The Night in Question

by Nic Joseph

  I also wondered if I was losing my mind.

  Go to bed, Paula.

  Instead, I hit the blogs.

  Very quickly, I learned two things. One, his fans called themselves Hookers, which was horrible and hilarious at the same time, and two, people would say almost anything under the shroud of anonymity. The comments on the blogs were, at best, amazingly supportive; at worst, they were downright creepy. I wondered if I’d had access to sites like these when I was a teenager if I’d be as open about my unabashed obsession with my favorite artists.

  I met Ryan Hooks tonight, y’all, and now I can die. Srsly, that’s it for me.

  I would leave my husband, my job, my kids, and my dignity behind for just one night. Just one night.

  On one blog, I found a thread called “Chicago-August,” and I clicked on it. It was filled with accounts from fans who’d seen him in different locations around town. The last one was posted at 3:30 p.m., two days ago.

  Saw RyHo at the W Hotel in downtown. Pretty sure that’s where he’s staying during his time here. I’ll be camping outside in my car to catch a picture. Wish me luck, Hookers!

  A very small, smug part of me wanted to post that she had it wrong—he was at the Renouvelle Hotel, not the W—but I closed the screen and moved on.

  Next search: Ryan Hooks and Tiffane.

  She only had one name, a popular one at that, but the auto search filled it in by the time I started Ryan’s last name. They’d met at the MTV Music Awards a few years back, which again seemed fitting, and the rest was history.

  Couple name, Tyan.

  Together three years before getting married in a small ceremony with friends and family in Palm Springs. Their wedding cake was vanilla with fresh strawberries and a dark-chocolate shell.

  The things you can learn on the internet…

  I scrolled through countless pictures of them: him dark, brooding, and unbearably sexy; her small, curvy, and gorgeous. The last year, though, had been rocky. A TMZ segment of Ryan being chased down by cameras and accused of cheating. Tiffane quoted as saying she’d leave him if she heard any more rumors about him messing around. Another article stated there was “trouble in paradise” and even threats of a divorce, but nothing had materialized from it.

  In the back of my mind, there was a question brewing, one that, even then, I knew would cause me a lot of pain, but I let it simmer there anyway.

  What would Tiffane do if she knew about the woman in the Gold Coast?

  It was such a ridiculous thought, but it lingered while I scrolled through article after article and watched video after video. By the time I realized that the sun was coming up, I’d watched Ryan Hooks singing at concerts, in music videos, at award shows, and even for fans at the airport. Every single one of his songs was about how much he loved someone, missed someone, or wanted to be a better man for someone.

  And even though I’d watched him do something that looked a lot like cheating, I couldn’t help but get drawn under his spell. Every interview was funnier than the last, every sultry pose sexier than the one before it. In the span of two hours, I all but fell in love, as much as the unending swamp of the internet would allow, and I couldn’t keep myself from being dragged away.

  It had to be the alcohol.

  It had to be.

  I dropped my phone on the living room table and then reached into my purse and pulled out Ryan’s. I pressed the home button to illuminate it, and there he was again, smiling up at me with his face pressed against his wife’s. I pushed the button again, causing the keypad to appear on top of their faces, and thought about Vanessa’s words:

  You could hack into it and read all his texts.

  I swallowed and let my thumb hover over the screen.

  It couldn’t hurt to try, right?

  Ryan’s birthday was December 7, so I quickly keyed in 1-2-0-7 and held my breath.

  Immediately, the entire screen shook.

  Nice try, it seemed to say.

  I grabbed my own phone and looked up Tiffane’s birthday.

  0-2-1-5.

  Again, the screen shuddered.

  Nope.

  I decided to give it one more try. I typed in 7-9-2-6—for R-y-a-n—and this time, the phone actually did respond.

  YOU HAVE ENTERED AN INCORRECT PASSCODE 3 TIMES. THE PHONE WILL AUTOMATICALLY LOCK AFTER 7 MORE ATTEMPTS.

  I clicked the button at the top of the phone to turn off the screen and dropped it back into my purse before standing up. Shelby didn’t move an inch as I walked past her and into the bedroom.

  Keith was rolled over on his side, snoring, the whiskey-stained glass in its usual spot. If he’d known what I’d spent the last three hours doing, he would’ve thought I was crazy.

  He probably would’ve been right.

  I crawled into bed beside him and finally let the sleep take over.

  • • •

  “Hey.”

  Keith was sitting in his wheelchair at the side of the bed, peering down at me. I blinked at him through last night’s mascara and wondered why he was talking so loudly.

  “We have to be at Dr. Bryant’s in an hour.” He pushed himself back and rolled out of the room.

  I was still in the clothes I’d worn the night before, my body sprawled awkwardly across the bed. I winced as I sat up, the sunlight hurting my eyes. Pushing myself out of bed, I went to the bathroom to get ready.

  During our early trips to the doctor’s office, Keith and I had been chatty—with each other, with the doctors and medical staff, and with anyone who’d listen. We thought talking a lot would make things a little less terrible. We simply couldn’t give in to the paralyzing abnormality of it all. We talked loudly to drown out the sobs in our hearts. We held hands, and we laughed. We pretended.

  These days, our visits were quiet, almost silent. We were too tired, and the doctor’s office seemed to shrink with each visit. Too tight for any small talk to fit.

  We were quiet on the trip there too, sitting silently beside each other while I drove the twenty minutes to her office. When we arrived, we sat wordlessly in her waiting room, our eyes trained on the silent television mounted in one corner. When she was ready, I pushed Keith into her office and took a seat beside him.

  “When’s the big day?” Dr. Bryant asked from behind her desk. “Heading back to work.”

  Keith cleared his throat and looked at me. “Tomorrow,” he said. “And I’m not exactly going back. I’m just going to watch one of the swim meets.”

  It had been a year since he’d been to a Morton College swim meet, and I hadn’t seen him so excited in a long time.

  “I’m excited for you,” Dr. Bryant said. She sat up straighter in her seat. “So, I’ve got good news and bad.”

  One of the things I appreciated most about her was her ability to quickly cut to the chase.

  “Which one do you want first?” she asked.

  “The bad,” Keith and I said at the same time, and we turned to look at each other.

  Dr. Bryant leaned forward, folding her hands on the desk in front of her. “Your range of motion hasn’t improved since last time,” she said. “And unfortunately, that’s bad news. None of the treatments we’ve tried so far are helping.”

  “But it’s not getting worse,” Keith said. “That’s got to be a good thing?”

  “Sure, good in that it could be worse,” she said. “But you’re not improving as much as we’d hoped.”

  “What’s the good news?” Keith asked quietly.

  Dr. Bryant looked at me first, and from the expression on her face, I knew what she was going to say.

  “That treatment I told you about—”

  She stopped as Keith let out a long, loud sigh.

  “That’s the good news?” he asked.

  Dr. Bryant stood up and walked around her desk. “I w
ouldn’t keep bringing it up if I didn’t think it could help you,” she said.

  “But we still can’t afford it,” Keith said. “Like we couldn’t the last time we came in and like we won’t be able to the next.”

  “But you’re an excellent candidate for it,” she said. “This treatment could radically change your quality of life. I don’t recommend it to everyone, because Dr. Reveno’s treatment requires a very specific patient, and you are really the perfect example of it. You’re the right age, the right height, and everything else lines up. I don’t want to oversell it, but I think it’s something you should consider.”

  Keith sucked in a breath. “Thanks for the update, Doc,” he said. He looked down at me. “I’ll wait for you outside.”

  As he left, I stood and faced Dr. Bryant.

  “Do you think it will actually work?” I asked.

  She nodded. “I do,” she said. “I wouldn’t keep mentioning it if I didn’t.”

  The ride home was tense.

  “I can ask David for some extra shifts,” I said after we’d been driving for nearly ten minutes in silence.

  “When, at two o’clock in the morning?” Keith asked. He looked over at me for a moment and then back out the window. “I know you’re not sleeping, Paula. You’re never there when I wake up.”

  “You mean I’m never there to make sure you wake up?” I said, and I cursed as the words came out of my mouth. He let out a long, slow breath. “Sorry.”

  I peeked over at him, but he was staring stonily out the window. I remembered sitting in the back seat of the car as my parents drove along, just like that, the silence riding in the car with us like a fourth passenger. I used to try to make conversation at first, asking how long it would take to get to the restaurant or wherever it was we were going, what they were going to eat, anything to get them talking. I soon learned that it was better for me to retreat into silence too.

  Now, I wished Keith and I had someone in the back seat, an eager little kid to help us break the tension and just talk.

  When we got home, I pulled over and jumped out of the car. I opened the trunk and pulled out his chair before carrying it over to the passenger door.

  He frowned when he saw that I’d left the hazards on.

  “You’re going back out?” he asked.

  I nodded. “I’m going to drive for a little bit.” We were both silent as I helped him into the chair. I moved around to push him toward the front door, but he held up a hand.

  “It’s okay, thanks,” he said before wheeling himself away from me.

  I stood there watching him for a moment before walking back around to the driver’s side, climbing inside, and pulling away.

  At first, I wasn’t really going anywhere in particular.

  I didn’t actually feel like picking up any rides, not yet, so I just drove, turning onto street after street, until the buildings around me got less and less familiar. As I drove, I couldn’t help but think of the conversation I’d had with Vanessa the night before as we stood outside staring at Ryan Hooks’s phone.

  You could sell it to a news site! I bet they’d pay a ton for Ryan Hooks’s cell phone.

  It was a ridiculous idea that didn’t deserve even a second thought, yet here I was, giving it a second and a third and a fourth. I shook my head and let my mind wander to the image of Hooks and the woman on Saturday night. It wasn’t the best distraction, but it would do, and I let myself zone out as I drove along, my brain bouncing from the image of the two of them staring at each other in the night, to Hooks’s smiling face on his Wikipedia page, and back again.

  I’d been driving along aimlessly like that for ten minutes when I blinked, realizing where I was.

  I hadn’t done it on purpose—at least, I didn’t think I had—but here I was, just five blocks away from the apartment on Oak.

  I knew I should stop myself, knew I should turn around and go home, but I wasn’t ready to face Keith again, and I certainly didn’t feel like picking up any strangers.

  With my fingers drumming lightly against the steering wheel, I accepted what I was doing, headed toward Oak Street, and began to sing a little song, just under my breath, a soft, rhythmic, self-deprecating chant.

  You’re losing your mind. You’re actually crazy. This is not a normal thing to do!

  Tap.

  You’re losing your mind. You’re actually crazy. This is not a normal thing to do!

  Tap.

  I kept humming and tapping as I drove down the street toward the apartment. When I got there, I slowed down and pulled over, pressing tightly against the parked cars so the traffic behind me could get by, before shifting into park. Then I leaned across the passenger seat and peered at the building.

  115 West Oak.

  The building had seemed taller, statelier, and more manicured than it did now, like something out of a storybook. Today, I could see that it was an average though attractive building sandwiched in between two equally attractive three-flats on either side of it. As I sat there, my mind flashed back to Saturday night, when Hooks had stood there, riveted by the sight of the woman in the window.

  I leaned even farther across the seat and angled my head to look up at the second-floor window—

  And jolted back when I saw a tall, slender figure near the same spot where I’d seen the woman on Saturday night.

  Shit!

  I breathed heavily for a few moments and then dared to lean over again, wondering if she was still there. I strained my neck toward the passenger window and craned up, letting out a breath when I saw who was in the window.

  Or, rather, what was there.

  A lamp.

  Curvy base, with a short, white lampshade.

  Not a person at all.

  A giggle burst out of me, and I leaned back against the headrest. I deserved this, to be cowering in my front seat, hiding from an inanimate object. I put the car in Drive, waited for traffic to clear, and pulled away.

  Of course the woman with the sleek blond bob was not still standing in the window since Saturday night. That would be both weird and insane.

  No, she was probably in her second Pilates class of the day.

  Or at the spa.

  Or maybe she was—

  Standing right there on the street.

  I put on a hard brake and stared out at a woman fifteen feet away from my car at the entrance to a small park, a half block or so away from the apartment I’d just left.

  I glanced up into the rearview mirror; luckily, there was no one behind me. I started driving again slowly.

  The woman didn’t notice me as I crept by because she was looking down at her phone, her forehead scrunched in a frown. I leaned forward and felt my breath catch.

  It was her.

  It wasn’t just the sharpness of her blond bob or her small, delicate features. It was the way she held herself, the power in her frame.

  It was definitely her.

  I could’ve kept going.

  I should’ve kept going.

  But there was something empowering, something dangerous, something absolutely irresistible about the fact that I knew something about her and Ryan Hooks that I wasn’t supposed to know.

  And I had a feeling that nobody else knew.

  At the end of the block, I made a U-turn and circled back to find parking.

  You’re losing your mind. You’re actually crazy. This is not a normal thing to do.

  Chapter 6

  Stay in the car, Paula!

  The voice of reason was screaming at me, shrill, high-pitched, and desperate, but I ignored her. I opened my car door and stepped out onto the gravel surface, shutting it behind me. I had seen the tall, blond woman for only a few seconds on the night that I dropped off Hooks.

  But I know faces. I knew the brushstrokes that would make up her face—short,
curved flicks for her high cheekbones, light, feathery strokes for her skin. The moment I’d seen her standing outside the entrance to the small park, I’d known for sure—it was her.

  It was a hot day, and I pulled my T-shirt away from my body as I walked from my car to the edge of the park. As I crossed the street, I knew I had a problem—I did not have an endgame for this little excursion. Some part of me just wanted to get closer, to see her face more clearly, to remove any last, miniscule shred of doubt.

  Still, I couldn’t exactly walk up and ask her.

  Was that you I saw in the window staring down at Ryan Hooks two nights ago?

  Yeah?

  Cool.

  Well, thanks.

  My feet moved me forward anyway, and suddenly I was approaching the entrance to the park where she was still standing, talking to someone on her phone. When I was about five feet away from her, she looked up and smiled, the slight, unassuming, and uninterested smile reserved for strangers.

  “Yeah, we’re going to be at Klein’s Boutique on Halsted,” she said into the phone. “Their stuff is gorgeous and really well made.”

  This close, I could see that she was in her late twenties and pretty in a simple, put-together way. She was wearing a pale-green silk jumper that toed the line between pajamas and high fashion but skewed solidly enough toward the latter. She’d paired it with flat gladiator sandals and a small rectangular purse that was slung across her body. Her nails were painted a bright, vibrant red, and I didn’t have to look closely to know that there wasn’t a single chip there. And then there was the bob, cut into wispy layers that made her hair seem to bounce around her face, even though she was standing still.

  I smiled back and averted my eyes quickly, moving past her to push back the gate and walk into the park. My feet sunk into the grass, and I looked around at what was an average, tiny park fashioned out of a sliver of empty space on Chicago’s Gold Coast. I drove by the small spaces frequently, wondering what it must be like to grow up playing in something so small, so manufactured. When I was a kid, I played in our large suburban backyard, or my parents took me out to a forest preserve about ten miles away where I could run around to my heart’s content.