“Jessica,” Allen said, eyes darting around the room. “Who were you talking to?”
“I was just playing,” Jessica said, eyes wide and scared, as if she were embarrassed or ashamed to be caught doing something she knew she shouldn’t be doing.
“Who were you playing with?” Allen asked, quickly shifting gears. Hearing that second voice had clearly unnerved him, and he was positive he had heard two voices upstairs, not Jessica pretending to be another little girl. “I heard another little girl up here.”
“Nobody,” Jessica said. She was clutching her doll.
“Nobody?”
Jessica nodded.
Allen’s heart now resumed its normal rhythm. She had just been pretending, playing some make-believe game. He tried another attempt: “I heard you talking to another little girl, Jessie. What’s her name?”
Jessica looked at her father shyly. “Lily.”
“Lily?” Allen smiled. “Oh, so you were playing with Lily. Where is she now? Did she go home?”
Jessica nodded. “Yes,” she said.
Allen gave another quick glance around the room. There was nobody else in the room. In the time it had taken him to come upstairs it would have been impossible for a child to have found a sufficient hiding place, and he’d heard the second voice when he was standing outside Jessica’s door. He’d heard it as clear as day. Or had he? Maybe Jessica’s talents at mimicking other children through role-playing had become so good that she convinced him there was a second child upstairs. He knew the new kid down the street Jessica played with was named Lily; he’d seen her a few times: a sullen, dark-haired child who lived with her older brother and mother and the mother’s new husband or boyfriend and another little girl, this one maybe seven or eight. Andy had taken up playing with the older girl and her cousin, and Dora had told him about an incident a few days ago when a rottweiler owned by the mother had almost attacked Andy. Dora had been furious, and went over to their house and chewed the woman a new asshole. Now Lily and the other child (Mary? Monica?) were forbidden to play with Jessica and Andy unless they came over to their house. This had apparently been fine with their mother; those kids were over here all the time now, it seemed.
So Jessie was pretending Lily was still here, Allen thought. No big deal. He looked at Jessica and smiled. “Well it’s late honey and it’s time to go to sleep. Why don’t you say goodnight to your friend and I’ll tuck you in.”
“Okay.” Jessica turned to the window and waved. “‘Night Lily!”
Allen tucked Jessica in bed, smoothed her hair back and kissed her forehead. “Sweet dreams, honey. See you tomorrow.”
“‘Night, daddy,” Jessica said.
Allen stepped away from his daughter’s bed and paused at the doorway to her bedroom. Except for his daughter lying huddled under the covers of her bed, the room was empty. Satisfied, he closed the door and headed back downstairs to turn off the lights and lock up the house for the night.
“ALLEN!” ROUGH SHAKING. “Allen!”
He felt himself jerked out of a sound sleep, Dora’s voice crashing in the din. He came awake quickly, sitting up as Dora shook him awake. “What! What!” He rubbed his hands over his face, shaking his head to clear the fogginess of sleep. “What’s going on?”
Dora clutched his shoulder. “I heard something. Listen.”
Allen was wide-awake now. They sat in bed, trying to stay quiet. The wind picked up during the night and it blew against the eaves of the house. The full moon cast its light through the curtains, spilling onto the bedroom floor. Allen’s eyes quickly adjusted to the darkness thanks to the moonlight.
The house was silent.
Quiet.
Allen tried to listen for his daughter’s voice from down the hall. He’d told Dora about Jessica’s play-acting when they went to bed and Dora found it a little amusing. Now it was three a.m. according to the digital numerals on the clock on her nightstand, and the house was still. So what did Dora hear?
Dora clutched his arm tight. “There! Listen!”
Allen listened, picking out the sound clearly.
The faint sounds of Jessica crying.
“Is that what you heard?” Allen asked again, whispering.
“Yes,” Dora said, climbing out of bed. “But I could have sworn I also heard...” She let the sentence trail off as she headed out of the room and Allen followed her down the hall. She opened the door to Jessica’s room and Allen could have sworn he heard that other voice again as they barreled into Jessie’s room, a second voice amid Jessica’s sobs. The room was bathed in sudden light and Dora was at Jessica’s bedside. Allen stepped in the room. Jessica was sitting up in bed, covers thrown off, crying. There was nobody else in the room except the three of them. I could have sworn I heard that other voice, though, Allen thought. And was Dora about to say she thought she heard it too?
“Honey, what’s wrong?” Dora cooed, taking their daughter in her arms. Jessica cried against Dora’s bosom. Allen looked around the room. Everything looked normal enough.
“Lily was saying bad things!” Jessica said, crying.
Now Allen sat on Jessica’s bed with Dora and rubbed her shoulders. Dora was holding her, rocking her. “It’s okay, honey. You were just having a bad dream.”
“No! It wasn’t a dream! Lily was here!” Jessica burst into fresh sobbing.
Allen felt a chill run down his spine. He stepped up quickly and closed the door so they wouldn’t wake up Andy.
“Honey, Lily wasn’t here,” Dora said. “Lily is at home in her own bed. You were just having a dream. You were just—”
“Lily was here!” Jessica sobbed. “And she told me b-b-bad things!”
“It’s okay, Jessie,” Dora cooed. “It’s okay—”
“She told me bad things like daddy fucking his secretary Barbara when he went away on that trip last week,” Jessica sobbed, and when she said that Allen felt like he’d been punched in the stomach. He felt all the color drain out of his skin, felt his belly plunge down an elevator shaft. “And that daddy...daddy stuck his—”
“Jessica, be quiet!” Allen said quickly, just wanting her to stop. My God, how can she know this, how can she—
Dora looked stunned. She looked at Allen, her eyes beseeching him to tell her that what Jessie was saying was lies, falsehoods from the imagination of a five-year-old girl who heard too much garbage language from the little girl down the street who seemed to be raised by a mother who had just emerged from a trailer park in the sticks and was therefore ignorant of proper behavior. Allen tried to meet her gaze, tried to tell her that he was shocked by the sudden accusations, shocked by the sudden foul language their daughter used, but his surprise at how his daughter had somehow known about a relationship he had tried to keep secret betrayed him. Dora’s face recognized this and her eyes widened at the revelation of his betrayal.
“She said Daddy was...was...was...”
“Jessica, stop it!” Allen said, a little too forcefully.
“...she told me all about it,” Jessica sobbed against her mother’s breast. “How daddy would say he was going out on business and he would stay with Barbara at some hotel and that—”
“Jessica, you’re making this up!” Allen said, trying to make her shut up and just be quiet. He felt like reaching out and putting a hand over her mouth to make her stop saying what he had been trying to hide for months. Dora looked at him, and in the brief moment their eyes met he saw that she believed Jessica. He turned away and looked at Jessica, trying to placate her, telling her she was just dreaming.
Dora rocked Jessica in her arms as their daughter’s cries trickled down. “Just ignore Lily, Jessie,” Dora said, caressing Jessica’s face, her eyes pooling with tears as she tried to meet Allen’s gaze. “Just ignore Lily and she’ll never say bad things to you again.”
“That’s right, Jessie,” Allen said, stepping forward to touch Jessica. “Just ignore her and—”
“Get out!” Dora snarled at Allen. He
drew back as if scalded and he froze at the look on Dora’s face. Her eyes blazed with anger. She wiped a tear off her cheek with the back of her hand. “Just get the hell out!” The venom in her voice froze him. She’d never used that tone of voice with him before. He felt his inner being crumble, and was just about to try to say something to make it all better, something like, hey, she was just imagining all this. This Lily kid’s putting this shit in her head! when Dora said again, louder, her voice taking on a gritty edge of hate that felt like a knife plunging through his heart: “Get the fuck out of here, you goddamn bastard!”
He couldn’t move. Couldn’t step back, couldn’t do what her voice commanded him. He looked at them, Jessica crying, Dora fixing him with a glare that wanted to kill him. His heart was pounding, his stomach felt like shaved ice. His balls shriveled up into his abdomen. “Dora...”
“Just get the hell out of my sight for once, Allen,” Dora said, turning away from him and burying her face in their daughter’s hair. “Just leave us alone!”
Her voice had lost some of its hateful venom, but was still brimming with an angry intensity he didn’t like. He stepped back, opened the door, and closed it behind him. He stood in the hallway, wanting to go back in the room and try to do something to make everything all right, but knew in his heart there was nothing to rectify this. Somehow Jessica had found out about Barbara. Somehow she’d known. He didn’t know how, didn’t know where the little neighbor girl came into play in all this, but he knew Jessica had found out somehow about his affair. It wasn’t something he understood; it was just something he felt in his bones. She knew. Plain and simple.
He stood outside the door to Jessica’s bedroom for a moment listening as Dora rocked and soothed their daughter. He heard her voice whispering and cooing to her: “It’s okay, sweetie. It’s okay, you just had a bad dream. Go to sleep.”
His stomach was leaden; his nerves tingled; he felt like shit.
He stepped down the hallway back toward the master bedroom, dreading the confrontation he knew was going to take place, hoping to deflect as much of the damage as possible. Maybe she’ll realize Lily’s been putting things in her head, he thought. Maybe she’ll think it’s all a sick joke. Jessie’s only five! Surely Dora has to realize that Jessie couldn’t know anything about—
As he reached the master bedroom door, he heard a fresh bout of sobbing and whirled toward Jessica’s bedroom, heart leaping in his chest.
It was Dora. Crying.
This isn’t the way it was supposed to happen. We only saw each other a few times. We weren’t even serious. We were just fuck buddies, indulging in each other because we were bored with our marriages and it didn’t mean anything! This can’t be happening!
But it was.
And he knew he was the cause of this new pain.
With shame weighing heavily on him, Allen entered the bedroom he shared with his wife. He sat on the bed, staring out the window at the star-filled night. He heard Dora cry for a while. Then it was silent.
She didn’t return to their bed.
After awhile, Allen lay down in their king-sized bed.
But he didn’t go to sleep. He couldn’t.
What the hell happened? What the hell is going on? How could she have known? How could she have found out?
Those questions chased him through to dawn’s light.
FIVE
MOTHERFUCKER.
Cindy Baker sat in her car, an old Ford, smoking a cigarette. She had parked five houses down from Ronnie’s new home, and had watched the comings and goings of the house for the past thirty minutes. She smoked cigarettes as she watched, the ignition powering the electrical system of the vehicle so she could listen to the radio. System of a Down wanted to blare from the speakers, but she had the volume turned down low. It wouldn’t be good to attract attention to herself.
She hadn’t shown up at the custody hearing a few days ago. Ronnie had told her it was happening, but she told him she wasn’t showing up. When he’d asked why not she said, “Why the fuck should I? Why should I have to ask a judge to see my own daughter?” Ronnie had started spouting a bunch of bullshit, something about doing right by Mary and about her getting help and counseling and bullshit bullshit bullshit. She didn’t need any fucking help, and she didn’t need counseling. What she needed was Ronnie, and she needed him to be away from that cunt from Oh-fucking-Hi-Oh and her two kids.
From this vantage point she could see Mary playing with another little girl who looked to be about five—a neighbor’s kid, maybe? Diana’s daughter, Lily, was sitting sullenly on the porch as the other two girls played. She was surprised she could remember the names of Diana’s kids. The older boy, Rick, was in the front yard somewhere tooling around on a skateboard. She hadn’t seen Diana since she pulled in and she didn’t want to see her now. She had to psyche herself up for it.
At first she refused to pick up Mary at Ronnie’s house for visits. Especially since the custody bullshit started. No fucking way was she going to have Diana supervise her while she visited her own daughter. So she’d refused to come to Ronnie’s house and insisted that he bring Mary to his mother’s. He’d complied for a while, but lately he hadn’t been able to do it. Something about all the hours he was putting in at work, so Diana was bringing Mary instead. That didn’t sit well with Cindy either, having that bitch drive her daughter to visit her. Cindy had dealt with the humiliation and pain of this the only way she knew how: she’d drowned it in alcohol and cocaine. And look where that had gotten her.
She rubbed the side of her head. The bruising from her fight with Karen was gone now but was replaced by a new one from a few nights ago. The fight she’d gotten into at the Cocalico Tavern a few weeks ago was still fresh in her mind, but it was now a distant memory to the bar’s patrons. She’d been banned from the club for a week and she hadn’t been back since. There was no need to run into that Karen bitch again; Cindy would just kick her ass again if she saw her and she didn’t want to waste the effort. She wanted to save the energy for Diana.
Cindy stubbed out her cigarette and lit another one. She wished she had a drink. There was nothing but a can of coke in the car and it had grown lukewarm. There’d been no booze in the apartment; Ray was supposed to have gotten some at the State store but he was a lazy-ass bastard, even if he had been kind enough to let her move in with him. Her visit with Mary wasn’t until tomorrow, but she had wanted to drive out to Ronnie’s house and park up the street just so she could watch her daughter play without being under the watchful gaze and under the thumb of Ronnie or Diana.
Cindy smoked, watching Mary and the other little girl playing, wondering about Diana. Why would Ronnie take up with her? She was a skinny little bitch. She walked like she had a stick up her ass, she was skanky, and she had two ugly kids. The thought of that woman living under the same roof as Mary made her skin crawl. Knowing she was a horrible person made her blood boil. She knew what kind of person Diana was the minute she’d laid eyes on her. And those suspicions had born fruit within the past few days.
It was no secret Cindy and Diana hated each other. Cindy could tell from the moment she met the woman two months ago that Diana couldn’t stand her. No telling what Ronnie had told her. Cindy had tried to make the best of the situation and had been friendly to the woman, but she’d been snubbed. Diana’s voice was always snotty when she spoke to Cindy, and it seemed she was always looking down her nose at her. When Cindy asked Mary how she liked her father’s new girlfriend her daughter had shrugged and said, “She’s okay, I guess. Daddy likes her.” That just made Cindy angry, and as the weeks passed and Ronnie pulled the custody thing on her, her problem had only gotten worse. Cindy had blown up at Ronnie over the custody issue and refused to go to the house to see Mary, insisting on Mary being brought to her ex mother-in-law’s. That worked fine until Diana started bringing the girl over. Then Laura announced she was just too busy on the days Cindy wanted to see Mary, and it would serve everybody’s interest if Cindy would just
visit with Mary at Ronnie’s. Cindy hadn’t liked the idea but she wanted to see her daughter, so she’d bit the bullet and done it.
The first few weeks’ visits had gone fine. She sat with Mary in the living room playing games with her while Diana surfed the Internet and smoked. Diana practically ignored her, and her kids walked around as if she wasn’t even there. There was a brief moment when Cindy thought that maybe Diana wasn’t so bad after all; she’d even tried making light conversation with her. But all she’d gotten back was attitude and short, clipped responses, suggesting Diana didn’t want to deal with her. Cindy had stopped trying to be friendly and made a passing remark to Laura one day when she was leaving Ronnie’s after a visit that Diana was “Queen Cunt”.
Then the shit hit the fan.
So far it was just phone calls. They started three days ago, at Ray’s apartment. Ray picked up the phone one night and handed it over to Cindy. When Cindy said “hello”, a female voice said, “You’re a pathetic wench, you know that? Just pathetic.”
“Who’s this?”
“Lost your husband, lost your home, lost your boyfriend and your other child,” the woman said. “Then you lose job after job, bounce from apartment to apartment, and now you’re in the process of losing your daughter. What kind of a mother are you?”
“You fucking bitch!” Cindy had screamed.
Diana hung up.
Cindy had been boiling mad; first thing she’d wanted to do was drive over to Ronnie’s and rip the woman’s head off and piss down her neck. Ray had talked her out of it, and Cindy opted for calling Ronnie’s house instead. When Diana answered Cindy screamed at her, “Don’t you ever fucking call me again, do you hear me you bitch!”
“Cindy?” Diana had asked, her voice taking on that, whatever are you talking about, dear? tone.
Fifteen minutes later she’d gotten another call. “Think you can threaten me, huh? You’re dumber than I thought you were.”
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