by Mary Kubica
or Imogen had picked up a habit of cutting, save for the amount
of blood on the washcloth. Not merely a dab or a trace, but the
washcloth has been wet through with it and allowed to dry.
I turn it over in my hand. The blood has seeped to both sides.
I let the washcloth fall from my hand.
My heart is in my throat. I feel like I can’t breathe. I’ve had
the wind knocked out of me.
As I rise quickly to stand upright, gravity forces all the blood
in me down to my trunk. There it pools, unable to make its
way back up to my brain. I become dizzy. Everything before
me begins to blur. Black specks dance before my eyes. I set my
hand on the wall to balance myself before lowering slowly to
the ground. There I sit beside the bloodstained washcloth, see-
ing only it, not touching it now because of all the DNA evi-
dence that must be on that rag.
Morgan’s blood, her murderer’s fingerprints. And now mine.
I don’t know how this bloody washcloth came to be inside
our home. But someone put it here. The options are few.
I lose track of time. I sit on the laundry room floor long
enough that I hear the sound of footsteps galloping around the
house. Light, quick footsteps that belong to Tate, followed by
heavier ones: Will.
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I should be in the shower by now. I should be getting ready
for work. Will calls out quietly for me, having noticed that I
wasn’t in bed. “Sadie?”
“Coming,” I call breathlessly back, wanting to show Will the
washcloth, but unable to when Tate is there in the kitchen with
him. I hear Tate’s voice asking for French toast. The washcloth
will have to wait. I hide it for now in the laundry room, laying
it flat beneath the washing machine where no one will find it.
It’s stiff with blood and easily slides under.
I rise from the floor reluctantly and creep back into the
kitchen, overcome with the urge to vomit. There is a killer liv-
ing in my home with me.
“Where’ve you been?” Will asks at seeing me, and all I can
tell him is, “Laundry.” It comes out in one forced breath and
then again, the black specks appear, dancing before my eyes.
“Why?” he asks, and I tell him there was so much.
“You didn’t need to do that. I would have done it,” he says,
reaching into the refrigerator for the milk and eggs. I know he
would have done the laundry eventually. He always does.
“I was trying to help,” I say.
“You don’t look good,” he tells me as my hand holds tightly
to the crown molding of the door so that I don’t fall. I want so
much to tell him about the blood-soaked washcloth that some-
one left in the laundry basket. But I don’t because of Tate.
I hear Tate, beside him, ask, “What’s wrong with Mommy?”
“I don’t feel good. Stomach flu,” I force out. Will comes to
me, presses a hand to my forehead. I’m not running a fever. But
I feel hot and clammy nonetheless. “I need to go lie down,” I
say, clutching my stomach as I leave. On the way upstairs, the
bile inside me begins to rise and I find myself rushing to the
bathroom.
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Mouse
Mouse froze. She waited for the sound of the bedroom door to
open on the first floor, for Fake Mom to come for her. Mouse
was scared, though it wasn’t Mouse’s fault she’d made noise. It’s
not like a person can stop themselves from sneezing.
Her legs shook in fear, her teeth began to chatter, though
Mouse wasn’t cold.
How long she waited there on the stairs, Mouse didn’t know.
She counted to nearly three hundred in her head, except she lost
count twice and had to start all over again.
When Fake Mom didn’t come, Mouse thought maybe she
hadn’t heard her. Maybe Fake Mom had slept right though that
sneeze. She didn’t know how that was possible—the sneeze had
been loud—but Mouse thanked her lucky stars if she had.
She continued on to her bedroom and climbed into bed.
There, in her bed, she talked to her real mom, same as she al-
ways did. She told her what Fake Mom had done, how she had
hurt Mouse and Mr. Bear. She told her real mom how she was
scared and how she wanted her father to come home. She said it
in her head. Mouse’s father always told her that she could talk to
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her real mom whenever she wanted to. He told her that wher-
ever she was, her mom was listening. And so Mouse did. She
talked to her all the time.
Though sometimes Mouse took it a step farther than that and
imagined what her real mom said back. Sometimes she imag-
ined her real mom was in the very same room as her and they
were having a conversation, like the kind of conversations Mouse
had with her father, the kind where he talked back. But that
was only pretend. Because there was no way to know what her
mother said back, but it made Mouse feel less alone.
For awhile Mouse felt satisfied knowing her stomach had food,
though three butter cookies was hardly the same thing as din-
ner. Mouse knew those cookies wouldn’t hold her off for long.
But for now, at least, she was content.
For now, she could sleep.
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Sadie
“How are you feeling?” Will leans over me and asks.
“Not good,” I tell him, still tasting vomit in my mouth.
He tells me to sleep in, that he’ll call me in sick to work, and
drive the boys to school. He sits on the edge of the bed, stroking
my hair, and I want to tell him about the washcloth. But I can’t
say anything to Will when the kids are just down the hall get-
ting ready for school. Through our open door, I see them move
in and out of the bedrooms, the bathroom.
But then a moment comes when they’re all in their bedrooms,
out of earshot, and I think that I’ll come right out and say it.
“Will,” I say, the words on my lips, but then, just like that, Tate comes scampering into the bedroom, asking Will to help him
find his favorite socks. Will grabs him by the hand, catches him
before he has a chance to jump on the bed.
“What?” Will asks, turning toward me.
I shake my head, tell him, “Never mind.”
“You sure?” he asks.
“Yes,” I say.
Together Will and Tate go to leave, to head to Tate’s bedroom
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in search of the missing socks. Will glances over his shoulder
as he leaves, tells me to sleep as long as I can. He pulls the door closed behind himself.
I’ll tell Will later.
I hear Will, Otto, Tate and Imogen movi
ng about in the
house. From upstairs I hear ordinary, everyday conversations
ensue about ham-and-cheese sandwiches and history tests. Their
words come to me through the floor vents. Tate tosses out a rid-
dle and by God, it’s Imogen who answers it, Imogen who knows
that in the one-story blue house where everything is blue—blue
walls, blue floor, blue desk and chairs—the stairs are not blue
because there are no stairs.
“How did you know?” Tate asks her.
“I just knew.”
“That’s a good one, Tater Tot,” Will declares, his nickname
for Tate, as he tells him to find his backpack before they’re late
for school.
The wind outside is ferocious. It flogs the clapboard siding,
threatening to tear it right off the house. It’s cold in the house
now, the kind of cold that gets under the skin. I can’t warm up.
“Let’s get going, guys,” Will calls, and, I rise from the bed
and stand at the door, listening as Tate noses around the coat
closet for his hat and boots. I hear Imogen’s voice in the foyer
with them. She is riding along to the ferry with them, and I
don’t know why. Maybe it’s only the weather’s doing, but I can’t
help but notice the irony of it. She’ll let Will drive her to the
ferry, but not me.
Suddenly all I hear is feet, like the rush of animals, before
the front door opens and then closes again, and the house is
nearly still. The only sounds are the whistling of the furnace,
the rush of water through pipes, the wind scourging the out-
side of our home.
It’s only after they’re gone that I rise from bed and leave the
room. I’ve only just stepped into the hallway when something
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269
catches my eye. Two things actually, though it’s the doll’s mar-
ble-like eyes that get my attention first. It’s the same doll of
Tate’s that I found in the foyer the other day, the one he carried
roughly to his room at Will’s request.
She’s perched at the edge of the hallway where the wooden
floor meets the wall. She sits nicely on her bum, wearing floral
leggings and a knit print. Her frizzy hair lies over her shoulders
in two neat braids, hands set in her lap. Someone has found her
missing shoe.
Beside the doll’s feet is a pencil and paper. I go to it, reach-
ing for the scrap of paper.
I brace myself, knowing what it is before I look. I turn the
paper over in my hand, seeing exactly what I expected to see
on the other side. The same crying, dismembered body as on
the drawings I found in the attic. Beside the dismembered body,
an angry woman clutches a knife. Charcoal blobs fill in the ex-
cess white space, tears or blood, though I don’t know which.
Maybe both.
I wonder if these were here early this morning when I carried
the laundry down. But it was dark then, I wouldn’t have seen
if they were. And on the way back up, I was nauseous, running
to the toilet, barely getting there in time. I wouldn’t have no-
ticed them then either.
I wonder if Will saw these things before he left. But the doll
he’ll have assumed was Tate’s and the drawings were upside
down. He wouldn’t have seen the content.
These things terrify me, because I think that if they do be-
long to Otto, he is regressing. It’s a defense mechanism, a way
to cope. Taking on childish behavior to avoid facing a problem
head on. My own therapist used to say this about me, telling me
I acted like a child at times when I didn’t want to tackle adult
issues in my life. Perhaps Otto is doing the very same thing. But
why? On the surface he seems happy enough. But he’s the quiet
type; I never know what’s going on inside his mind.
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I think back on that therapist of mine. I was never very fond
of her. I didn’t like the way she made me feel silly and small, the way she denigrated me when I expressed my feelings. It wasn’t
just that. She also confused me with other patients.
Once I sank down into her leather swivel armchair and crossed
my legs, took a sip of the water she always left on the table for
me. She asked what had been happening lately, in that way she
always did. Tell me what’s been happening. Before I could reply, she began to counsel me on how to sever ties with some married man I was seeing though I wasn’t seeing a married man. I
was married already. To Will.
I blanched in embarrassment for her other client, the one
whose secrets she’d just shared.
There is no married man, I explained.
She asked, No? You broke it off already?
There was never a married man.
I stopped seeing her soon after.
Otto had a therapist back in Chicago. We swore we’d pick
up the therapy when we moved to Maine. We never did. But I
think it’s time we do.
I step past the doll. I go downstairs. I take the drawing with
me.
A plate of French toast sits on the kitchen counter. That and
a pot of coffee, keeping hot on the coffee maker’s warming
plate. I help myself to the coffee but I can’t bring myself to eat
a thing. As I lift the mug to my lips, my hands tremble, casting
waves across the coffee.
Beside the plate of French toast is a note. Feel better, it reads, with Will’s signature closing, the ever-present Xo. He’s set my pills out for me. I leave them where they are, not wanting to
take them until I’ve gotten some food inside of me.
Out the kitchen window, I see the dogs. Will must have let
them outside before he left, which is fine. They’re snow dogs—
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huskies—in their element in weather like this. It’d be nearly
impossible to get them back in before they’re ready to come.
In the backyard, the wind beats through the naked trees,
making their limbs bend. It’s snowing, a heavy snow. I hadn’t
expected so much. I’m surprised that school wasn’t canceled
today. But I’m also grateful for it because I need this time alone.
The snow doesn’t fall vertically, because of the wind. It falls
sideways instead, with abandon, forging snow drifts across the
yard. The sill of the kitchen window begins to collect with snow,
burying me alive inside. I feel the weight of it on my chest. It’s
harder to breathe.
I take a careful sip of the coffee, noticing that the pendant
necklace I left on the counter early this morning is gone. I search the floor, behind the canisters, the junk drawer where we keep
random things. The necklace is nowhere. Someone has taken
it. I picture it lying there how I left it, the dainty chain coiled into a mound with the M on top.
The fact that it’s now missing only adds to my suspicion. This
morning while I lay in bed, the four o
f them—Will, Otto, Tate
and Imogen—were in the kitchen together. It would have been
so easy for Imogen to slip that necklace from the countertop
when no one was looking. I consider the threatening notes Mor-
gan received. Would Imogen have sent those? Why, I wonder
at first, and then just as quickly: Why not? I think of the way
Imogen treats me. The way she scares me. If she could do this
to me, she could just as easily do it to Morgan.
I leave the drawing where it is and carry my coffee to the
laundry room. There I see that this morning, after I went back
to bed, Will finished the laundry for me. The piles of clothes
I left are gone. They’ve been replaced instead with an empty
laundry basket and a clean tile floor.
I drop to my hands and knees beside the washing machine,
looking beneath, grateful to find the bloodstained washcloth still
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time. All the emotions come rushing back to me, and I know
that I have to tell Will about this.
I leave the washcloth where it is. I go back to the kitchen to
wait. I sit at the table. Otto’s drawing sits six feet away, the eyes of the decapitated head staring at me. I can’t stand to look at it.
I wait until nearly nine o’clock to call Will, knowing that by
then he’ll have taken Tate to school. He’ll have dropped him off.
He will be alone by now and we’ll be able to speak in private.
When Will answers, he’s on the ferry, heading to campus.
He asks how I’m feeling as he answers the call. I tell him,
“Not good.” I hear the sound of the wind whipping around
him, gusting into the handset. He’s outside, standing on the
outer deck of the ferry getting peppered with snow. Will could
be inside in the nicely heated cabin, but he isn’t. Instead he’s
relinquished his seat indoors for someone else, and I think that
this is so classic Will, to be selfless.
“We need to talk, Will,” I say, and though he tells me that
it’s loud on the ferry, that this isn’t the best time, I say it again.
“We need to talk.”
“Can I call when I get to campus?” he asks. Will talks loudly
through the phone, trying to counter the noise of the wind.
I say no. I tell him this is important. That this can’t wait.