Lies of the Heart

by Michelle Boyajian

  “Hi, this is Paul Minsky from Oceanside Realty? Not sure if I have the right number, but if this is the same Nick Burrelli that visited last spring, I have great news about that cottage on Topsail Island? North Carolina? It’s up for sale again, and the owner asked if you might be interested. If you are, give me a call at the office at 9:10—”

  Katie fumbles in the junk drawer for a marker, one hand still glued to her temple. She scribbles the names and number on a yellow Post-it with the word “cottage” beside it. She presses the sticky part of the paper across the top of the answering machine and slowly draws a big question mark beside “Topsail Island.” Last spring? She stares at the Post-it, the questions rising, until she hears the metallic sound of garbage cans clanging into each other in her backyard.

  Out on the deck, she peers into the night, suddenly bright with moonlight. Her two metal cans are lined up neatly by the shed, the sides wet and glistening. She crosses her arms against the cold, walks to the edge of the deck. The moonlight pushes through the barren branches of the trees, casting striped blocks of light and shadow onto her lawn and shed. There is a fine mist on everything outside, a hazy fog that settles onto the grass and the dead leaves and the branches above her head. Katie leans over and rests her elbows on the railing, feeling sleepy finally, grateful that the day is at last winding down, but then Nick joins her once again. It wasn’t anyone’s fault, she hears him say, and suddenly the moonlight loses its soft edges, makes the beads of water everywhere look like tiny drops of glass, like one good wind could shatter it all, splintering her backyard into a million pieces.

  9

  They had been lovers for only four months, but Katie could already sense when Nick wasn’t beside her at night; sometimes his absence pulled her up from her dreams, arms paddling wildly as if from a great depth, until she surfaced and called out to him.

  She felt it now, just before she took in a deep breath and opened her eyes. He was by the window that looked out on the hospital’s expansive parking lot, sitting in a boxy chair with his long legs dangling over the arm. Half his body in the moonlight that shone into the darkened room, the other in shadow. Her chest stretched with tenderness.

  —Hey, she whispered.

  He turned to her.—Hey, he said, hopping up. He moved to her side.—How do you feel?

  —Sleepy, she said, motioning to the bag of Demerol hanging by the side of her hospital bed.

  —No more cramps?

  —Almost gone, she said. And then, taking another deep breath:—I guess—I guess we didn’t have to get married after all, huh?

  Nick squinted down at her.—Dana and your parents just left, he said.—They’ll be back in the morning.

  Katie nodded, concentrated on the bumps her knees made from underneath the scratchy white sheet.

  —The doctor came in earlier, too, Nick said, his voice softer.

  —It wasn’t anyone’s fault. It’s called a spontaneous abortion. Probably meant there was something really wrong with the baby.

  Katie nodded. She wasn’t brave enough to look at Nick—the loss felt like a punishment for her infinite craving for him to be close, to have his hands stealing over her body.

  —Do you regret it? she asked.

  Nick shrugged.—It was too soon to be thinking about kids—

  —No, Katie interrupted, finally looking at him.—I mean the wedding. Do you regret getting married?

  —It was the right thing to do, Nick said with conviction.

  She laced her fingers into his, watched their hands become one. —But now? she asked.

  There was the briefest pause, the briefest hesitation—so brief, in fact, that she could almost ignore it, could almost pretend that it didn’t happen. She could almost fool herself that his fingers didn’t loosen inside hers for a quick, barely perceptible beat.

  He looked up, smiled in that shy way that always pulled at her. —Of course not.

  Katie lay back and closed her eyes. Stopped herself from tearing the hospital sheet off and pulling him closer, from pulling him down on the bed with her and saying, It would have worked better if you said it right away. If you moved your eyes to mine, and pulled our hands up to your chest, it would have been perfect.

  10

  The equipment is cumbersome and the light at the top of the basement stairs is out again, but Katie’s feet have trudged up and down the carpeted stairs so many times that they know the way by feel. Tonight, before she finally ends her day, she needs to see Arthur cradle Sarah’s hand in both of his again, to see Sarah’s shy smile once more when Arthur teases her in his gruff voice about their courtship—to at least try to make some order of all this footage she knows so well. Not just an escape, Mom, she thinks, but my profession. The perfect response, but only when her mother isn’t there to hear it.

  At the bottom of the stairs, she elbows on the bright overhead lights and pads onto the cold tile in her thick wool socks. Her workstation is exactly as she left it two nights ago: a disaster. Strewn across her desk are dozens of papers, sketch pads, markers, videotapes, cutting scissors, reels of film, and paper plates with globby piles of drying ketchup or half-eaten sandwiches on them. Her editing board is no better, covered with more of the same. Beside it are stacked boxes filled with research papers, books, a turned-over garbage can with small cellophane squares spilling out.

  Katie eyes the other half of the basement with longing: completely empty except for an old red beanbag chair in the center—what Nick always referred to as “his side.” Katie walks to her desk, the cold penetrating the wool and seeping up into the soles of her feet. She dumps the projector onto her desk, snaps on the space heater, and rubs her hands together.

  This basement, so open and full of possibility, was the selling point of the house, or at least that’s what Nick told people. It’s perfect for Katie, for her work, he said to her parents, and showed them where he planned to install the pull-down screen on the wall. We’ll put a comfortable chair here, her editing board and file cabinets there, he said pointing, her parents nodding in agreement. Nick may have convinced them, but Katie knew that the real sticking point with the house was the neighborhood in Warwick Neck—stately, distinguished, jam-packed with doctors, lawyers, and businessmen respected in the community. It was the prestige that Nick craved, the image he wanted to project to the world, but with Katie’s never-ending filming expenses and Nick’s salary, they couldn’t really afford it. And then Nick’s mother came through as she always did since they had married—with a grudging generosity that didn’t seem to faze Nick at all and made Katie cringe whenever she called. It’s a gift. You don’t have to pay me back, Candice said on the phone after they returned from the closing. But every time Katie thought of the amount of that check—big enough to make their monthly mortgage payments manageable—every time she heard the satisfied tone in Candice’s voice, she understood that her mother-in-law was trying to prove something, to show Katie up in a way that Katie could never quite figure out. And every time she gave them a small loan for more filming supplies (saying, before Katie could hand the phone off to Nick, I hope you have enough supplies to see this one through), Katie wondered what she had to do to show this woman that she loved Nick the way he deserved. On her rare visits, Candice watched Katie closely when Nick turned away or left the room, her dark eyes tripping over Katie’s body, quickly assessing, while the sunny smile remained on her face. Katie was grateful when her mother-in-law moved to California shortly after she and Nick were married—almost like a jilted lover, Katie had wanted to say to Nick more than once, but she knew better by then.

  She walks over to the three long shelves that Nick installed into the wall beside her editing board just last winter. There, lined up in no particular order, are canisters of all sizes and colors, waiting for her. Katie flips through the ones on the top shelf, searching for the reel where Sarah describes Arthur’s marriage proposal, when she hears a small creaking noise. And then, before she can get her hands to the end of the shelf w
here it meets the wall, the top shelf bumps down to the second shelf, and the canisters skid down and crash, one by one, onto the floor. The tinny sound of metal striking metal reverberates off the basement walls, rings in her ears; one smaller, rust-colored canister breaks free and rolls across the floor before bumping into a stack of newspapers. Katie watches it wobble in circles, then slap sideways onto the tile floor. Then, only silence.

  “Perfect,” she mumbles, kneeling down to pick up a large silver canister from the middle of the mess.

  She snaps the reel onto the spool, feeds the film onto the spindle. The film catches, hums forward, and she flicks on the bulb. She reaches for the sound machine, pulls back on impulse: she only needs to see Arthur and Sarah together before she ends this night and, she hopes, falls into a gray, dreamless sleep before starting all over again tomorrow.

  At first there’s just a fuzzy image, but then the focus adjusts. Instead of Sarah and Arthur waiting to greet her, though, there is an extreme black-and-white close-up of Nick’s face.

  “Shit.”

  Katie’s eyes skip to the jumbled canisters on the floor, then back to the screen. The basement shrinks, the darkness deepening outside the projector’s light. She watches as the camera angle widens, and then there is Nick in his dark suit and striped tie, holding a small plaque against his chest. The Warwick Center employees and clients stand in a semicircle around him, smiling and clapping. Nick dips his head modestly as the applause continues. Eddie Rodriguez, the director of the recreation program, is on the right, two of his fingers in his mouth for that shattering whistle of his. The cameras flash and wink all around Nick, and he shakes his head, runs a hand across the back of his neck.

  An award ceremony from years ago, one in a long line of gatherings to reward Nick’s devotion to his clients. Katie remembers this one (something to do with his new methods in speech-articulation work), and she remembers how she felt, too, standing across the elegant conference room at the Marriott Hotel, feeling miles away from the action as she filmed—longing to clap along, to join everyone in the half circle surrounding her husband. But most of all she remembers wanting Nick to look her way, to look directly into the camera and see her there behind the lens, recording his success on film. She yelled Over here! at least three times, but he couldn’t hear her above the clapping and shouts of congratulations.

  “Over here, Nick,” she calls out now, her voice hollow in the cold basement.

  The camera sweeps to the right and there is the program director, the normally stern Patricia Kuhlman, looking relaxed for once as she crosses her arms and cradles both her elbows in her hands—the admiration in her face unmistakable. In the background the camera catches Dottie Halverson’s husband, Fred, bending over a steaming tray on a long banquet table, plate piled high. Chafing pans are lined up on top of a white tablecloth, a long flickering candle between each one, but the view is suddenly blocked, because Nick’s colleagues and clients, as if on cue, are closing the gap around him to shake his hand, embrace him.

  Katie remembers this moment perfectly now, rests her hand on her stomach and presses down.

  The camera jostles, and then there is Jerry, turning back to mouth Sorry at Katie for bumping into her as he moves away from her side. The camera follows his lumbering walk into the center of the crowd, the direct path he makes toward Nick. It captures the way the employees and clients automatically shift aside to allow Jerry into the fold, hands reaching out and slapping him good-naturedly on the back. And then there is Nick, stepping forward, his dark eyes catching Jerry’s; it’s impossible to miss the pride in Nick’s face as he slings an arm around Jerry’s neck and pulls him in close. The camera zooms in, frames Nick and Jerry smiling—Nick’s face even more handsome because of his happiness, Jerry’s face pudgy and filled with childlike joy. And then the camera pans back, catches Jerry suddenly squirming inside Nick’s arms.

  Jerry swerves his large body halfway around, his face scrunching up, looking for the camera—searching for Katie, to share his happiness with her. He finds her, stares directly into the lens from across the room, his reaction instant: a dazzling smile lights his entire face, makes his eyes fill with delight.

  She abandons the projector, telling herself it’s the sound of trash cans banging into each other outside again that urges her back up the basement stairs, two at a time. She twists her ankle on the last step, limps through the kitchen and out the slider door.

  The weather has shifted—a little warmer now. She heads across the deck toward the stairs, a quick check confirming that one of her trash cans is knocked over. Too cold for raccoons, she thinks, and stops short at the stairs: her neighbor Sandy’s dog, a terrier with a black head and white body, and a long snout, stands on the matted lawn next to the deck, one paw resting on the bottom step. The dog gazes up at her with perfect innocence in his black eyes; he scratches once on the wood, his stubby white tail sticking straight up in the air.

  “Jack?”

  This one word sets his tail wagging, his head turned sideways.

  “What are you doing here?”

  The dog places his other paw on the step, whines softly. Was that Jack barking earlier when her parents came by? Katie wonders. Has he been out in the cold this entire time?

  “Go on home now.”

  Jack’s head twists the opposite way. He whines again, eyes begging. The smooth white fur on his back shivers.

  “Oh, okay, fine,” Katie says, and Jack bounds up the deck stairs, bumps into her shins and runs into the house.

  Inside, Katie checks the clock on the stove—10:33, probably too late to call a house with small kids and a baby—and watches Jack click his way back and forth in the kitchen, his long black nose stuck firmly to the floor. The dog raises his head quickly—he’s caught the whiff of something good—and makes his way to the sink, where the ice cream sits in a goopy mess, half in the carton, half in the basin. He jumps up, two front paws resting against the cupboard, and turns hopeful black eyes her way.

  “I don’t think so. C’mon.”

  She walks over, grabs Jack by his collar, and pulls. The dog’s front paws hit the floor, and he takes two steps before extending his front legs and putting on his brakes; he suddenly pants like he’s been running for hours. A metal tag on his collar burns into Katie’s knuckle—it’s like a thin wafer of solid ice.

  “Don’t worry, I’m not throwing you out.”

  Jack follows her to the kitchen closet. She finds a length of rope in a box hidden at the back, kneels down to thread it underneath his collar. Jack’s body spasms at the close contact, and he covers Katie’s face and hands with kisses. She scratches behind his ears, smiles.

  “C’mon. Your mom must be worried.”

  The walk to Sandy’s house is short and wet. All the houses are dark now; the only sound comes from Jack’s nails clicking on the pavement and the faint whirring of a sanding truck in the distance. Above them the wet tree branches glint in the light cast from the moon and a streetlamp. A cold drop escapes from one, falls down the back of Katie’s coat and splashes onto her neck. She shivers, pulls her collar tight. Jack looks over his shoulder at her, happy smile in place.

  “What are you looking at?”

  It’s been months since Katie has walked up to Sandy’s door and knocked, and even though she actually has a legitimate reason to be here this late at night, she hesitates on the top stair. Through the bay window, she sees Sandy move into view with her baby daughter in her arms, bumping her up and down, her lips shhhhhshhhh-ing. Even at this hour, even with a crying baby and a worried expression on her face, Sandy looks beautiful: thick dirty-blond hair tied back in a ponytail, flawless, peach-colored skin, and full, pouting lips. More like a teenager playing house than a woman only a couple of years younger than Katie’s own thirty-two years.

  When Katie first moved into the neighborhood, she was flattered by this woman’s attentions, her desire to chitchat and speculate about the people who lived around them, but tonight see
ing Sandy has the opposite effect on her. She feels awkward and plain, wonders now if it was just her ability to engage in this gossip, to listen to Sandy’s drawn-out ruminations, that was the real attraction in the first place. And then Katie has an unexpected but intense desire to talk to Jill, to finally ask her about Amy—if Jill would still be her friend today if Amy hadn’t married and moved all the way to Michigan years ago.

  Sandy turns, paces back. The baby’s face is pleated with red blotches of rage, her tiny fingers balled up into fists. Katie stares at this woman who has so pointedly avoided her since Nick’s death, and she wonders if anything worse than a colicky baby has ever intruded into her ideal, protected little world. It could, she wants to say to Sandy now. Shit happens, you know.

  Jack barks up at her, breaks her reverie; she bends down to pet him, tries to compose a casual expression before she knocks softly, but the door is already opening. Sandy stands in the doorway, holding the baby far back on her hip, away from the cold. The little girl takes one puckered look at Katie and turns her head to howl in protest.

  “Katie?” Sandy says in a voice soft with surprise. She looks down at Jack. “I thought I heard you out here, bud.”

  While Sandy leans down to pat Jack, Katie peeks into the home that used to be so familiar—the expensive leather furniture littered with coloring books and cookie crumbs, the lush plants escaping their pots, the ficus tree that reaches halfway up to the cathedral ceiling. Scattered along with the blinking electronics and knickknacks from trips abroad are stuffed animals, racing cars, and tipped-over game boxes with the pieces spilling out onto the hardwood floors. A big flat-screen TV flickers in the background, muted.

  Sandy rises, bumps the baby up and down on her hip, and the little girl’s crying settles into a grating whine. Sandy sneaks a look at Katie, turns back quickly to kiss her daughter’s head, and Katie thinks how tired she is of this: the way people look at her all the time now, their faces filled with hesitation or confusion about what they should say—or the way Sandy’s face is right now, filled with almost childlike guilt. Katie looks down at Jack as if to say, Don’t worry, he’s the only reason I’m here.