Dear Wife

by Kimberly Belle

  “What about her?”

  “Come on, man. Stop being so difficult. What does she think happened?”

  I sigh, sinking onto a counter stool. That heavy, sandbag feeling is back along with a knifepoint throbbing behind my eyes. “I’m pretty sure she thinks the same thing.”

  He pops open the beer and tosses the top on the counter. “Well, okay, who cares what that old hag thinks? The cops are the ones you need to convince.”

  I roll my eyes, toss the bottle top and the rest of my pizza slice into the trash. “You’re a motherfucking genius, Derrick. You really are. Convince the cops I didn’t do it. Why didn’t I think of that?”

  “I’m serious, J. I know a guy who works for Century 21, and he’s always talking about the crazies who wander into his open houses. Mostly people come for the free snacks or to take a dump in the powder room, but just last month, some asshat pulled out a gun. Took my friend’s wallet, his watch, the keys to his car. Sabine’s hot. It’s not unimaginable somebody saw her and got the wrong idea.”

  “I know. I’ve been telling her that for ages.”

  The microwave dings, and he reaches in for the pizza, then snatches his hand back with a hiss. He rips a paper towel from the roll and tries again. “And what about those gangs over on the east side? All those break-ins on Cherry Street aren’t for nothing, you know. Those little shits are taking over the city. It’s only a matter of time before they move their territory up this way. Maybe it was them.”

  “Maybe,” I say, because for once my brother is not wrong. The gangs are taking over the city, and thanks to the soaring unemployment, the poverty, the crappy schools graduating illiterate halfwits without a single marketable skill, there are fewer and fewer people here to stop them. What used to be a hardworking American metropolis now has the dubious honor of being one of the most dangerous cities in America, second only to Detroit. The smart folks have all moved away. Maybe I should join them.

  He folds the slice in half, and orange oil spurts onto his hand, dripping down his fingers and onto the floor. “I’m just saying there are a million people it could’ve been. Seems to me the cops are being lazy, focusing only on you. Don’t let yourself be an easy target. Show ’em it’s not always the husband.”

  He shoves half the pizza in his mouth in one giant bite. A long strand of melted cheese dangles from his chin like a worm, but for the first time in well, ever, I don’t gripe at him for the mess. My idiot, dickhead brother has a point. I have let myself be the easy target.

  I pluck my phone from the countertop, pull up a number I once knew by heart. After two rings, a familiar voice hits my ear. “It’s about time,” she says. “I’ve only been leaving you messages all over town.”

  * * *

  Amanda Shephard steps through my front door, looking just like she did in high school. Blonde, thin, a complicated sort of pretty—big lashes and acrylic nails and long, heat-curled hair. Her face is caked under a layer of makeup I’ve never seen her without, not even the summer before senior year when our entire class spent every day bobbing in blow-up tubes on the river. All the other girls had shiny cheeks pink from the sun, but Amanda’s makeup was like a mask, flawless and impenetrable.

  She pulls me into a perfumed hug. “Oh, Jeffrey, you poor, poor thing.”

  Her voice echoes in my foyer, loud and consoling in a way that makes it feel exactly the opposite. It’s her television voice, the one she’s cultivated for her show, Mandy in the Morning, a local daily featuring all things mundane and ridiculous.

  I extricate myself and give her a tight-lipped smile.

  “How are you doing? How are you holding up? Are you eating at all?”

  I think of the eggs in the sink, the pizza I shoved out the door along with my brother, right before she got here. “A little.”

  “If I had known, I would have made you a casserole.” She waves a manicured hand through the air and laughs. “Oh, who am I kidding? We both know I can’t cook. I would have ordered you some Chinese takeout or something. Anyway, I’m so glad you called.”

  “Thank you. And please,” I say, gesturing toward the living room. “Make yourself at home.”

  In the sixty minutes it took her to get over here, I cleaned up the place. I dusted and fluffed all the pillows, and I exchanged my running shorts for a pair of khaki slacks and a navy polo over loafers. Nothing too fancy. I don’t want her to think I’m trying too hard.

  She steps into the room and gasps, making a beeline to the wall of windows. She stops just beyond the desk, standing before a sheet of glass lit up by the sun. It turns her hair iridescent and makes the fabric of her dress float like a wispy cloud around her body—a cloud that is more than a little see-through. Well, well, well. Amanda Shephard is wearing a lacy red thong.

  “You’re so close to the river,” she says without turning. “Like the house is floating on top of it or something.”

  “I know.”

  “The view is stunning.”

  Yes. It is.

  She presses a hand into the glass, and the sun turns her skin to fire. Amanda is conventionally beautiful, but up to now, I’ve never found her all that attractive. Too processed, too high maintenance. But standing here, in my cheating wife’s house, I’m beginning to see another side of Amanda. The side that would make a spectacular revenge fuck.

  I clear my throat. “The view is what sold us on the house. Turns every window into a piece of artwork. Did you know the river changes colors, depending on the weather and time of day? I didn’t know that until I got to look at it every day.”

  She smiles over her shoulder. “Well, Jeffrey Hardison, you sensitive old dog, you. Next thing I know, you’ll be reading me poetry.”

  At the south end of the river, a black search boat motors upstream, and multiple people lean over the sides, staring into the water.

  “Do you mind if we get started?” I say, pointing Amanda to the couch before she sees the boat. “When we’re done here, I need to get over to the police station and see if there’s any update about Sabine.”

  “I just came from there, actually.” She wrinkles her nose, stepping away from the window. “They won’t tell me anything other than that Sabine’s car showed up at the Super1, which in all honesty tells me nothing. Who are the suspects? What are the clues? The people of Pine Bluff deserve to know the truth, Jeffrey.”

  “I agree.”

  She sinks onto one of the twin three-seaters, and I choose the one opposite her. The search boat has stopped in the middle of the river, the flashlights all trained to one spot. I watch as a man in full diving gear slips over the side.

  “I really wish you’d have let me bring the cameras,” Amanda says, dragging a voice recorder from her bag.

  I shake my head. There’s an orchid in the air between us, and I shove it to the opposite end of the table. “I already told you, I can’t say or do anything that might get in the way of the police investigation.”

  She freezes, one arm stretched halfway to the coffee table. “So this is off-the-record then?” She straightens, holds up the recorder. “Can I even use this thing?”

  I lean back in my chair and pretend to consider it.

  Amanda loses patience after only a second or two. “You called me here for a reason, Jeffrey. Stop playing around and tell me what it is.”

  “Fine. I called you here because I want you to help me set the record straight. The thing is, I’ve seen this movie, and I know how it ends. With the husband serving twenty to life.”

  “Only the guilty ones.” She says it teasingly, playfully, letting it hang with obvious implication.

  “Come on, Amanda. We’ve known each other for what—fifteen, twenty years?”

  She purses her glossed lips. “I won’t tell if you don’t.”

  Behind her crossed legs, a stealthy thumb presses down on the record button. I pretend that I don’t notice.

  “Long enough for you to know what I am and what I’m not capable of. I may be a dick at times, b
ut I am not the kind of guy who makes his estranged wife go missing. I’m not a murderer.”

  She tsks at the word estranged. “Shelley McAdams is a friend of mine. Let’s just say she’s not taking it well.”

  The doctor’s wife. At least I’m not the only sucker.

  “Yeah, well, no offense to Shelley, but she’s one of the reasons I called you here. The police seem to be assuming this was a crime of passion, but I’m not the only one with a motive. How do we know Shelley didn’t... I don’t know, seek out her own revenge?”

  “Because Shelley is in Chicago, interviewing divorce attorneys.” Amanda flashes a sorry-but-I’m-on-her-side smile. “Don’t be surprised if she gets full custody of the kids.”

  “Okay, so other people, then. You know the statistics on crime in this town. Sabine has money, she’s gorgeous and she’s often alone in some empty house. There are plenty of sickos out there. How do we know it wasn’t one of them?”

  “I’m sure the police are looking into it.”

  “No, they’re not—that’s the whole point. As far as I can tell, the only person the police are sniffing around is me.”

  “Then why don’t you look into a camera and tell the world you’re innocent?” When I don’t respond, she adds, “If you’re nervous, if you need some media coaching, I can help you get some. It’s not that hard.”

  “I’m not nervous. I just think what I have to say would mean so much more coming from someone who’s not me.”

  “What do you have to say?”

  “I have...information about my wife. Information that coming from me would sound...suspicious. Coming from you, however, it would be news.”

  Amanda straightens in importance at the last word, just like I knew she would. Amanda longs to be seen as a real journalist. She spends a lot of time online, promoting the newsworthiness of her show on social media, defending it from people who dismiss it as fluff. Calling her a journalist is like handing her a Pulitzer. It validates her.

  “How about this?” I swing my ankle over a knee, sinking deeper into the couch. “You put that recorder of yours onto the table, and I’ll talk into it and tell you what I know. When we’re done, if you like what I have to say and want me to say it all over again into a camera, we can talk about that, too.”

  By now, Amanda is like a dog with a bone. I’ve given her one with just enough meat that there’s no way she will let it loose. But she’s always been a bit of a drama queen, and she takes her time pretending to decide. Arms crossed, eyes narrowed, glossed lip working between her teeth. I settle in and indulge her theater. After a few seconds, she places the recorder on the table.

  Showtime.

  I walk her through what I know. That Sabine was there, in the Super1 lot, before she disappeared. That she left without her car and her burner phone, but with her iPhone, which the police have not been able to locate. That I was the one to sound the alarm, a few short hours after she was expected home. That I’ve barely slept since.

  “So what, then? Do you think someone took her?”

  I shrug. “It’s possible, I guess. But there was no sign of struggle near her car, no blood on the ground or tire marks. If she got into someone’s car, I’m guessing it was someone she knew. Then again, I think it’s much more possible she...” I wince, looking down at the sisal carpet.

  Amanda scoots forward on the couch, leaning in. “You think it’s more possible she what?”

  I heave a full-body sigh. “I feel like I’m betraying Sabine by even bringing this up, but I also think if she were here, she’d understand. The thing is—and you’re the first person I’ve ever told this to, so please forgive me if I stumble over my words—but a little over two years ago, Sabine was going through a rough patch. Her mother has Alzheimer’s, and she’d stopped recognizing Sabine. Not every time, but that first time was pretty devastating. On top of that, we heard the baby Sabine was carrying, the one we’d spent a lot of money trying to conceive, didn’t have a heartbeat. All that goes to say, things were really, really shitty.”

  Amanda makes a sound of sympathy, but she waits for me to continue.

  “After she lost that baby, it’s like she... I don’t know, went to a place I couldn’t follow. She stopped eating. She stayed in bed for days at a time. She was self-medicating, with alcohol and leftover painkillers and whatever else she could get her hands on before I flushed it all down the toilet. Then one day, she was fine. She got up, got dressed and went back to work like nothing had happened. She sold three houses that week and listed two more. I remember thinking that’s how good a broker my wife is, that she can end three comatose weeks with deals totaling more than a million dollars.”

  “How did she do it?” Amanda asks.

  “I have no idea. It could have been a fluke, deals that she had been working on before the miscarriage that suddenly came through, I don’t know. But the point is, I finally relaxed. I thought things were better, that she was better, and I stopped hovering so much.” I pause, counting in my head to three. “I shouldn’t have stopped hovering.”

  Amanda’s forehead crumples between perfectly sculpted brows. “I don’t understand. What does all of this have to do with what happened to Sabine? With wherever she is?”

  “Maybe nothing, maybe everything.” I fill my lungs with breath, blow it slowly out. The vapid Amanda holds hers. “What I’m trying to say is, Sabine has done this before.”

  Amanda’s eyes go wide. “You’re not suggesting...”

  I nod. “Two years ago in November, the day after Thanksgiving, Sabine got on a bus and disappeared.”

  BETH

  Early Monday morning, Martina shows up at my door fresh from the shower. “Good morning! You look pretty. Let’s carpool.”

  Her face is bare, rosy cheeks and scrubbed skin, a fringe of dark lashes that doesn’t need mascara. Two French braids snake around each ear and leave twin wet marks on her God Works Here T-shirt. The total effect is easy, youthful, adorable.

  I smile and reach for my keys. “Good idea. I’ll drive.”

  “But I’ve already got mine.” She holds her car keys up, jingles them in the air beside her face.

  “I’m a real backseat driver,” I say, nudging her out of the way so I can step into the hall. “You don’t want me in your passenger’s seat, I promise. I’ll only make you crazy, and besides, I like to drive.”

  What I really like is to stay in control. No way I’m strapping myself into somebody else’s car and letting them steer me Lord knows where, not with every penny I own strapped to my middle. I’m not about to relinquish my cash or my shiny new command on life that easily. At least behind the wheel of my own car, I am the one in charge.

  As long as things are on my terms, I wouldn’t mind the company.

  Martina opens her mouth to argue, then becomes distracted by a door opening at the far end of the hall. Tom, the red-faced, sweaty guy who lives in the room across from mine, steps out of the bathroom in a puff of steam. He’s soaking from his three-minute session under the shower, water streaming in rivulets down his short, square body and onto the hallway runner. His hair, usually wrapped into a complicated comb-over that’s not fooling anyone, hangs in thin strands onto his bare shoulders.

  “Good morning, ladies,” he says. “You two are looking awfully spiffy today. Matching outfits, I like it.”

  Better than his outfit, which is a tiny slip of ancient terry cloth slung low around his potbelly. It flaps open when he walks, providing intermittent views of something I’m trying hard not to notice.

  Martina makes a face. “Put some clothes on, Tom.”

  “Gotta dry off first.”

  “I thought that’s what the towel was for.”

  I make a sound in the back of my throat. “Towel” is a generous term.

  “Nope. Towel’s for modesty.” He stops at his door, giving us his hairy back while he works in his key. “My body parts function best when they air-dry. You two have a good day, now.” He steps inside and shuts the
door.

  Martina turns to me with a concerned frown. “Is that true? Am I supposed to be letting my parts air-dry?”

  I laugh and head for the stairs. “Come on. I don’t want to be late.”

  We run into Miss Sally in the hallway below, her hair wound around fat curlers the same hot pink as her silk robe, a floral kimono wrapped loosely around her body. It hangs open between her breasts, two jiggly mounds of flesh right at eye level. What is it with half-naked people in this place?

  “Well, don’t you two look like the Doublemint twins,” she says, taking us in from head to toe. “I see our Martina got you a job, huh?”

  I glance at Martina, flashing her a smile. “She did. For which I am forever grateful.”

  Martina grins and bumps me with a shoulder.

  “I hear good things about that place. A friend of mine goes there every Sunday. Sits front and center, right in front of the big cross. He’s been trying to get me to go, but I keep telling him not to bother.” Miss Sally’s gaze dips to my chest, and the text written across my shirt. “Unlike your souls, I’m pretty sure mine is doomed.”

  “Don’t be fooled,” I say, laughing. “I’m going to need more than a T-shirt to save my soul.”

  Miss Sally laughs like we’re in on the same joke, even though all those things I used to believe about my inherent decency are no longer true. I’ve lied, I’ve cheated, and before this thing is through, I will have done much worse.

  Some might say that makes me just as bad as you, but I don’t believe that. This is nothing like the times you held me down and spit in my face, punched me in the stomach so hard I stopped breathing, held my neck and tried to make me swallow a whole bottle of Ambien. “I don’t want to do these things,” you told me after every instance. “It must be you. You are the one who brings this out in me. I wouldn’t be like this if you were a different woman.” What I’m doing is self-defense. For me, this is survival.