Dear Wife

by Kimberly Belle

  Oh yes, I do. I understand perfectly. I understand that no matter what happens next, I will not go into that hotel room. As soon as I cross that threshold, I’m dead.

  “Let’s go.” You tilt your head across the pavement, gesturing in the direction of the stairwell. I don’t budge, and you lift your brows. “The sooner we get upstairs, the sooner we can get this over with.”

  Despite your words, my heart thrills with excitement. You haven’t reached for the bag hanging at my hip. I’m not even sure you’ve noticed it.

  You shove me across the broken glass toward the stairs, and my thoughts are a jumble of desperate Hail Mary pleas. I search the lot for people, scanning the windows for anyone, for a hooker or her pimp or Terry, her face pressed to the glass. But the folks here can sense danger like a dog sniffing out a bomb, and they know when to barricade the doors and stay away from the windows. If anyone is up there peeking out of theirs, watching you force me across the lot, they’re not going to help.

  You make me go first, pushing me into the stairwell, and I begin the slow climb. You stay close to my heels, and I drag my feet on purpose. The gun bounces in the bag at my hip, but I won’t win in a shoot-out. I need a distraction, a junkie with a needle in his arm, a bum crouched in a corner, his pants around his ankles. I just need a second, just one, to catch you off guard.

  We’re almost to the second-story landing when it happens. The giant brown pile I passed on the way down, one that was definitely not left there by a dog.

  You crook an arm, press your elbow over your nose at the unholy smell. “Jesus, how do you stand living here?”

  Now.

  Gripping the railing in a fist, I lurch backward, throwing my upper body into yours with everything I’ve got. I feel the flash of pain as we butt heads, hear the crunch of your nose connecting with my skull. Blood explodes and you stagger backward on the stairs, but my arm works like a bungee cord. I give a hard tug on the railing and it pulls me forward. The momentum flings me right past the landing and around to face the stairs.

  I don’t look back. I hit the ground running.

  BETH

  I shake off the pain and sprint up the stairs, taking them by twos and threes to the second-story catwalk. I’m rounding the corner when the ground beneath me shakes, your body lumbering up behind me. Your heavy footsteps, the swish of your jeans, the low growl of your voice—bitch bitch bitch. You’re fast, but I have a decent head start, and I know where I’m going.

  What, you thought I wouldn’t have a plan? That I would come all this way, lie and cheat and steal, and not be prepared? There you go again, underestimating me.

  I tear down the catwalk, screaming and banging on doors. “Help! Somebody help me. Help!”

  Nobody’s going to help. This place is a revolving door of drug deals and armed robberies, of tussles in the parking lot and gunshots right outside my door. People stay inside for a reason, to get away from the discarded syringes and avoid stray bullets.

  But you’ll think I’m counting on them to save me.

  I reach the stairwell on the opposite end and fly up the stairs. The only way away from you is up. My only advantage, the element of surprise.

  At the top of the stairwell, I scale the metal rungs on the wall to the door in the ceiling, a heavy metal plate that opens to the rooftop. It’s supposed to be locked, and it was, until I took the lug wrench I found in the trunk of the Buick to the rusted metal loop on the padlock. I give the door a shove, and I’m greeted with sunlight and a blast of heat. I hoist myself out, then flip the door shut, right as you come around the corner.

  There’s nothing up here to weight the door down, no air-conditioning units or piles of junk I can haul over. No fire escapes or balconies I can lower myself onto, either, just a sudden, steep drop to the highway, three stories down. Nothing up here but bird shit and a giant billboard, looming above six lanes of traffic.

  Whether I am ready for it or not, I am officially done running.

  I hear you just below me, metallic dings as you scale the ladder. I edge around the door to the opposite side, step back so I’ll be out of sight. By the time you turn around and see me, it’ll be too late. I’ll already have a gun pointed at your head.

  The door explodes, metal clanging against asphalt, sending up a puff of dust and dirt. Your hands clasp either side of the opening, pulling your body up with a lot less effort than it took me. You pop up like a spring, landing on the rooftop with both feet. You look around, realizing too late that I’m behind you.

  I widen my stance and aim.

  When you see the gun, you laugh. You actually laugh, and your eyes gleam in the sunshine. So does the blood on your face, streaming from your nose, leaving dark red trails down your shirt. You don’t look scared. You look entertained.

  “This one’s loaded.” I jut my chin at the gun in your holster. “Put yours on the ground.”

  You roll your eyes. “You’re not a good enough shot to use that thing. You’ll miss me by a mile.”

  “I can hit you between the eyes, through the center of your heart or I can take out a kidney. Just tell me which one, left or right?”

  You quirk your head at the confidence in my tone, but your cocky smile doesn’t fade.

  “Put your weapon down,” I say again.

  You don’t move. “You’re really starting to piss me off, Emma.”

  My finger presses harder on the trigger. “You have exactly three seconds to unclip your gun and put it on the ground. One. Two—”

  “Okay, fine. Fine.” You unclip the one in your holster and place it carefully on the ground. The Sig is next, the unloaded one you took from my waistband. You don’t try anything, don’t take your chance and shoot me, and that is another mistake. You think you’ll get another chance. You’re underestimating me still.

  “The one at your ankle, too.”

  You puff a laugh, then put that one down, too.

  “Good. Now empty your pockets.”

  “Come on, Em—”

  “Empty them.”

  With a theatrical sigh, you toss everything to the ground. Your wallet, a set of cuffs, your badge, some papers and loose change. When you’re done, you hold your hands high in the air, humoring me, but your expression is anything but humorous. “Happy now?”

  Not even close. I point the Sig at your face and nudge you backward, putting some distance between you and the weapons. When I get close enough, I kick them away.

  “So, what—you shoot me in the head and leave me for the rats? Take out my kneecaps then roll me over the side?” He glances behind him to the edge, some fifteen feet away and closing fast. “What’s the plan here?”

  The plan is to not do any of those things.

  You take another step back, then another. The look you give me is the same as always, firm and fierce, but the fire I saw in your eyes before is gone.

  I’m in control now.

  “How did you know?” I have to shout over the roar of the traffic below us. “About Sabine, I mean. How did you know she was the one helping me?”

  “I saw you together in the park.”

  You pause to let that one soak in, and I do the math. The park was what—two, three weeks ago? That’s when Sabine told me about Nick, made me memorize his phone number. I wonder what else you know, what else you saw when I didn’t realize you were watching.

  “I know a guilty person when I see one, and I saw the look on your face. You were terrified somebody would see you together, so I did some research. As soon as I found out she was working at the shelter, I knew what the two of you were planning. And then I came home early from that training, and I couldn’t find you, but I found her at that Super1. I was waiting at her car when she came out.”

  “But Sabine didn’t know where I was. I didn’t tell her on purpose.”

  You shrug. “That explains why she wasn’t very helpful.”

  “So you killed her?”

  Despite everything, I’m still praying you’ll deny it. I
t’s one thing for you to enjoy hurting me, but to hurt a stranger for helping me? I’m praying you’re not that evil.

  “What else was I supposed to do? She looked me in the eyes and lied about that day in the park. She said it was a chance meeting, that you only talked for a minute or two when really it was sixteen. Sixteen whole minutes. I know because I timed it. When I told her that I knew she was helping you make a run for it, she got loud. She went for her phone. I shoved her in the back of my car and got out of there before anybody came over to see what the fuss was about. And what do you think would have happened if I’d let her get away? I’ll tell you what. She would have gone running to my boss. She would have told him lies about us. About me. I couldn’t have her doing that. I have a reputation to uphold.”

  Yes, your precious reputation, more important to you than how you actually treat your wife. Something you fabricated to deflect from what you really are, a coddled mama’s boy with the same hot head as his convict father. Everything you do is an attempt to prove you’re nothing like him. Becoming a cop. Taking care of your mother. Shoving your gun down my throat so I wouldn’t leave. Anything to project this big, happy family.

  I hate you with a burning, blazing fury. “I did this on purpose, you know.”

  “Did what?”

  A truck rumbles by, shaking the rooftop like an earthquake, and I wait for it to pass.

  “Brought you here.”

  Your brow crumples. “What do you mean, you brought me here? You didn’t bring me here. I am trained for this. This is what I do. You tried to throw me off your trail but I found you.”

  “You think I didn’t know you’d be clocking all the Wi-Fi check-ins to the Facebook page? That you wouldn’t notice all those long listens on the scanner website? Those were all huge Bat Signals in the sky. I knew they would be.”

  You tilt your head, and the look you give me is dubious. “No, you didn’t. You couldn’t even install the new printer. I had to come home on my lunch hour to do it for you.”

  Your heels are inches from the edge of the roof now. One more step backward and you’ll be hanging over air.

  “Pay attention, Marcus. I knew that Jade would be working her magic down in the basement, plotting all the IP check-ins onto a map, and I knew they would lead you straight to me. Did you see my friend Nick on all the ATM cameras? I am not as stupid as you think.”

  You don’t say a word, but your expression is cussing me out.

  “And how about those phones from that skeevy minimart? Did you find those?” I catch the flash of surprise in your eyes, the way your jaw goes slack, and I laugh, a harsh, bitter sound. “I gave three of them away to random people I met on the street. The fourth one I used for days. I stole money from a church, and then I spent it in a place just up the road, one with dozens of surveillance cameras. Are you getting what I’m telling you? I planned this. I sent up flares that would lead you here. I wanted you to find me.”

  I see the moment the quarter drops, the way your brow clears in understanding, in shock. Your voice is both incredulous and enraged. “You fucking bitch.”

  “Why, because after all these years I’m finally standing up for myself? That doesn’t make me a bitch, it makes me brave. Now apologize.”

  “No.” Even now, backed into a literal corner with nowhere to go but through a bullet, you won’t say the words. You can’t get them over your tongue.

  I wag the gun, pointing in the air at your face. “Repeat after me, Marcus. I am a sorry excuse for a human and I apologize for ever hurting you.”

  “No.” This time you shout it. You shake your head, your expression bitter. “You’re the one who should apologize, because this is all on you. I would have stayed with you forever. I would have died for you. You fucked this up, not me. I loved you, and you fucked us up.”

  I shake my head. “You didn’t love me. You only loved what I could give you—control.”

  “What? That’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard. You don’t give me control. I take it.”

  And that right there is the crux of the problem. The one thing you did right. For too long, I allowed you to take my power. I was complicit in my own victimization. It took an outsider, another woman—Sabine—to make me see that in order to end this, I had to demand my power back.

  I give the gun another wag—hello? I’m in control now—and it works. The fury drops off your face, and your eyes get glassy.

  “You were wrong before, you know. I really do love you. You are the best thing in my life. The only part that makes it worth living. If I live to be a hundred, I’ll never love anyone the way I love you.”

  I shake my head. There is literally nothing you can say to make me lower this gun.

  “Come on, babe. We still have good times. I can still make you laugh, and remember all those days last summer on the river? You, drinking wine and sitting between my legs while I rowed? Let’s go home and do that again. Let’s pack a picnic and take out the boat.”

  Your words are as manipulative as your apologies, the fake tears and grand romantic gestures that always come after a beating. A year ago, I might have said okay. I might have said you are not well, you have a problem—I won’t let you work through it alone. But I’m not the same person I was ten months ago, when I started planning this. Not the person I was ten days ago, either, when I told Sabine goodbye.

  I’m Beth Murphy now, and Beth Murphy knows what you’re about to do.

  I know it from the way your weight shifts and your eyes get squinty at the corners. The way your hands tense into tight, white fists, how your muscles vibrate but your knees get loose and liquid. You are a predator, ready to pounce.

  At the first sign of a lunge, I tilt the barrel a half inch to the right and squeeze the trigger. Even though I was prepared for it, the pop reverberates up my arm and through my bones, a shock to my system.

  But it’s nothing like the shock on your face. The bullet whizzes past your ear, and I bet it makes a whistling sound, doesn’t it? I bet it feels like fire where it nicks your skin—only a millimeter or two but hot enough to send you staggering. One foot lurches back, but there’s nowhere for it to go. Your other boot connects with the rooftop’s rim, and your weight tumbles backward. Your ass hangs over the highway.

  You teeter on the edge for what feels like forever. Long enough for you to lift a hand to your ear and come away with blood. Long enough for me to lower the weapon and step back. Long enough for you to open your goddamn mouth and tell me you’re sorry.

  And then, just like that, you’re gone.

  BETH

  Four months later

  I arrive twenty-seven minutes into the Sunday service, halfway through a hymn that sounds more like a rock ballad. A good forty singers are lined up across the back of the stage in bright purple robes, their expressions glorious on the twin LED screens above their heads. The Reverend sings along at the far end, tapping a tambourine in time on his knee. Their faces, their entire bodily beings radiate joy, as do those of the people around me, a full house of people swaying to the music. What did Martina call it? Happy-clappy, though now that I’ve seen it for myself, I’d sooner call it euphoric. Enough that nobody notices when I slip into an upper row seat.

  Not that anyone here would recognize me, now that my hair is back to its original color, the deep mahogany God originally intended. A couple more months and it’ll touch my shoulders. Then again, maybe I’ll leave it like this, in a bob just long enough I can tuck a curl behind my ears. Now that I’ve gotten used to it being short, I rather like the freedom of fresh air on my neck. Sure beats the weight of hair, or the feel of Marcus’s hand on it. And a woman at the airport yesterday said the haircut suited me, that it was sassy. I don’t feel sassy quite yet, but I’m getting there.

  Is it weird that I still hear his voice? It’s annoying, certainly, and maybe a little crazy, but sometimes I’ll be going about my day, heating up a can of soup for lunch or brushing my teeth before bed, and he’ll bitch about how I’m
doing it all wrong. “Put the cap on the tube. You’re making a mess. And lay off the ice cream. You’re looking a little hippy.”

  You you you. Bad bad bad.

  But I’m not the same Emma he pushed around for all those years. Now I do what I couldn’t when he was still here: I ignore him. I let him go on and on and I act like I don’t hear a thing. I read a book, take a long bubble bath, bake brownies and eat half the pan. This will not be his lasting legacy, this ability to take up space rent-free in my head, making me feel shitty about myself. If Marcus talks and I pretend not to hear, is he really there?

  The music fades, and the congregation sinks into their seats.

  The Reverend steps to the podium, and I wish I could say his sermon was about something relevant. Forgiveness or new beginnings, maybe, or the many reasons why good people do bad things and still get to go to Heaven. But I suppose that would be too convenient, much too serendipitous, and real life doesn’t come tied up with a pretty bow. He preaches about the greatness of God, and I listen for a while before my mind starts to wander.

  It’s been four months since Marcus tumbled off that rooftop, four months since the police slapped handcuffs on my wrists and carted me downtown. I told them everything, and still they threw the book at me. They charged me with falsifying my identity, with fraud, with unlawful possession of not one but two stolen weapons. They even threatened me with second-degree murder for a while, until my attorney pointed out both guns were empty. The bullet Clyde gave me was never found, but the residue was, up both of my arms, my shirt, my face and Bozo-the-Clown hair.

  And then the Atlanta police received a call from Chief Eubanks. He told them that when Sabine’s body floated up from the darkness, she brought along an unequivocal clue: strapped to her wrist was a sports watch, one of those devices that monitors heart rate and tracks workouts. Running. Biking. Swimming. This model was waterproof, and once they recharged the battery, they discovered she’d turned on the GPS function, which tracked her all the way into the lake. Unsurprisingly, it matched the GPS on Marcus’s patrol car at the time of her death.