Open House: A Novel

by Katie Sise

  “Oh,” I say, stalling, and then I start backing away from her, from this, inch by inch.

  “Can I help you with something?” she asks, her eyes narrowing.

  Lie to her. Think of something. Just tell her a lie!

  But I can’t. Something’s wrong with me—I can’t say anything at all. I back down the stairs, gripping on to the railing, scared I’m going to fall and hurt my tiny baby, which is probably not even possible at this stage of a pregnancy. And then I think about Priya’s baby, who is apparently Brad’s baby, and then I start thinking about how when these two babies grow up, they won’t ever know that they were face-to-face like this one winter night, just a few feet apart when their mothers realized they were sleeping with the same man.

  And then I throw up.

  I’m still on the steps; I haven’t even made it to the sidewalk yet. “Emma?” Priya says as I heave. “Are you all right?” I hear the door close behind her, and she comes toward me, but I don’t want this—I don’t want to make a scene; I don’t want anyone else seeing us. I wipe my mouth and stumble down the steps. “Leave me alone,” I hiss. I say it as meanly as I can so she won’t come after me, and she doesn’t.

  I race over the sidewalk. I only turn around once to see Priya still standing on the steps in her robe, her hand on her stomach as though she can shield the baby—her future—from all of this. A streetlight sets her black hair aglow.

  Finally the row of town houses ends, and I round the corner, collapsing against the redbrick wall. I catch my breath for a moment, and then I pull my phone from the pocket of my jeans. I fire off three texts to Brad, pressing the send key with shaking fingers.

  Just went to your house and talked to your fiancé.

  I know her. She’s my teacher.

  Stay away from me.

  FIFTEEN

  Priya

  Priya was still in the kitchen fumbling inside her bag to find her medication as Brad paced the creaking floorboards overhead. He’d told her she could take up to four pills per day, but when she googled the medication, the dosage seemed more aggressive than what WebMD said to do.

  Priya swallowed her fourth pill and went back to the table. She sat, waiting for the blurry, numb feeling to come, staring at the empty space across from her. Who had texted her husband to make him hurry from the room? When her thoughts started to soften around the edges, she drifted back to the texts she’d found ten years ago from Emma.

  Just went to your house and talked to your fiancé.

  I know her. She’s my teacher.

  Stay away from me.

  Priya had never stopped thinking about that night Emma showed up on the steps of Brad’s town house with their illicit relationship written all over her face; it was always right there on the fringe of Priya’s thoughts, where it belonged. Emma McCullough had haunted Priya for ten years now, and the girl would most likely haunt Priya until the day she died.

  Brad’s stir-fry sat unfinished on his plate, the soy sauce and chicken fat congealing. Priya could hear his muffled voice upstairs as she took a slow sip of her water and glanced out the french doors into her neighbor’s yard. She wished she could catch sight of Elliot, but it was too cold for the neighborhood kids to be playing outside, and they did different things now on play dates, didn’t they? Less outdoor play, more iPads and video games. When had that happened? Could they ever go back?

  That night ten years ago, after Emma showed up, Priya didn’t confront Brad right away. She’d wanted to talk to Emma once more, to get all the details before Brad could convince Emma not to tell her anything. But the following Monday morning, just as Priya was getting her classroom ready for nine a.m. watercolor class and trying to figure out what she was even going to say to Emma, a police detective knocked on the door. “Can I help you?” she’d asked, swinging it open. She was breathing heavily just from the trek across the classroom; she was due with Elliot any day.

  “Have a minute?” the detective had asked, not waiting for an answer.

  Priya had wiped paint from her cheek as she followed him across the studio, and he’d seemed almost relaxed as he studied the paintings clipped to easels. “You teach Emma McCullough?” he asked.

  Priya’s body had reacted before her brain. Adrenaline coursed through her, and blood rushed from her hands and feet into her midsection. Maybe it was her body’s way of protecting the baby, but it left her with the odd sense of being dismembered, of floating through space as only a mother, a round pregnant ball without limbs to anchor it.

  “Yes,” she’d answered the detective, shifting her weight. “I do.”

  “Any of these hers?” he asked casually, studying the paintings as if they were at an exhibit together.

  “This one,” Priya said, gesturing to a watercolor of a cracked vase holding vibrant purple orchids. It wasn’t Emma’s best, but he wouldn’t know that. Priya leaned against an easel, unsteady.

  “Are you all right?” the detective had asked, his eyes traveling up and down her body, lingering on Elliot inside her.

  “I’m fine,” Priya had said. Sweat broke out along her hairline. “I’m just very pregnant.”

  “Please, sit down,” the detective instructed, pulling out a chair. Priya did as he said, trying to focus as he spoke. “Emma went missing on Saturday night,” he’d told her, his words even, “and now we’re speaking with her teachers, trying to get a sense of if she was having any problems, any difficulties in school or with friends.” The detective’s eyes were on her face, and she prayed he couldn’t see the way her chest was heaving as she tried to breathe. “We’re trying to figure out if she had any reason to run away, or to hurt herself,” he said, his words slowing, each one hitting her like a slap. Priya nodded as her heart raced on. Could Brad have done something to Emma? Scared her in some way, or worse? She didn’t think so—she honestly didn’t. Brad wasn’t religious, but he was one of those people who believed life was sacred. It was what drove him to be a doctor, he’d once said, the idea of protecting God-given life. Surely he couldn’t hurt a young girl? Or was Priya stupid to even think that? Did she know him well enough to know for sure? She was carrying his child: Could she really trust herself to think rationally about this?

  After Priya lied to the detective and told him she knew nothing, she canceled class and raced home. Elliot’s nursery was all set up for his arrival, and that’s where she found Brad, sleeping in the rocking chair, still in his scrubs from the previous night when he’d assisted in an emergency surgery. Brad had turned on the sound machine, and a steady heartbeat filled the room. “Brad,” Priya managed to say, and when he woke, he rubbed his eyes and grinned at her. She couldn’t figure out why, until he asked, “Is it time? Is the baby coming?”

  “No,” Priya said as he got out of the rocking chair and strode toward her. Her heart was beating so fast she thought she might die right there and lose everything. She righted herself against the changing table. “A detective just came to my class, Brad. Asking about Emma McCullough.”

  Brad stopped dead. What he’d done was all over his face, and Priya knew she’d never need to ask if he’d slept with Emma.

  She let go of the table. She felt a little steadier now. He’d cheated—she could deal with that; it wasn’t a crime. But if he’d hurt Emma, she needed to know now, so she could end it. “Did you do something to her?” Priya asked, her words barely audible amid the pulse of the sound machine.

  Brad shook his head. “No,” he said. “No, no, I didn’t. Priya? Sit.” He gestured to the rocking chair, but Priya was sick of people telling her to sit down.

  “No,” she said. “I don’t need to sit, I need you to tell me if you . . .” She bent forward, unable to finish her sentence. She tried to straighten up, but suddenly she wasn’t feeling very well. Her stomach tightened like a fist, and she clutched her lower belly.

  “Priya?” Brad asked.

  She couldn’t speak. Liquid trickled into her underwear and leggings. It wasn’t a gush like in the movie
s, but it was unmistakable. It was time to have Elliot.

  As they sped toward the hospital, Priya screamed through contractions, and when she had a break from those, she screamed at Brad. He admitted to sleeping with Emma—he didn’t even try to lie. He apologized profusely, and swore up and down that he didn’t hurt her, that he could never hurt her, or anyone. By the time they arrived at the hospital, Priya could barely walk. An orderly put her into a wheelchair and wheeled her into labor and delivery. The contractions were coming on faster now, and she and Brad spoke in hushed voices while nurses came in and out of the room. Tears streamed over Brad’s face as he apologized, and Priya tried to face the reality that her fiancé had slept with a twenty-one-year-old girl who had disappeared and might be hurt. If she believed him, she needed to protect the father of her child, but if she didn’t, she needed to turn him in, to protect someone else’s child. This contradiction played through her mind on an endless loop, but then there was the urge to push, and suddenly she couldn’t focus on anything other than this baby who wanted to be born. She looked up at her fiancé’s pleading face hovering over hers, and she decided to believe him. She took his hand and started breathing and pushing, screaming and crying. Minutes later, Elliot emerged with cries of his own. Priya held her baby close, warm against her chest, and never spoke of Emma McCullough again.

  SIXTEEN

  Haley

  Haley woke from her dreams drenched in sweat. Emma still filtered through her mind in the space between asleep and awake. I’m waiting for you to find me, Emma had said, dressed in the same white tank she’d been wearing the night Haley saw her in the lobby for the last time. Figure me out, Haley. Please, look a little closer.

  “Dean!” Haley heard herself cry out. She turned toward him, but the sheets were empty. She swung her legs over the side of the bed and saw moonlight on the floor. The clock on their bedside table read just past midnight.

  “Dean?” Haley called as she stepped across the wide wooden planks. A blue glow came from the bathroom, and she followed it. She swung open the door to see Dean sitting on the cold tiled floor, his back pressed against the bathtub. He was staring down at his phone, and when he looked up, his features were so furrowed she hardly recognized him.

  “Haley,” he said. He set down his phone with the screen side against the tiles, making them ghostly white. “You okay?” he asked, standing and coming toward her.

  Haley rubbed her eyes, but she didn’t feel tired anymore. She glanced down at Dean’s phone. “I’m fine,” she said as he wrapped his arms around her. “It was just a dream.” She tried to let herself relax into his embrace, but she couldn’t. “What were you doing in here?”

  “Just work emails,” Dean said. “I couldn’t sleep.” He pulled her tighter against his chest until she felt too hot and itchy against his Yarrow sweatshirt, until she couldn’t breathe right. She pulled away, gasping. “Let’s go back to bed,” she said, trying to shake a feeling she couldn’t quite name.

  SEVENTEEN

  Priya

  The next morning snow fell heavily from a white sky. Priya drove along the interstate toward Josie’s open house, gripping the wheel and arching forward. The wipers beat away the snow, and Priya tried to focus on the clean patch of road in front of her. It was 10:49, and she wanted to be there right when Josie had told her to be—just before eleven—so she could get this over with. Hopefully the snow wouldn’t delay Josie’s open house visitors, because Priya needed an easy out. What a lovely home! she imagined saying as she excused herself from Josie and any potential clients.

  Priya drove past the Protestant church on Main Street with its spire shooting into the white winter sky, and then the yoga studio and the new coffee shop. Her nerves made her fingers shaky against the steering wheel. She had her medication ready if she needed it, but she was trying not to take it. She’d woken up this morning feeling not quite right, and she wondered again if maybe Brad had gotten the dosage wrong.

  Priya had to admit, the open house was a good place to meet. If Brad ever found out, Priya could always say she saw the gorgeous colonial with green shutters online and wanted to see it for herself. Josie and Priya had met exactly three times over the past decade, and Brad had never caught her. The meetings always seemed to happen when the weather took a turn to frigid. (Emma had disappeared in the winter, so maybe it triggered something in Josie, something she wanted to try to make amends for.) During their meetings, Josie had said many condemning things about Brad, mostly involving the emails she’d found and deleted on Emma’s computer back in college. Apparently when Emma disappeared, Josie’s biggest concern was that Emma would be in trouble for sleeping with Brad because he was a teacher, and that she’d lose her scholarship, which is why she deleted all the emails between Brad and Emma before the cops could secure her laptop.

  Priya could never exactly figure out Josie’s motive for telling her these things. Was she trying to warn Priya, convinced that Brad had done it, or was she hanging it over Priya’s head for some kind of blackmail to eventually be used against her and Brad?

  Still, Priya went to the illicit meetings when Josie requested them. They seemed like a kind of therapy for Josie, the way she poured out her fears that Brad had done something to her roommate and that she should have stopped it. And Josie always seemed to take solace in the fact that Priya didn’t actually believe her husband had hurt Emma. Josie listened intently as Priya went on about what a gentle person Brad was, and she always exhaled when Priya was done convincing her anew of Brad’s innocence, as though Priya was absolving Josie, too, of having done anything wrong. Priya thought it must be what priests felt like, to absolve and console with that kind of power.

  Something’s changed, and I need to explain.

  That’s what Josie’s text had said yesterday. But what could have possibly changed after all these years?

  Priya turned right onto Carrington Road. She scanned for house numbers and tried to get her bearings, which was nearly impossible in the whiteout weather. A yellow farmhouse with black shutters and a red barn sat high on a hill, and Josie was pretty sure she could make out the number three on a stone pillar covered in snow. She hugged the right side of the road, careful not to veer onto a lawn. Carrington Road was much snowier than the interstate, and Priya’s nerves spiked as she fishtailed once, then twice, failing to steady the car. She finally righted it, and pressed the accelerator to keep climbing the hill past two more houses. She tensed when the car skidded at the top, terrified the wheels wouldn’t grip the slick pavement, imagining herself sliding back down the hill and into traffic. She glanced in her rearview mirror and saw a black Land Rover behind her. The person was driving too fast, coming too close. Priya had the childish urge to press her brakes and slow down even more. She despised people who drove carelessly in bad weather. Did they have nothing to lose?

  Her foot was shaky against the accelerator. The car behind her was nearly at her bumper, and she could make out a dark-haired man and woman, the man driving and the woman gesticulating in the passenger seat. They were definitely arguing. Priya almost pulled over to let them pass, but she worried she’d get stuck on the side of the road, or that the people would crash into her car as they tried to swerve around her. “Back off!” she yelled, and even though she knew they couldn’t hear her, the man seemed to notice how much he was tailgating her and suddenly slowed.

  Priya let go of a breath. The Land Rover followed her down the slippery hill and around the next bend. Priya could barely see the road, but she made out three blue balloons tied to a mailbox, and thank goodness, because the snow had erased any sign of a house number. It had to be the open house. Priya pulled carefully into the driveway, but to her dismay, so did the Land Rover. Priya’s heart raced as she followed the curve of the driveway. Why had Josie asked her to come only a few minutes before eleven? This was so foolish—Priya would never be able to talk to her alone now. She tried to breathe, tried to figure out what to do. The driveway was too narrow for her to t
urn the car around, even without the snow.

  She kept going. The driveway was long and winding, and when the house came into view, Priya marveled at its classic beauty. She was so taken by the white house with green shutters that it took her a moment to realize that Josie’s car wasn’t the only one parked near the garage.

  Priya’s heart pounded as she studied the license plate of the Highlander.

  Brad was here.

  EIGHTEEN

  Haley

  This is mortifying,” Haley said as she and Dean went up the driveway toward the open house behind the Subaru he’d been tailgating. “This woman’s going to think we’re insane.”

  “Who cares?” Dean asked. It was so callous and unlike him that Haley’s mouth dropped an inch. “Sorry,” he muttered, navigating the snowy driveway. He pulled the car behind the woman’s Subaru, boxing her in.

  “Perfect,” Haley said beneath her breath.

  “What did you just say?” Dean asked.

  Haley was so shaken from the fight they’d gotten into this morning over absolutely nothing, but she couldn’t back down. “She can’t even leave now, Dean,” she said. “You’ve blocked her exit.”

  Dean grumbled something inaudible and backed up the car. The sound of snow and ice being crushed by tires filled Haley’s ears. She hated winter.

  “Sorry,” Dean said again. “Okay? I’m sorry for the fight this morning; I’m sorry for tailgating the woman; I’m sorry about my parking job.”

  Haley nodded toward the woman. “She’s the one you should apologize to,” she said. Why couldn’t she ever let anything go?

  The top of the driveway was framed by a circle of evergreens, and Josie and Noah’s SUV was parked in the driveway next to a Highlander, still running, beneath a basketball hoop. Haley tried to catch a glimpse of the woman in the Subaru, but all she could see was her black hair high in a bun. The woman was turned at an awkward angle, staring at the Highlander. Maybe the woman was thinking what Haley was, which was that there were more cars than she’d expected to see at an open house on a snowy January morning. Haley really wasn’t looking forward to making small talk with other prospective buyers. She exhaled, turning away from the woman and taking in the house, a cream-colored colonial with shining green shutters, somehow both grand and understated. It was beautiful, exactly as Josie had promised.