“A right to what, Natalie?”
She crosses her arms over her chest and juts out her chin. “I’m done talking to you, whatever your name is. I’m mourning. I don’t have to put up with this.” She spins away from me and walks away briskly.
“I found your uncle’s storage unit,” I call after her retreating form.
She freezes. Turns to face me. “What are you talking about?”
“Your uncle had a unit in a storage facility in Trumbull. He rented it the week Will Crane disappeared, which I thought was an odd coincidence. I’ve been there. There’s a body inside. I believe it’s Crane’s.”
Natalie doesn’t blink.
“I’m going to have to call it in to the police, Natalie. An anonymous tip. Is there anything you want to share before I do?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. So take your fake name and fake-ass bullshit and get the fuck away from me.”
Well, that went well.
Some things should remain private. Jake had never been one to splash every precious morsel of his life on social media, for example. He’s discreet about his sexual liaisons, cautious in his romantic ones. He respects others’ right to privacy. He’s never nosy (although he likes to think he is a good and reflective listener). He doesn’t gossip. He doesn’t meddle.
Strange then to be picking and poking through the most intimate private details of his father’s life, to be charged with this task. It was triage at first: location of the will, identification of the trusts in his and his sister’s names, the deed of sale on the apartment, access to bank accounts; a thunderous train of legalese delivered by properly composed, sadly serious faces.
Now, with provisional money available to both of them and Natalie’s school fees settled, Jake has to dive deeper into the archaeological dig that was the life of Brian Burrows. It feels unnatural. Uncomfortable. It feels surreal.
Jake pulls open the top drawer of his dad’s night table.
Condoms right on top. Okay, that’s something he didn’t need to know about. He tosses them aside. A flashlight. A tube of dry-skin lotion. A nail file. A Swiss army knife. Post-it notes and a loose bundle of pens. A set of keys, small ones that look like they would fit padlocks, say, or safe deposit boxes, as opposed to doors or a car. Jake pockets the keys.
Buried underneath all the clutter is a zipped portfolio.
He slides it out from the drawer and lays the portfolio on the bed. Opens it.
Inside is a stack of childhood artwork: one carefully preserved, proudly signed artistic effort of both Jake’s and Natalie’s for every school year, grades K–8. Jake fans out the pieces, examining their paintings and drawings. Even in kindergarten Natalie’s artistic talent was evident. Her family drawing of the four of them actually has an essence about it that makes Jake’s heart surge with sudden, painful longing for his mother, who he suspects curated this collection.
Jake replaces the stack in the portfolio and zips it shut.
In the next drawer down, a pair of furry cuffs. Yuck. More shit he doesn’t want to think about. He slams that drawer shut without digging any further.
He’d seen Natalie talking to Hannah Potter at the cemetery; he’d swear it. But Natalie denied that the woman he’d seen her with was their mysterious disappearing friend, so Jake let it go. Particularly since he’s thought he glimpsed Hannah any number of times since they’ve been home. Maybe he’s going crazy.
Questions about Hannah Potter’s true identity and why she abducted him from a street in Paris loop through Jake’s thoughts. The more he thinks about it, the more certain he is that she drugged him, bound him, gagged him. But she also probably saved Natalie’s life with the first aid she administered before the EMTs’ arrival. So who is she? What does she want with them? He’s teased out a thousand different explanations in his head.
His questions about Hannah are entangled with the motives and murders that will forever mark the pathways of his life.
His mother killed by her lover, who hid her body. Why? Now Jake may never know. He prefers to believe Mallory did choose Brian and Jake and Natalie in the end. That was the story, after all.
Uncle Frank’s actions disturb on a whole other level. Jake shares DNA with a man callous enough to kill at least two men in cold blood, one of them his own brother.
And his motives! Jake remembers how very chuffed Uncle Frank became when Mom disappeared. How he bloomed into his role as the pillar of stability in their disintegrating midst. Frank killed Crane for his own ego, more or less, that’s how Jake figures it. To prove something, fill some stupid, gaping hole in his psyche. And then he murdered Brian out of fear of receiving justice for that killing. What a coward. What a creep. A crazy.
A shiver passes through Jake as he recollects how very close he came to losing Natalie. Followed by a rush of guilt about how very anxious he is to be free of her, how very badly he wants Natalie safely in school. She’s too much responsibility for him. Is he awful to feel this way? Yeah, he is.
Jake moves over to the other bedside table. Opens the top drawer. Bundles of letters.
Actual letters is Jake’s first thought as he recognizes his mother’s handwriting. He runs the tip of his index finger gently over her spidery scratches before opening the letter on top. He starts to read and feels the blush rise through his throat and cheeks.
Love letters from Mallory to Brian. More intimacy Jake never should have shared. He stuffs the letter back into the envelope and tosses the stack back like it was radioactive.
He peers deeper into the drawer. Other letters. One in particular catches his eye. Addressed to his dad and from Dr. Bloom, Natalie’s shrink at the treatment center.
What catches Jake’s attention is the postmark: April of this year. Jake hadn’t known Natalie had anything to do with the doctor since she’d been released from the treatment center over two and a half years ago. Not that it would necessarily have been Jake’s business, but still.
Jake pulls the letter from the envelope. Starts to read. The words leap up off the page and swim before his eyes.
Maybe I really am going nuts. After all, it runs in the family, doesn’t it?
I arrive in the dead of night. Park my rental car, cut the lights, and wait, slumped down on the seat, a hat pulled low over my eyes. The parking lot is nearly empty: two white vans with the storage facility’s logo; a rusty old Dodge Dart that looks like it might have taken up permanent residence in a corner.
A pair of headlights sweeps into view, casting sharp beams into deep shadows. There’s enough light for me to see the slight figure emerge from the car and open the trunk.
On sneakered feet, I pad across the asphalt of the lot. The figure is listing to one side, straining to lug a heavy can. As I get closer I can smell the can’s contents: gasoline.
“Where’s the fire, Natalie?”
The heavy can drops, hitting the asphalt with an echoing clang.
“Oh, that’s right,” I persist. “You were going to set one, weren’t you? Isn’t that what the gas is for?”
She turns to face me.
“Is there a reason you’d want to burn Crane’s body, Natalie?”
“Who are you?” Her voice is tightly controlled. “What is it you really want?”
“I’m someone who wants to help you, Natalie. Talk to me.”
The polished young woman I had seen at the funeral dissolves back into the frightened girl I knew better.
“Why should I trust you? I don’t even know who you are.”
“Haven’t I helped you so far? I found your brother when you couldn’t. I found your dad’s stalker. I saved your life.”
She tears away a shred of cuticle from her thumb with her teeth. “Why?”
“It doesn’t matter why. Just trust that I’m on your side.”
“Okay,” she concedes in a hoarse whisper. “I was there that night. The night Crane died.”
Eyes cast downward, bloody thumb lodged in the corner of her mouth, Natali
e tells me her story.
Will Crane had welcomed her in when she’d showed up unannounced at his kitchen door. She wanted the truth! Answers! She burned for a confrontation. He seemed surprised but pleased to see her. Which made her perversely angry. As did his offer of tea and cookies.
Crane poured the boiling water over strainers and into a matched pair of blue earthenware mugs. Natalie wondered if Crane and her mother had sipped from these mugs together.
They perched on stools set by the kitchen’s center island.
Crane was kind. He knew things about her, things he could only have learned from her mom. The nicer he was, the more confused Natalie got. Angrier too.
Finally, he admitted killing Mallory. It was a lovers’ quarrel gone terribly wrong. He loved Mallory, just wanted her to stay. He never meant to hurt her. He was so matter of fact about it all. That was the creepiest thing.
Natalie lifts her eyes to meet mine as she continues.
“I watched as he lifted his tea to his lips. I kept talking…asking him questions. I was trying to stay calm even though I was reeling. And…and…not just from his confession.”
Natalie casts her gaze back down at the asphalt. Continues in a hesitant mumble, speaking so softly I can barely hear her.
She’d seen him slip something into her cup. But she’d been smart. She’d swapped their mugs when he went to the pantry to comply with her request for sugar.
Panic flooded Crane’s eyes as pain and paralysis took hold. He gasped like a beached fish, clutched uselessly at his throat. Wracked with fear and loathing, Natalie watched until he slumped across the stainless steel table. He was dead.
It was meant to be her. He’d tried to kill her.
A sharp rap on the kitchen door made her jump.
She had no idea what Uncle Frank was doing there but she could see his silhouette through the frosted glass pane, hear him calling her name. She ran over to let him in.
He’d found her sketchbook, he told her. With the drawings and notations. Guessed where she was.
He spotted Crane’s lifeless body and stopped in his tracks.
Natalie’s voice breaks as she continues. “I told him, like I just told you, about the tea, the switched mugs. I wanted to call the police. But Uncle Frank said no. He said he wanted to spare me, all of us really, a trial, all the awful press. He said we’d been through enough. He said Crane deserved what he got. That it was justice. That he would take care of everything.”
Natalie buries her face in her hands. “I still can’t believe that Uncle Frank killed Daddy over this!” she cries. “Don’t you see why I said Uncle Frank admitted to killing Crane? Who would believe me? Uncle Frank is the only one who was there that night who could confirm everything and now he’s dead. I killed him.”
Pure anguish contorts her voice. “And technically I killed Crane too. What happens if my DNA is on that body?”
She gestures to the storage facility. “Please—if you really want to help, you’ll let me burn this place down.
“You have to understand,” she continues earnestly, “I’m on a new path. Everything in my life is going to be different now. Yesterday is history.”
“There’s no body inside, Natalie,” I reveal. “I’ve got no idea where Will Crane’s corpse is. I just needed to know.”
Her face shifts as she processes this information. “So now you know,” she says hesitantly. “What are you going to do?”
Her wide eyes are fearful. Her palms splay open, beseeching me.
“Go home, Natalie,” I order her. “Start your life. Not everyone gets a second chance. Don’t blow yours.”
She nods. Ducks her head shyly. “Thank you,” she whispers.
And she is gone in a flash, leaving behind the reeking can of gasoline.
Natalie loves being at RISD. She loves the architecture of New England, the crisp autumn air, being a part of a community of artists. She’s milked the notoriety of her family too, a disappearance and two deaths, leaving her free of the typical freshman insecurity about where she fits in. With a tragic and heroic past, about which she only lets escape the occasional tantalizing detail, as well as pockets full of cash, she was popular almost instantly. It was silly, she now reflects, that she ever worried.
Natalie feels healthier than she has in years.
A pile of dead leaves materializes in front of her, and Natalie kicks through it with abandon, laughing when a pair of old ladies cross themselves as they swerve to avoid her.
It’s all behind me now.
Maybe one day she’ll be able to explain it all to Jake. What it was like after he left home to start college. How lonely she was with only Mallory in the house. Mom became more depressed and withdrawn, retreating to her bedroom to watch stupid police procedurals and makeover shows. Natalie had to take on the maternal role, making dinner, doing most of the shopping, the laundry.
Then Mom lit up. There was just no other way to describe it. Natalie was excited. She suspected it had to do with the volunteer work Mom was doing at the women’s shelter, but she didn’t care about the why, she was just glad to have her mother back.
Of course she did care about the why when she realized the reason was that slick Mr. Crane with his nice hair and big laugh. Natalie started following her mother, obsessed with their movie dates, intimate dinners, quick coffees, and long, lingering talks at Crane’s nursery. It was there she got the idea to use a pinch of pesticide in Mallory’s food. Natalie decided to give her just enough to keep her sick, keep her home.
Natalie never wanted to kill her mother. Of course not.
The night she did was tragic, in that circumstances left her no choice.
She’d been just zipping along home from Melissa’s when Mallory tore out of their driveway, nearly knocking Natalie off her bike! Mom didn’t even see her! Natalie could’ve been killed! Where the fuck was she going in such a hurry? Dad and Jake were both just back, Mom going out tonight made no sense. Unless…
Natalie followed her mother to Will Crane’s house. Waited outside for over two hours. When Mallory emerged, Natalie was waiting. That put a hitch in Mom’s lighthearted step.
Natalie confronted her. It got loud. A light snapped on in a neighbor’s house. Mom suggested they take their conversation to her car. Natalie petulantly suggested they go over to their boat, The Happy Daze.
“Our family boat. Remember us? Your family?”
They sat in silence as Mallory drove them over to the yacht club.
Once on board the boat, Mom tried to explain about her feelings for Crane. It was pathetic. She thought she was in charge. Natalie set her straight about that. When they argued, Mallory asked about the dead roses, her keyed car, the bloody message on their front doorstep. Natalie shrugged. She had to do something to keep Mallory at home. Her mother gave Natalie a look she will never forget. As if she didn’t recognize her. As if Natalie had turned into a monster.
Mom threatened to have Natalie put away. But Natalie wasn’t crazy. Mom just wanted her out of the way so she could run off with her boyfriend. No fucking way.
Natalie boasted about the poison she’d been slipping into her mother’s food. That had been in the glass of lemonade Natalie had just poured for her.
Mallory stared at her empty glass in horror.
Afterward, it was easy. Natalie had crewed on The Happy Daze her whole life. She knew just how far off shore to dump her mother’s weighted body.
And really, it was Mom’s fault anyway, the whole thing. She never should have said she wanted to leave. She never should have looked at me like that.
—
As for Crane, he deserved to die. All of this was his fault.
The night she showed up at his house, she was prepared but not decided.
—
He could have altered the course of things at any point, even though he was so thoroughly to blame.
He was pleased to see her, which irritated the crap out of her. Acted like they had some kind of bond. Because
they both loved her mother? It was all she could do not to vomit.
She shyly offered to make them tea, showed him that she had brought a tin of Mallory’s favorite blend. She busied herself with setting the kettle on the stove, spooning tea leaves into the mugs he handed her.
The teapot began to sing, a rising whistle. Natalie flicked off the burner and the pot sighed itself to silence. Natalie poured the boiling water into the matched pair of blue earthenware mugs.
Natalie studied the dying man impassively as he gasped and writhed.
Oleander. From his very own nursery. Fitting.
He took my mother away from me. He deserves to die.
He confessed to killing my mother. Then I saw him slipping something into my tea. I switched our mugs without him noticing, just to see, I wasn’t sure about anything. And then he just slumped over! It could have been me. He meant it to be me.
She imagined herself in the police interview room, on the witness stand, in the papers. A tragic and heroic figure, the daughter of a slain mother who’d narrowly escaped death by the same cunning, murderous hand.
A heart carved from lapis lazuli sat on Crane’s counter. Natalie had been with her mother when Mallory had purchased it. “A birthday present for a friend,” Mallory had said, as the clerk put it in a gift box. It sickened Natalie to see it there, proudly displayed. She snuck it into her pocket.
And then Uncle Frank showed up. Natalie tried her story out and liked how it played until Uncle Frank decided he was going to play the hero, dump the body. He sent her home. Natalie went along with it, even as she rued the loss of the opportunity to tell her martyred tale of escaping death to a wider audience. That’s come full circle at least, she thinks with satisfaction.
Uncle Frank had been so cool up until this summer. Natalie had felt a certain admiration for him, especially his brilliant touch of the confession letter “from Crane.” Because Mom had chosen us. Dad and Jake had lapped that up. Natalie was the only one who knew the truth. None of this would have happened if she’d really chosen us.
The Burial Society Page 21