by Lisa Unger
“You should be proud of yourself,” she tells me when I’ve completed the classroom-and-pool portion of my instruction. “Most people with so much fear could never do what you’ve done. You’re ready for your open-water certification.”
I thank her and tell her I’ll be doing my open water with another dive master, an old friend. She tells me to come back if I ever need a refresher. I shake her hand and wonder what she’ll say to investigators if I die.
She was so frightened of the water, I imagine her telling them. Prone to panic.
Everyone knows that panic kills, especially at seventy-five feet deep.
In the parking lot after my last lesson, I see Detective Harrison’s Ford Explorer parked next to my car. I notice that it’s dirty, the bottom covered with mud as though he has been off-roading. My insides drop with disappointment and fear. I was starting to think we’d heard the last of him. I walk over to his window. He rolls it down, and a wave of cool, smoky air drifts out.
“Hello, Annie.”
I don’t answer him. He takes a photograph from the passenger seat of his car and hands it to me.
“Do you know this man?”
It’s a picture of Simon Briggs, his face pale and stiff, eyes closed. Dead. I think of the envelope I am still carrying around in my car. I haven’t looked at it, in an effort to preserve the false sense of security I’ve been nursing over the last few days.
“No,” I say.
He gives me a sideways look, a kind of lazy smile. He knows I’m lying. I don’t know how.
“Okay,” he says. “How about this guy?”
He shows me another photograph. It’s a mug shot of a middle-aged man with pleasantly gray hair and a mustache. He has a kind face. It’s the man I know as Dr. Paul Brown.
“Your doctor, right?”
I nod.
“His real name is Paul Broward. He was wanted in three states—New York, California, and Florida—for insurance fraud, malpractice, and operating without a license. It was revoked for sexual assault of a patient.”
The information takes a second to sink in. The detective and I engage in a staring contest until I eventually lower my eyes.
“‘Was’ wanted?” I say finally.
“His body was found by fishermen in the Everglades yesterday. Or parts of it, anyway. Enough to identify.”
I feel a roil of shame and sadness. I hadn’t really believed he was dead, had almost convinced myself I’d imagined everything that night that felt like so long ago. Whatever he was, he had helped me. I didn’t want to think of him dying that way. And then I had to ask myself, did Ophelia kill him? Did I kill him? Gray destroyed the bloody clothes I wore home that night. I look down at my own hands. They don’t seem capable.
“You sure know how to pick ’em, Annie.”
I have decided not to reply to any more of his antagonistic statements.
“So,” he says when I don’t answer, “I have two dead bodies and one live woman lying about her identity connected to them both. I ask myself, what is it about you that encourages people to turn up dead?”
“I don’t know that other man,” I say, gesturing toward the first photo.
“Then why did he have your picture in his car?”
And why did Gray shake his hand and then shoot him in the head? Why did he leave the car there to be discovered by the police? Too many questions, no good answers.
“I have no idea,” I say. I want to walk away from him, to get into my car and drive. But something keeps me rooted. In a weird way, Detective Harrison has become the only person I’m clear about. I wish I could tell him what I saw, show him the envelope, ask him what else he knows about my doctor. But of course I can’t do any of that.
Instead I say, “My husband paid you off, right?”
“Yeah,” he says with a shrug. “But I still have a job to do.”
“What makes you think I won’t report you to Internal Affairs or something?”
He gives me a pitying look. “The way I see it, Annie, we’ve got each other by the balls. You squeeze, I’ll squeeze harder. Makes us even, doesn’t it?”
He has a point.
“Look,” he says. He seems suddenly sincere, concerned. “I think you’re in big trouble, and not just with the law. Maybe the police are the least of your problems.”
My heart starts to thrum. I know he’s right. Ever since that first panic attack in the grocery store’s parking lot, I have known that Annie Powers was not long for this world.
“A guy like Briggs, he’s just the hired help. He’s dead, but there will be someone else right behind him. Someone wants to find Ophelia March, and it ain’t because an aunt she didn’t know about left her some money.”
“And you know who that is?” I find myself moving closer to him involuntarily. My hand is resting on the window edge.
“No,” he says, shaking his head.
“You said—” I start.
“I lied. I was just trying to scare you.”
I walk away from him then, go back to my car. He rolls down the passenger window of his car. I notice the shock of white hair again.
“Start by asking yourself this question,” he calls after me. “Who referred you to that doctor? How did you find him? Whoever it was should be considered suspect.”
I don’t answer him as I get into the driver’s seat and start the engine.
“Are you too stupid to know when someone is trying to help you?” he asks.
“For a price, right?”
“Everything has a price, Annie. This is a material world. You should know that better than anyone.”
I shut the door, back out of my parking space. Before I pull out of the lot, I turn and look behind me at the detective. He points to his eye, then points to me. I’m watching you, he’s telling me. He probably didn’t mean for it to be comforting but, oddly, it is.
29
When Victory and I show up at Vivian’s unannounced later that afternoon, I see a flash of something on her face that I’ve never seen before. It happens when our eyes connect through the thick glass of her front door. It’s just the ghost of an expression, and in another state of mind I might not even have noticed it. It’s fear. Vivian is the strongest woman I’ve ever known, and when I see that look on her face, my heart goes cold.
“What a surprise,” she says with a bright, warm smile, swinging open the door. But it’s too late; the secret has passed between us. I walk through the door with Victory in my arms. She immediately reaches for her grandmother, and I hand her over, stand back as Victory bear-hugs her and then begins to chirp happily about her day. Vivian makes all the appropriate confirming noises and exclamations as we walk to the kitchen. I sit quietly, sipping a glass of water as Vivian makes a grilled cheese sandwich and cuts it into tiny squares the way Victory likes it. I stare out the double glass doors at the glittering blue waters of the infinity pool, thinking all variety of dark thoughts as the most important females in my life chatter, light and happy, like two budgies.
After her snack Victory runs off to the elaborate playroom they keep for her here, and Vivian sits down at the table across from me. She folds her arms on the table in front of her and waits. I tell her everything.
When I’m done, I look at her and see that she has hung her head. She raises her eyes to me after a moment, and they are filled with tears.
“Annie, I’m so sorry.”
I lean forward. “Why, Vivian? Why are you sorry?”
“Oh, God,” she says. That look is back, but it’s here to stay. Then, “Annie, there was no body. Marlowe Geary’s body was never recovered.”
“No body,” I repeat, just to hear the words again.
“It seemed like the only way at the time, Annie. He had to have died in that crash. He couldn’t have survived. But we didn’t think you could heal if you’d known they’d never recovered the body.”
I examine Vivian’s face, the pretty crinkles around her pleading eyes, the soft flesh of her cheeks flush
ed red with her distress. She is suddenly unfamiliar, this woman whom I have come to love more than my own mother. In a way I don’t really blame her for deceiving me all these years. I can understand why she did it; I can even believe she did it to protect me. But I’m angry just the same. I keep my distance, wrap my arms around my body against the clenching in my stomach. I look at the flowers on the table, bright pink and white tulips bowing gracefully over the lip of the vase. I try not to think about all the times I’d confessed my fear that Marlowe Geary might still be alive. I try not to think about how many times she, Drew, Gray, and my father had lied to me, made me feel like I was crazy, assuring me about this body they all knew was never found.
“Why are you telling me this now, Vivian?” I ask her when I trust my voice again. “What’s changed?”
She doesn’t seem to hear me. She just keeps talking.
“You were haunted by him,” she says. “I knew you were in pain. I thought, in time, all that pain would just go away. But then I started to wonder if part of you, maybe the part that couldn’t remember so much, was still connected to him. That doctor, he was supposed to help you.”
“Dr. Brown?” I say. “He knew who I was? He knew about my past?”
She shifts her eyes away and doesn’t answer.
“You brought me to him,” I say, remembering my first visit, how she drove me there, waited until I was done. “You said he’d helped a friend of yours.”
“I know,” she agrees, nodding solemnly. “That’s what they told me to say.”
“Who?”
“He knew everything about your past. He was supposed to help you come to terms in your own way, in your own time.”
He always knew when I was lying or leaving something out. There was never anyone in his waiting room. He never took any notes about our sessions but had perfect recall. All these things come back to me. Why didn’t I see any of it before?
“Who told you to say that?” I ask again when it was clear she wasn’t going to answer me.
“When you were stronger, I wanted Gray to tell you that Marlowe’s body was still missing. I thought you needed to know. But he didn’t want that. He just wanted to protect you. That’s all he’s ever wanted. You know that, don’t you?”
She takes my hand and holds it tight, looks at me with an urgency that makes me uncomfortable, that fills me with fear. But I don’t pull away from her.
“What are you trying to tell me, Vivian?” I lean in close to her and squeeze her hands. “Please just tell me.”
Her eyes lift to something behind me, and I spin around in my seat to see Drew standing in the doorway. He looks like a thunderhead, brow furrowed, eyes dark, neck red.
“Viv, you shouldn’t have,” he says sternly.
Vivian sits up straight and squares her shoulders at him, sticks out her chin. “It’s time. This is wrong. She needs to know.”
“She never needed to know,” Drew says. “Geary’s dead. Body or no body. No one’s ever heard from him again,” he says to me, his eyebrows making one angry line.
They exchange a look. I can see it was an old fight between them, words spoken so many times they don’t need speaking again. There is more Vivian wanted to say, but I know she’ll never say it now that Drew is here.
“No one’s ever heard from Ophelia March again, either, and yet here I sit.”
They both turn their gazes to me. Vivian looks so sad suddenly. Drew’s expression I can’t read.
“Who’s Ophelia?” We are interrupted by Victory. She’s staring at me with wide eyes.
“She’s no one, darling,” I say, reaching down to touch her face. “She’s just a character in a book.” I rise and lift my daughter into my arms. She must have wandered in while we were speaking. I’m not sure how long she’s been there or what she heard. All my questions will go unanswered now. It doesn’t matter anyway—they’re both liars.
I grab Victory’s jacket and book bag from the table. Vivian and Drew both move to stop me, then catch themselves. They won’t make a scene in front of their granddaughter. At least they have more respect for her than they do for me.
“Are we leaving?” Victory asks.
“Yes,” I say. I can feel her examine my face because she didn’t understand my tone. I look at her and give her a smile, which she returns uncertainly. I walk out the door without another word, jog down the steps, and go to our car. Victory calls behind us, “Bye, Grandma! Bye, Grandpa!”
Vivian and Drew stand by the door, waving stiffly to my daughter.
“Are you mad at them?” she asks as I buckle her into her car seat. Adrenaline is making me clumsy and hyperfocused, and I’m fumbling with the task of fastening the straps around my daughter. When I don’t answer, she asks the question again. I don’t want to lie, but I don’t want to play Twenty Questions, either. I don’t say anything, just kiss her on the cheek and ruffle her hair. I close her door and move to the driver’s seat, all the while feeling the heat of Drew’s and Vivian’s eyes.
“You are mad,” Victory says as we pull out of the driveway. “My teacher says that it’s okay to be mad but that you should always talk about your feelings, Mommy.”
“That’s good advice, Victory. But sometimes things are a little more complicated than that.”
She gives me a nod of grave understanding, and I wonder what kind of lesson I am teaching her today. Nothing good, I’m pretty sure.
As I drive off, my anger subsides and the adrenaline flood in my body finds a lower level. With Drew and Vivian disappearing in my rearview mirror, I am aware of a kind of relief. Gray talks about how before an operation there’s a terrible tension that fades once the first shot is fired. All the wondering about how things will go down and if he’ll survive evaporates, and he becomes pure action. Today I finally know what he means.
Gray is waiting at home when we get there. He jumps up from the couch as we walk in the door. Victory runs to him, and he picks her up and hugs her hard. She giggles in a way that makes my heart clench, a kind of sweet, girly little noise that is uniquely hers.
“How’s my girl?” he asks.
“Mommy’s mad at Grandma and Grandpa,” she tells him seriously.
“That’s all right. Sometimes we get angry with the people we love,” he says, depositing her on the floor and looking at my face. His eyes tell me that he’s already talked to Drew and Vivian.
“Hey, guess what? Esperanza’s waiting for you upstairs. She’s got a surprise for you.”
Victory doesn’t need to be told twice. I watch as she runs off. I hear her little shoes pounding up the stairs.
We stand looking at each other for a minute. I can’t read his expression.
“Why did you kill Simon Briggs?” I ask after I don’t know how long. The room is darkening as the sun fades from the sky. I can hear the lapping of the waves against the shore. I hear Victory laughing upstairs. There are black beans cooking in the kitchen.
He frowns and opens his mouth to deny it. I put up a hand. “I followed you. I saw you shoot him.”
He turns his head to the side and releases a long, slow breath.
“Because I couldn’t figure out who he was working for,” he says finally. “I found out where he was staying. I offered him a payoff in exchange for the name of his employer and for him to go back to whoever it was and say he couldn’t find you or that you were dead or whatever. When I gave him the money, he lied to me, said he was working for the police. So I killed him. I figured that it would send a message to whoever had hired him.” He finished with a shrug.
“How do you know he lied?”
“I know,” he says.
“Is he alive, Gray? Marlowe. Is he?”
He doesn’t answer, just fixes me with a stare. I can tell he wants to reach for me but there’s a high, hard wall between us.
“Is he alive?” I ask again.
Finally, “I don’t know, Annie. I just don’t know.”
I let the words move through me. Strange as it
is, it feels good to hear him admit it, this thing I have known all along. I somehow feel stronger, saner, for knowing that my instincts haven’t failed me completely.
“What happened to Dr. Brown? Who was he?”
“He’s someone my father knows. He was a clinical psychiatrist who dealt with military and paramilitary posttraumatic stress patients. We thought he could help you.”
I don’t tell him what Detective Harrison has told me. I’m not sure why. Probably because I figure he’ll have an explanation for whatever I say. I don’t know whom to believe. Harrison isn’t exactly unimpeachable himself.
“What happened to him?”
“I don’t know, Annie. That’s the truth.”
That’s the truth. It’s a funny phrase. If you need to say it, it’s probably because every other thing out of your mouth has been a lie.
I see her then. She’s standing out on the deck, her hands pressed up against the window. She’s every bit as real as I am, which doesn’t mean much. I see her for what she is finally, just a girl who’s been lied to and betrayed by everyone she loves, someone who’s forever looking for a rescue that’s just not coming.
If there was ever any question about what I needed to do for her, it had been answered. Between Ray Harrison’s revelations and Vivian’s confessions, it’s all very clear. I understand Ophelia after all these years, why she has been afraid, so eager to flee the life that Annie Powers made. It has all been a façade, flimsy and insubstantial, waiting for one good wind to blow.
“Annie?” says Gray.
“Don’t call me that,” I say. “It’s not my name.”
Later I tuck Victory into her bed and lie down beside her. She clutches Claude in one arm, holds my hand with her free one. She’s drifty, eyelids droopy. I drink in the delicate lines of her profile, the soft pink of her skin, run my fingers through her silky hair. Sometimes it seems that all you do as a mother is say good-bye in tiny increments. The minute they leave your body, they just get further and further away, first crawling, then walking, then running. But tonight it’s even worse. Tonight I really am saying good-bye. Of course, she has no idea.