by Joseph Souza
I check on Zack before I sneak over and read more of her diary. He’s sitting at his desk and reading a book, one hand cupping his bruised cheek. I ask if he’s okay and he turns and regards me oddly before turning back to his book. My maternal instincts prevail and I rush over and kiss the top of his head. He shies away from me, and it hurts when he does this. It makes me feel unloved and unwanted. I wish he had some friends to hang with instead of going up to his room day after day and reading his stupid books. It makes me sad that we ever moved from Seattle and into this cursed neighborhood.
“I love you.”
“Love you too,” he says, not looking up from his book.
“You okay to be alone for a little while, buddy?”
“Yes.”
“I’ll be back soon.”
“Where are you going?”
“I’m just going to take a walk.”
“But it’s supposed to rain.”
“I’ll be quick.”
He looks up at me, and his freckled face makes me so sad that I run out of the room before I break down in front of him.
I head outside and notice that the sun has completely disappeared behind the mass of dark clouds. The neighborhood takes on an especially ominous hue in bad weather. I sprint over to the Gaineses’, covering my head with my jacket as the raindrops begin to fall. Once safely on the porch, I remove my shoes and carry them inside. Without warning, it begins to downpour,
The carpet along the stairs tickles my feet as I climb up to their master bedroom. I plop down on the mattress and stare up at the recessed lights, imagining what private horrors Clarissa must have to endure in this room. After five minutes of doing nothing, I reach into the drawer and pull out her diary and key. My body trembles as I open it. What has she learned about my past? And what terrible act has Russell inflicted upon her this time. I can’t believe how much progress I’m making on this case. For a relative newcomer in town, I’ve accomplished far more than the police have.
I open the diary to the last page and begin to read.
October 21
Still can’t believe what I found out today from my contact in the Justice Department. It’s hard for me to believe. Leah seemed like such a kind and caring person. I nearly coughed up my breakfast when I read it. Who knows about anyone anymore? Does the entire world consist of monsters waiting in the lurch? Like Leah? Like Russell? Then again, maybe Leah’s changed her ways. Maybe she’s made her peace with God and has moved on from the sins of her childhood.
Does Clay know? I’m betting he doesn’t. Maybe he should know whom he’s sleeping with each night. Maybe it’s my responsibility to tell him.
I’m thankful they left when they did after that miserable dinner. To think that my husband would want to have sex with Leah disgusts me. Yes, Russell was quite upset when Clay rebuked him. I take no pleasure in sleeping with other men, except that, in the early days, it made Russell happy. It spiced up our sex life. I initially did it for the sake of our marriage. To please him. But now I do it out of self-preservation. So that he doesn’t rage on me. It’s my fault for agreeing to do it in the first place. I never should have agreed to his outrageous sexual demands.
I was madly in love with Russell when I first met him. Although fifteen years removed didn’t seem so bad at the time, I understand now how it has put me at a disadvantage. That and the fact that he was my professor, and I his eager student. But that’s in the past now. Our marriage is at a crossroads and no amount of cooperation on my part may be able to save it. Sadly, I believe that once an abuser, always an abuser.
But a killer?
What am I to do? Where am I going to go? I’m living a nightmare that I can’t wake up from.
I slam the diary shut and lie back against the pillow, clutching it to my chest. I’m furious. My cheeks melt like hot candle wax. How everything could change for me if this comes out. She knows. I’ve been repressing this part of my life for so long now that it feels like reading a horror novel penned by Stephen King. It doesn’t seem a part of me or part of my history. In the years since, I’ve completely rewritten my life story, and in its absence patched together a much happier narrative. I’ve created, on the surface anyway, a much happier version of the Leah I present to the world.
I close my eyes and scream into the pillow. It takes ten minutes before I’m able to calm down and my breathing becomes normal. Focus, Leah, I tell myself. I understand now what I need to do: confront Clarissa and admit to her that I’ve been sneaking into her home and reading her diary. I’ll say that it was an act of desperation, a silly idea that I came up with in order to befriend her. I’ll fall to my knees and beg for forgiveness, and plead with her not to divulge my secret to anyone. It horrifies me to think what might happen if Clay finds out. What would people around town say if they knew? I’d never be able to show my face in Dearborn again. In exchange for her silence, I will tell Clarissa everything I’ve uncovered about this case and about Russell. Maybe she can use that evidence in her divorce proceedings and try to maintain custody of the children.
I peel the curtain aside and look over at Zack’s window, hoping to catch him red-handed doing something naughty. How bad have things gotten when you’re peeping into your own home? I run downstairs in my bare feet and grab a half-empty bottle of Riesling out of the fridge, take a healthy sip, and then return upstairs with the bottle. My grief needs to be tamed like a wild stallion galloping on the beach. I sit against the headboard, drinking straight from the bottle, feeling sorry for myself. The alcohol makes me feel better, but I know I’ll pay dearly for it come morning.
I don’t want to think about anything. For so many years I’ve convinced myself that my marriage is strong. But is it really? Because what would Clay do if he learned the truth about me? I’m not that young girl anymore and haven’t been in a long time. Although I apologized in front of the judge, I’ve never really been contrite for what I did. In many ways, I’m still glad I did it.
I close my eyes and, through the spatter of tears, tell myself that it’s okay to sleep. I lift the bottle, but it’s already empty. My head swims in a weed-infested pond of cold Riesling. I let my mind drift to sloped vineyards, arid Tuscan fields littered with grapes, and virile men walking along dusty paths carrying woven baskets. I slip further under the blanket, reminding myself to make the bed up as soon as I’m ready to go. Zack has his book. He’ll be fine by himself. There’s no one else in the neighborhood to worry about.
* * *
I’m awakened sometime later by footsteps coming up the stairs. I sit up in shock. How long have I been out? I toss the covers aside and run over to the window and see Russell’s blue BMW parked in the driveway. Darn. There’s not enough time to make the bed, hide the empty wine bottle, and slip under the mattress. I’m woozy and unsteady on my feet. It suddenly occurs to me the danger I’m in—Russell might kill me if he finds me here. He killed Cordell and now he will kill me. I look around for something to defend myself as the footsteps approach the door. The knob turns and I stagger against the wall. My knees buckle and I ball up into a fetal position, ready to scream. I suddenly realize that I don’t want to die just yet. I close my eyes and mumble the Lord’s Prayer.
Then the door bursts open.
CLAY
Thursday, October 22, 3:35 p.m.
AS I SIT DRINKING IN MY OFFICE, I CAN’T HELP BUT THINK BACK about how it all unraveled with Mycah.
The end of August was fast approaching and I looked forward to welcoming my wife and kids back into my life. Two weeks had passed since I’d last seen Mycah. No calls, no visits or texts. We’d quit each other cold turkey, although the temptation to call her was strong, especially after I’d consumed more than a few beers. Somehow I managed to be a good boy during that time.
Then the day came and Leah and the kids stepped off the plane and into my arms and I felt whole again. The missing pieces of my life fell neatly into place. They moved into my small efficiency and planned to stay there until we fou
nd a house that appealed to Leah. Zack and Zadie slept on an air cushion in the middle of our compact hotel room. I even took time off from the brewery to take them to Old Orchard Beach to enjoy the last days of a gorgeous Maine summer.
But after a few days passed, something didn’t seem right. We were slightly off as a family unit. My absence from their daily life had created a subtle but noticeable distance between us. We circled each other like suspicious cats. At the time, I chalked it up to the newness of our situation. I figured that everything would return to normal once we settled in to our new home and got reacquainted with one another. It felt awkward at first, but so did everything back then. In retrospect, I underestimated the emotional toll that moving three thousand miles away had on all of us. And my affair with Mycah had irrevocably changed me as a person.
Not a week after Leah and the kids arrived, I received a text from Mycah, pleading with me to meet her. What the hell was this? I deleted the message, got back to work in the brewery, and did my best to ignore her. I’d finally come to grips with my reckless behavior and needed to move on. The guilt still tortured me, and I knew that I’d need to forgive myself in order to get on with life. On the worst of days, I thought about ending it all. Yet, oddly enough, the memories of those sexual trysts kept me going, and night after night I replayed those sizzling trysts in my mind.
She continued to text and harass me, and I promptly deleted her messages without reading them. No way did I want to chance Leah seeing them. One Sunday, as I walked out of a restaurant with Leah and the kids, I saw Mycah sitting on the hood of her car and watching us. Three nights later the doorbell to our hotel room rang. I opened it and saw Mycah standing there with a pizza in hand, dressed in a blue delivery uniform, her hair tied up in a bun.
“We need to talk,” she whispered.
“Shhh. What are you doing here?” I said.
“It’s important that I speak to you.”
“You and I are finished.”
“Who’s at the door?” Leah sang out from the bathroom.
“Pizza delivery,” I called back to her.
“But I thought we were going out for dinner,” Leah replied.
“Yeah, I figured we could save it for later,” I said, turning back to Mycah. “Meet me at the brewery tomorrow night.”
“No. I can’t risk being seen there with you.”
“Then where?”
She mentioned a motel thirty miles away, and I agreed to meet her the following night. I took the pizza from her, slammed the door shut, and tossed the box onto the wrinkled bedsheet. Zack and Zadie immediately made a beeline for it, seeing as how we kept little to no food inside the mini-fridge. But when they opened the box, there was only half a pizza left.
“Oh, Clay. You’ll ruin their appetites.” Leah walked out of the bathroom, wearing a white towel wrapped around her head. She stared down at the four remaining slices. “Where’s the rest of it?”
I shrugged.
“They only delivered half a pizza?”
“Looks like it.”
“What a rip-off.”
“They must have made a mistake.”
“Pesto?” She snatched the slice out of Zack’s hand before he could bite into it. “Why would you order pizza with pesto on it? You know that Zack is allergic to pine nuts.”
“They must have screwed up the order. I would never order a pesto pizza.”
She walked over and sat down at the foot of the bed, picking up the phone. I suddenly remembered a night, after we made love, when I told Mycah about Zack’s allergy to pine nuts and how we once had to rush him to the hospital.
“What are you doing?” I asked.
“Calling the pizza place to complain. Give me their number.”
“Put the phone down, Leah. It’s no big deal.”
“Of course it’s a big deal. We can’t let them cheat us.”
“I don’t have the number.”
“Then how did you call in the first place?” she said, holding the phone aloft.
“Put the phone down,” I said firmly.
“Why?”
“Because the owners are thinking about giving me a tap in their restaurant. That’s why I don’t want to make a big deal out of this.”
“They should at least give us a free pizza.”
“Trust me, they’ve given me more than a few free pizzas when I was working late nights at the brewery. That’s why you need to let this go.”
Leah put the receiver down. She crossed her arms and sulked. A few moments passed before she skittered into the bathroom to get dressed.
We went out to an Italian eatery that evening. I was facing the door when I noticed Mycah walking in with a skinny young black man. He wore his long hair in dreadlocks, and from her description of him at the time, I assumed it was Cordell. They sat on the far side of the bar, Mycah facing me. Our eyes met at one point during dinner and she smiled seductively.
“Are you okay, honey?” Leah asked, sitting across from me.
“I’m fine. Why do you ask?”
“You look weird. Like something’s bothering you.”
“Why would I be upset now that you and the kids are here?” I reached over and cupped her hand. “I was just thinking about the house we’re going to visit tomorrow. It’s priced to sell and I really think you and the kids might like it.”
“You say it’s a big neighborhood and that there’ll be lots of families moving in?”
“That’s what the agent says. It’s a large cul-de-sac with a big field and at least twelve other homes being constructed for families just like ours.” After blowing six thousand bucks on Knicks tickets, I searched around and had found a much less expensive development.
“Hooray. I can’t wait to see it,” she said, clapping excitedly.
The mention of a new house in a busy neighborhood immediately put Leah in a good mood, and she squeezed my hand throughout dinner. As much as I tried not to look over at Mycah, I couldn’t help but notice when she kissed Cordell on the lips. She looked amazing and at that moment I jealously coveted her.
Zadie talked nonstop throughout dinner, giving me a nagging headache and forcing me to drink more beer than I should have. Despite Leah’s protest, we skipped dessert and I hustled them out of the restaurant before Mycah did something foolish.
“You seemed a bit distant tonight,” Leah said on the drive home.
“No, I’m very happy to be back with you and the kids. It just feels as if the honeymoon is finally over.”
“I’m not following you.” She put her hand on my lap. “Aren’t you glad we’re here?”
“Of course I am. You don’t know how hard it’s been for me without you guys around. Now the pressure is really on me to make this brewery work.”
She smiled and rubbed her hand against my thigh in a nonsexual manner. “Then just be happy, silly.”
“I am happy. It’s just that you’ve made such a huge sacrifice by coming out here that I don’t want to let you down.”
“You’ll never let me down.”
“I’ll be spending long days at the brewery, trying to get this business off the ground.”
“Don’t worry, Clay. Everything will work out now that we’re a family again. You’ll see.”
Once we arrived back at the hotel, we put the kids to bed. Leah took a long shower while I sat in the darkened living room, staring at the muted flat-screen. I glanced occasionally at Zadie sleeping next to me in her duck-themed pajamas. Then at Zack on the air mattress, his thin little hands folded over his chest. I couldn’t believe that I’d jeopardized my relationship with these precious creatures by sleeping with that whore.
I guzzled the first growler of beer and went to the mini-fridge and retrieved the second. By the time I got back to the pullout, my phone started to ring. Who could be calling me at this hour? I stared down at the caller ID, instantly recognizing the number I’d deleted from my contact list. I couldn’t believe that she had the nerve to call me after the way she�
�d been stalking me.
“What?” I whispered.
“I need to see you right now.”
“We agreed to meet tomorrow night,” I said, listening for Leah to emerge from the bathroom.
“It has to be tonight.”
“What if I say no?”
“I wouldn’t if I were you. You know what I’m capable of doing.”
I held my tongue, trying to restrain my anger. “I wish I’d never gotten involved with you.”
“Well, you did, asshole, so fucking deal with it.”
“Where?”
“Your brewery. Be there in fifteen minutes. I’ll wait for you to go in first.”
“Okay.”
“I have something important I need to tell you.”
“And it has to be in person?”
“Yes.”
I went over to the bathroom and informed Leah that I had to make an emergency trip to the brewery, making up some lame excuse about a fire alarm going off. Thankfully, she never questioned me about my business dealings.
Despite being drunk, I took the growler with me, sipping it through a straw while driving across town. The brewery was only ten minutes away, and at this time of night, there were not many cops patrolling the roads around Dearborn. My head felt as if it might explode. I kept telling myself not to do something I might regret. Never in my life had I maliciously laid a hand on a woman, but Mycah had sorely tested my resolve. If she happened to drive off a cliff that night, her body mangled and torn beyond recognition, I would have pumped my fist in celebration.
The center of town had long been deserted, and the streets were bathed in an eerie darkness. I pulled up to the back door of the brewery and wobbled inside. Pitch blackness greeted me. I turned a light on in the back, sipping from the growler as I made my way to the tasting room. Then I collapsed on one of the stools—and waited. Fifteen minutes passed. Thirty. Forty-five minutes later, as I was about to leave, the back door opened and Mycah appeared.