the person you were?

  Thirteen

  I immediately knew my husband was dead.

  When I touched his bare shoulder, no energy radiated from him. Not warmth, but energy. A sense of life we absorb around us from others but never realize its presence until it’s gone.

  The moment my fingertips stroked Riley’s shoulder, I knew I was alone in that room.

  I floated above myself, above our bed, detached completely but yet so focused, reaching over to the bedside table and grabbing Riley’s phone to dial three numbers.

  911, what’s your emergency?

  Yes, hello, thank you. I think something’s wrong with my husband.

  I said that. I said thank you. Who says thank you to a 911 operator at the beginning of a call?

  That phone call started my path to where I am now.

  Back here, to this house.

  My fingers hover over the keyboard of my laptop, frozen. My brain doesn’t know what to tell them to type, so they wait there patiently for a command.

  It’s been two hours since I dropped off Max at school, and I’m sitting in the covered back porch, the midmorning sunlight strong and heavy, weighing on me like a blanket. Through the open windows, I can smell the musk of the lawn, freshly cut by the landscapers, likely one of the last mows of the season. A cup of black coffee cools in a mug on the side table next to me.

  My job at the moment is to inherit another world, the world of Jenna Black, Missouri detective, as imagined by J. L. Sharp. J. L. Sharp is my pen name, one chosen for the non-gender-specific initials and vaguely sinister last name.

  I have three books published in the Jenna Black mystery series, all with the same boutique publisher. My fourth comes out in January, and I was about ten thousand words into my fifth when Riley died.

  I need to dive into Jenna’s head, see how she’s planning to piece together the clues in her latest cold-case investigation, this one centering on a sixteen-year-old girl found raped and dead in a Topeka barn in the midnineties. I want to absorb Jenna’s strength, be guided by her moral compass, but yet again here I sit, fingers poised, a blank canvas with no painter in sight.

  Other thoughts pinball inside my head:

  I feel guilty by writing. I should be outwardly mourning. I never wear black.

  I’m worried about Max. Maybe I made things worse by moving us here.

  I need to find a job, a real job, just so I don’t have to totally rely on Dad. I don’t want to be kept by him.

  I’m afraid of being lonely but don’t want to admit that to anyone.

  And…

  I place the laptop on the side table, stand, and walk into the kitchen.

  Slowly. Up the hardwood stairs, sixteen steps I’ve climbed thousands of times.

  Second floor. The hallway stretches before me, shorter than I remember as a child but long enough to still swallow all my courage in the middle of the night.

  It was here.

  This hallway.

  The hallway, and then the stairs.

  It ended on the stairs.

  I close my eyes, as if inviting the memories back, and they come.

  That night.

  His face.

  His fear.

  This is why I’m here, isn’t it? To exorcise my demons? To face my past head-on? That was the plan, but this house has so far won the battle; it continues to scare the shit out of me.

  My eyes open at the distant sound of my phone ringing. It’s a relief, as if the universe knew I needed to be pulled away from my thoughts.

  I race down the stairs and into the kitchen where my phone is charging. The caller ID display ices my stomach.

  MIDDLETON PREP

  “Hello?” I say.

  “Hello, I’m calling for Rose Yates.” The tone of the woman’s voice doesn’t do anything to assure me.

  “This is she.”

  “Hi, Rose. This is Sandra Halliday, assistant vice principal at Middleton.”

  “Is everything okay? Is Max okay?”

  “He’s fine. But I’m calling to tell you there’s been an incident, and we need you to come down and pick him up.”

  My chest tightens at the word incident.

  “What kind of incident?”

  “We’ll explain more face-to-face, because that’s always easier. But he was involved in an altercation with another student.”

  “Alter—”

  “I know t
his is stressful, Rose. But I assure you he’s fine, as is the girl.”

  Girl. Oh god, what the hell happened?

  “We just need you to come down,” she continues. “Max will be in the front office with me.”

  “Yes, of course. I’ll be right over.”

  I hang up, scramble for my purse, and rush to the garage. I back out, race through the neighborhood, then force myself to slow down as I reach the main boulevard leading to Middleton.

  Red light. I bring the car to a stop and use the precious few seconds to try to center myself. Deep breath. In, then out.

  It doesn’t work. My pulse doesn’t slow a beat.

  Four words keep churning in my head. Over and over. Usually I can summon a mantra, a positive affirmation, something simple and powerful I can repeat, looping in my mind, assuring me.

  But these words don’t provide comfort, and though I want to think of different ones, these won’t go away.

  It’s all my fault.

  Fourteen

  Middleton Prep looks a lot more like a prison than it did this morning. The tint on the exterior windows is too dark to see through them. I suppose that’s a safety feature, but I imagine each of those rooms as a solitary confinement cell.

  I sign in at the front office, using the Student Absence sheet. I’m stopped when I get to the box asking for the reason I’m picking up my student. My gaze scans previous entries, which alternate between “sick” and “appointment.”

  I finally write “unknown.” It’s the truth.

  I’m ushered into the administration area by a mousy woman who tries so hard to avoid eye contact it’s as if she walking me down death row. We get to an office with a closed door and a nameplate reading “Ms. Halliday.”

  Mousy knocks, and I hear “Yes?” from inside. The woman ushers me inside Ms. Halliday’s office before scurrying away. Max is sitting in a chair, hunched over, and when he turns his head, I see his tear-glazed eyes.

  “Oh, sweetie,” I say, rushing to him. He stands and hugs me, squeezing harder than normal.

  “I didn’t start it, I swear,” he says.

  “What happened?” I ask.