The Wife Upstairs

by Rachel Hawkins

  “You just saw me two hours ago,” I remind him. “Miss me already?”

  I try to sound flirty, sexy, but Eddie must pick up on something in my voice because he asks, “Hey, everything alright over there?”

  “I’m fine,” I tell him, even as I keep my ear cocked toward the ceiling, still listening. “I just heard something in the house.”

  “Like what?” Eddie asks, and suddenly I feel very young, getting spooked by a noise in the house, like a kid left on her own.

  “Just a thump,” I tell him, shaking my head even though he can’t see me. “Or a few thumps. It’s so stupid, I know. Now I’m creeping around upstairs like I’m in a gothic novel or a bad horror movie.”

  I expect him to laugh, or make a joke. Instead, he says, “It’s a big house, Jane. It makes all kinds of noises, especially in the summer.”

  “Sure,” I say. “Like I said, stupid.”

  “Why don’t you go back to bed, Nancy Drew?” he says, cajoling, and a spike of irritation shoots through me, angry and hot.

  But I shove it down. He’s trying to be nice, and I can’t keep doing this, I can’t keep trying to destroy a good thing that’s right in front of me.

  “Well, right now, I’m all sweaty and gross, so maybe a shower instead,” I say, and he makes a low sound that would usually send desire spiking through me.

  “Wish I were there and not here,” he says, and I make myself sound appropriately intrigued as I reply, “You could always come home for lunch.”

  He sighs, and I’m actually a little relieved when he says, “Would that I could. But it’s a big day on the Connors’ place, then I need to drop by Southern Manors. I’ll be home before five though, promise.”

  “I will hold you to it,” I say, and after Eddie hangs up, I stand there in the hall, hands braced on the now-empty table.

  There’s a mirror over the table, and I look into it now. I’m pale despite my run, my hair scraggly and slightly greasy, and there are dark flakes of mascara under my eyes.

  “Get your shit together,” I mutter at my reflection, scraping my hair back from my face with both hands. The girl in the mirror looks feral, and I bare my teeth before shaking my head at myself, laughing softly.

  And then the knocking starts again.

  25

  When I used to walk dogs in the neighborhood, I sometimes thought about where people like Campbell, Emily, and Caroline went during the day, when they pulled out of Thornfield Estates in their oversized SUVs.

  Not far, apparently. Today, we’re at Roasted, for a meeting of the Neighborhood Beautification Committee. Campbell and Emily are both wearing athleisure, but I’ve dressed a little nicer, pairing a gray pencil skirt with a pink blouse and matching heels. I’m still not quite as tan or as glossy of hair as they both are, but I can see myself reflected in Emily’s giant sunglasses, and I know I look a lot more like both of them than I did just a few months ago.

  Making a mental note to ask Emily where she gets her hair done, I reach down into my bag—another new purchase, this massive leather purse that could probably hold Adele—and pull out the binder I’ve carefully labeled TENBC in a pretty, swirly font.

  “Look at yooooouuuuu,” Emily says, reaching out to playfully shove at my arm. “So organized!”

  I smile, not mentioning that I was up until 1 A.M. working on this and that it took a stupid amount of concealer to cover the circles under my eyes.

  Or that while I sat on the floor of the living room, cutting pictures out of magazines and sliding them into the binder’s plastic folders, I’d heard those thumps from upstairs again, the weird sounds Eddie had said not to worry about.

  Just a couple, and faint enough that I hadn’t jumped or shrieked this time, but I’d still made a mental note to call an exterminator.

  Now, though, I’m all smiles as I lay the binder out on the table, my ring flashing in the sunlight.

  Campbell leans forward to look more closely at the ring, just like I’d hoped she would.

  “When’s the wedding?” she asks, and Emily perks up a little, too.

  Gossip as currency, yet again.

  I look down at the binder, flipping through its pages. “Honestly, we’re not sure. It was going to be fairly soon—something small, you know? Casual, at home…”

  “I’m sure all of this with Tripp has made planning a wedding hard,” Emily says, sympathetic, and I look up.

  “We’re mostly trying not to think about it,” I say, which is true.

  Both women hum in agreement, and then Campbell sighs, turning my binder to face her. She flips through the pictures, but I can tell she’s not really looking at them.

  “I found a couple of ideas from Southern Living,” I say. “For the flower beds in the front of the neighborhood? On that fourth page—”

  “Did you know the police found out Tripp was at the lake?”

  Emily says it in almost a whisper, and I jerk my head up, surprised. That’s new.

  But I’m not as shocked as Campbell, apparently. She sits up so abruptly that she kicks the table, rattling the wrought iron.

  “Are you fucking kidding me?” Campbell whips off her sunglasses, her blue eyes wide. “He was down there? Seriously?”

  Emily nods, and I slide my binder back across the table to me. “That’s what the police said. I think someone saw him? Or there are receipts? Like, the actual kind, not the Kardashian kind.”

  I laugh a little at that—who knew Emily had jokes?—but Campbell is still looking at both of us, her sunglasses dangling from her fingers.

  “So … he really did it. He killed them.”

  “Of course, he did,” I say, more sharply than I mean to, and they both turn to look at me.

  Fuck.

  Clearing my throat, I flip through the binder some more. “I just mean … the police are doing their jobs. They wouldn’t have charged him if they weren’t confident he did it.”

  Emily nods, but Campbell still looks unsure, chewing her lower lip, her leg jiggling. “It’s just so weird,” she says. “Tripp could be an asshole when he drank, don’t get me wrong, but he wasn’t … violent. And he loved Blanche.”

  I’d thought so, too, but now, I wonder if him falling to pieces after she died, him wandering the house and drinking all day wasn’t grief, but guilt.

  And Emily pipes up, “They were having some issues though, Cam. You know that.”

  They both glance at me, quickly, then at each other, and I know what this is about.

  “Tripp told me,” I tell them, “that there were rumors about Eddie and Blanche.”

  Another shared glance, and I think they might try to bullshit me, but then Emily shrugs and says, “I mean. They were spending a lot of time together. And Bea was never around.”

  “Never,” Campbell says, shaking her head. “That company was her whole life. Especially in those last few months. We barely ever saw her.”

  “That’s true,” Emily adds. “When we first moved into the neighborhood, Bea definitely spent more time with us.” She smiles, tapping my binder. “She did stuff like this. But last spring, she was missing meetings, passing on parties…”

  “But do you think…” I let the question dangle, and I see them look at each other again.

  “No,” Emily finally says. “But Bea and Blanche were kind of weird right before all of it happened.”

  Campbell sucks in a breath, sitting back in her chair, her gaze again darting to Emily.

  “What?” Emily asks her, sipping her coffee. “It’s true, and they’re both dead. It’s not like it can hurt anyone now to acknowledge it. Besides,” she adds, waving a hand, rings throwing off showers of sparks, “it wasn’t anything juicy. I think it had to do with Bea’s mom or something. Back before Eddie was even in the picture.”

  I can see where that kind of gossip isn’t interesting to them, but damn, do I wish I knew more about it. Hearing that Bea and Blanche had some kind of tension isn’t new—Tripp had said the same thing—but why, exac
tly? I know there is something in that friendship that I am missing, and I can’t shake the thought that figuring it out is key to understanding Eddie. I try another angle. “Did Bea have a temper?”

  Both women laugh, shaking their heads as Campbell takes the lid off her coffee to drain the cup.

  “Oh my god, no,” Emily says. “She was sweet as pie. Tough, sure, ambitious and all that. But a real doll. I never saw her get mad at anybody. Not even when that catering company she hired completely screwed up her and Eddie’s anniversary party. It was supposed to be Hawaiian luau-themed, but they brought, I don’t remember, what was it, Cam?”

  “Finger food,” she replies. “Like it was a tea party. Little cucumber sandwiches, petit fours, that kind of thing. Bea just laughed it off. Eddie was the one who—”

  She stops abruptly, glancing at me, then shrugs it off. “Anyway, no, Bea never even got mildly irritated as far as I could tell.”

  Silence descends, hanging awkwardly between us for a moment before Emily asks brightly, “So, are we all going to the country club tomorrow night?”

  Oh, right. Another fundraiser, another thing stuck on my fridge because I’m one of these women now, the kind who goes to fundraisers at country clubs.

  I smile at them.

  “Wouldn’t miss it.”

  As we stand up to leave, Campbell’s eyes slide down my body. “Wow,” she says. “You look … great, Jane. Really.”

  “Doesn’t she?” Emily says, giving me another pat on the arm. “I think she might wear pencil skirts even better than Bea, and that was, like, her entire thing.”

  She’s still smiling, but something about the comment bugs me. I hadn’t consciously been emulating Bea, but I see now how I must look like I put on a Bea costume for this meeting. Me and my pencil skirt and binder, like some kind of pale imitation.

  The ghost of Bea.

  The thought unsettles me all the way home, and when I come in, I look at myself in the hall mirror.

  My hair brushes my shoulders in the same long bob Bea wore. The earrings I’m wearing remind me of ones I’ve seen in pictures of her.

  I’m even wearing the same shade of red lipstick.

  Turning away, I pick up my purse, taking the binder back out.

  She did stuff like this.

  Do I want to be the new Bea to these people? Or do I want them to accept me as Jane?

  I don’t know anymore.

  My phone buzzes, and I sigh, reaching into my bag to fish it out.

  It’s a text from John.

  Hey, friendo, it starts, and fuck me, I hate him so much.

  Little short on cash this week. Another $500 should cover it. You can mail it again. Cash. Xo

  My fingers hover over the keys.

  I could tell him to fuck off.

  I could text Eddie.

  And then I reach into my purse and pull out the folded sheet of paper, the one Eddie gave me with the Phoenix number scrawled across it.

  Or I could find out who’s looking for me. What they actually want. What they know.

  And finally put this all to rest, so that I can move on with my life.

  Fingers trembling, I start to dial.

  26

  The Baptist church where John works isn’t one of the bigger congregations in the area. In the South, I’ve noticed, some churches take up entire blocks.

  John’s hardly looks like a church at all. It’s a squat, ugly brick building, and only the stained-glass window of Jesus surrounded by lambs tips you off to the fact that it’s a house of worship.

  I’ve dressed in one of my best outfits today, a blue pleated skirt with a white boatneck blouse, paired with blue-and-white-striped ballet flats and silver jewelry. When I’d looked in the mirror this morning, I almost hadn’t recognized myself. I didn’t look like the Jane I’d been two months ago, but I also didn’t look like I was trying to copy Emily or Campbell.

  Or Bea.

  I looked like … me.

  Whoever that was turning out to be.

  My shoulders are back as I open the door, my head high, and when I step inside, the girl sitting at the desk gives me a bright smile.

  She probably thinks I’m here to donate money.

  She’s half-right.

  “Hiiiiii,” I drawl, sliding my sunglasses up on my head. “Is John Rivers here?”

  I don’t miss it, the way her smile droops just the littlest bit.

  I feel you, girl.

  “He’s in the music room,” she says, pointing down the hall, and I thank her.

  The church smells like burnt coffee and old paper, the linoleum squeaking under my shoes as I make my way to a room at the end of the hall where I can already hear jangling guitar chords.

  John is sitting on a riser in the middle of the room, a music stand in front of him. I can see the cover of his sheet music book. Praise Songs for Joyful Hearts.

  Appropriate, because my heart is pretty fucking joyful right now.

  His fingers slide on the strings as he looks up and sees me there, and I register that beat, the fractional moment before he recognizes me.

  He’s wearing his navy polo today, the one with the church’s logo on the chest, and his hair has been combed back from his face. He’s also wearing an awfully nice new pair of sneakers, and if I doubted it before, I now know that not all of Eddie’s money went to a new sound system.

  “Jane.” John gets up, putting the guitar down, and I hold a hand up.

  “I won’t be here long,” I tell him. “I just dropped in to let you know that I finally talked with your mysterious Phoenix contact.”

  The blood literally drains from his face. I watch it, the way his cheeks fade from ruddy pink to a sickly sort of gray, and it almost makes the shit he put me through worth it.

  But not quite.

  “You know, he was actually kind of a nice guy. Especially when I explained to him that anything you had told him was bullshit.”

  I can still feel the shock, the sheer fucking relief that had coursed through me as the voice on the other end of that mysterious phone number told me that he was employed by a Georgie Smith, who was looking for her sister, Liz. That Georgie thought Liz had had a daughter who had ended up in foster care in Arizona, that she might have gone by the name Helen Burns, and that Georgie would like to meet her.

  I’d made myself sound regretful, almost a little wistful as I’d confirmed that I’d been in foster care with Helen, but that last I heard, she’d gotten involved in drugs, and I thought she might have headed even further west, Seattle, maybe? No, Portland. One of those. But in any case, I hadn’t heard from her or seen her in years, and—a lowered voice here, a conspiratorial whisper—I wouldn’t bother talking to John Rivers any further. John Rivers had a history of conning older women like Mrs. Smith—he’d string her along, promise he knew her niece, then he’d never deliver. The private investigator didn’t sound surprised, just said he knew the type and thanked me for my time.

  When I’d hung up the phone, I’d waited for real regret, knowing I’d just snipped the one thin thread still holding me to any family. And a year ago, even a few months ago, knowing my mom had had a sister who was looking for me would’ve made me feel almost pathetically grateful. Aunt Georgie.

  Now, it was just another loose end to tie up. I’d made my choice, made my family, and I was closing the door on all of it.

  And most importantly, now I was certain: no one knew what had really happened in Phoenix.

  I’d gotten away.

  John is still staring at me, his throat working, and I wonder if this is how good he felt when he surprised me in the Home Depot parking lot.

  If so, I almost don’t blame him for doing it.

  “Anyway, I made sure he knew you were shady as fuck, and, just for a little extra flavor, I might’ve implied you were also kind of pervy and obsessed with me, so he will definitely not be answering any more of your calls.”

  That part’s not true, but it’s too fun to watch him swea
t.

  Still, he’s not totally beaten yet. “You did something, Jane,” he says. “You ran from something. Or you never would’ve paid me.” He steps forward. “You never would’ve come to live with me in the first place if you weren’t on the run. We were in the same group home for what? Two months? You barely knew me. But you needed somewhere to hide. Tell me I’m wrong.”

  “I don’t have to tell you shit,” I say, and he glances at the door, wincing a little.

  I look over my shoulder, remembering the girl at the desk, remembering where we are, and almost laugh. “Are you … worried about me swearing? In this conversation about you blackmailing me?”

  I move closer, my new expensive handbag dangling in the crook of my elbow, Eddie’s ring winking on my finger.

  “You are smarter than I ever gave you credit for, I’ll allow that,” I tell him. “But this is over now. You don’t call me, you don’t call Eddie, you forget you ever knew me or that I ever existed.”

  His face is sullen, but he still says, “Forget you? Or forget Helen Burns?”

  My heart still thuds heavily in my chest when I hear that name.

  It’s over.

  She’s gone now.

  “Get fucked, John,” I tell him sweetly, and then glance up at the picture on the wall, another portrait of Jesus, this time with a bunch of kids around his feet instead of lambs.

  “Sorry,” I mouth at him with an exaggerated grimace, and then I walk out.

  As I pass the desk again, I see the girl watching me with obvious curiosity on her face, and I give her another smile as I pull a checkbook out of my purse.

  “My fiancé and I had heard your church was in need of a new music system.”

  I leave the church several thousand dollars poorer, but a truckload smugger. Let John ever try shit like this again now that his boss, the Reverend Ellis, came out to shake my hand and thank me effusively for my generosity, promising me that both Eddie and I will be thanked in every church program from here on out.

  I want John to see that every Sunday.

  Mr. Edward Rochester, and his wife, Mrs. Jane Rochester.

  Okay, maybe I jumped the gun a little with the wife bit, but we are getting married. Eddie is innocent. And I’m—free.