Open House: A Novel

by Katie Sise

  I try to focus straight ahead through the windshield so I feel less sick, and my eyes settle on Noah’s headlights scattering the gravel and flickering into the thick foliage. I try not to think about the creatures lying in wait, the coyotes and owls we all hear at night, and especially the black bear a handful of students have reportedly seen while running.

  I want to ask Noah to turn back, but I don’t. Instead, I ask, “What big news?” The engine growls as we pick up speed, and I can see Noah’s wolfish grin in the rearview mirror.

  “Australia,” he says, looking utterly satisfied with himself. “I got into the semester abroad program for the fall.”

  No. A few weeks ago he told me he was applying, but I didn’t pay much attention then because there wasn’t a reason to, other than the fact that I would miss him while he was gone.

  “Congratulations,” I say, trying to do the math.

  Josie beats me to it. “So that’s what, in nine months or so?” she asks, and my stomach drops. How can she be so cavalier? I try to breathe. So she knows it’s his, and the worst part is, she’s right about the timing: If I’m doing the math right, this baby would be due in September, so how’s Noah going to take it when I tell him there’s a baby due during the course of his dreamy semester abroad?

  “I guess, yeah,” Noah answers Josie, his smile fading. He looks confused and annoyed, which is the way he gets when he senses we’re talking about something more than just what we’re saying out loud.

  “Did you already put your deposit down?” Josie pushes.

  Noah considers her. There’s no way he’d guess what she’s getting at. “Yeah,” he says blandly. “I did.”

  “You’re going to have so much fun, Noah,” Josie says. “Australia. Wow. What a dream.”

  I slink farther down my seat, the leather cold against my skin. Noah doesn’t say anything else. He just drives faster along the narrow road, plunging us deeper into the woods.

  TWENTY-SIX

  Priya

  Priya clutched a Styrofoam cup full of coffee and nodded in response to one of Detective Salinas’s questions. The police station’s interview room was just big enough to fit a metal table and three chairs, and the empty chair made Priya worry that another cop would come in to join in the questioning. She was barely holding it together with just Salinas, and so far he only seemed to want a timeline of events.

  “So, to review, you last spoke with Josie during the day yesterday afternoon, by phone?” he asked, his pencil poised in the air. The pencil and paper struck Priya as old-fashioned, but she loathed technology, so she appreciated it. There wasn’t a phone or laptop in sight.

  “No,” Priya corrected, tapping her index finger against the table. “By text. I guess that’s by phone. I’m just trying to be accurate, sorry.”

  “And what was the nature of your conversation?” Salinas asked, scrawling away on his paper in loopy cursive.

  Priya cleared her throat. Another woman had been hurt, and Priya didn’t want to lie. There had to be a way to tell the truth without implicating her family. “Josie and I have known each other for years,” Priya started. “We’re connected by the disappearance of Emma McCullough. Emma and Josie were my students at Yarrow; and as you maybe already know, Emma and Josie were best friends. I was close with both of them.” This was an exaggeration, but not a lie. Priya was only thirty-one when she was teaching Emma and Josie, and she related well to all her students. “And during the past few years Josie and I sometimes met up.” It was obvious how interested Detective Salinas was in this part. Priya knew she needed to rein it back in. “Josie became a friend of mine as the years went by, even if we didn’t get to talk that often. I told her that Brad and I were looking for a new home, and she offered to keep an eye out for us. She wanted me to meet her at the house on Carrington.”

  “Really?” Salinas asked, his round brown eyes steady. “A five-bedroom home for a family with one child?”

  Priya’s heart pounded. What a fool she’d been to think she was in control of this conversation. She imagined Brad in another exam room, telling the same story, and tried to steel herself. “People with one child like big houses, too, Detective,” she said.

  “Do they?” the detective asked. Priya willed her hands to stop trembling against the coffee cup, staring back but saying nothing.

  “Let’s move on,” Detective Salinas finally said, glancing back to his loose-leaf papers. They seemed less quaint now and more incriminating. “What time did you and Josie arrange to meet?” he asked.

  “She told me her open house started at eleven,” Priya said. Also true.

  “And did you drive straight from your house, or from elsewhere?”

  “From my house,” Priya said. She pulled her thick black hair over her shoulder and twisted it, a habit she’d had since she was a child. When her parents brought her to India at age ten, she saw her grandmother did the exact same thing, and it made her feel connected to something bigger, a line of blood that meant something more than what she could see.

  “Did you stop off anywhere?” Salinas asked, which felt like the same question, but Priya answered anyway.

  “No,” she said, letting her hair fall loose again.

  “And when you arrived at the open house, who else was there?”

  “Dean and Haley,” Priya said. It struck her that the way she said it sounded too familiar, like she’d known them before today. “Well, actually, they pulled in behind me. So Brad, Dean, Haley, and I were there the same time, I guess, and we all introduced ourselves.”

  “How nice,” the detective said, putting a bad taste in Priya’s mouth, making her feel increasingly like she’d done something very wrong. “And did you approach the house together, or separately?”

  “Together,” Priya said.

  “How did you announce yourselves?” Salinas asked, and Priya paused at the odd phrasing.

  “Um, well, Dean knocked on the door, and rang the doorbell once or twice. Is that what you mean?”

  “Yes.” He scrawled something across the paper, and then asked, “How long did you wait before entering the house?”

  “Not long,” Priya said. “It was freezing. At some point Dean just opened the door.”

  “So Dean was the first to enter the house?”

  “He was,” Priya said. “Or, maybe Haley was, actually? I don’t remember. But Brad and I followed them both inside.”

  “How did Dean know the door was unlocked?”

  “They usually are, at open houses,” Priya said, trying not to sound snotty. But wasn’t that obvious?

  Salinas didn’t seem offended. “Was the door ajar, or simply unlocked?” he asked.

  “I think just unlocked. I definitely didn’t see it open a crack or anything like that.”

  Salinas nodded. “And what happened next?”

  “We called Josie’s name a few times. Dean did, I think, and then Haley. Brad and I mostly followed their leads.” Salinas looked at Priya like there was something wrong with that. “And I signed myself in,” Priya said quickly, “because I saw that Josie had left a sign-in sheet for visitors. And Haley suggested that we go upstairs, but then there was a strange sound from the kitchen, so we all went back there, and that’s when we saw Josie lying on the floor.”

  The door swung open, and Priya turned to see a thirty-something woman dressed in a traditional police uniform. The woman’s gaze traveled all over Priya, and she didn’t seem impressed with what she saw.

  “Detective Harris,” the woman introduced herself, “and I know who you are.”

  Priya’s cheeks burned. Detective Harris was carrying a slim laptop, and she moved gracefully across the tiny room and sat next to Salinas, who grunted something indecipherable. Detective Harris opened her laptop, and she and Salinas stared at it for at least a full minute. Priya felt like crying, but she knew she couldn’t, so she lifted her eyes to the spiderweb of cracks on the ceiling and counted the faint lines.

  Finally Detective Harris sp
oke. “You arrived separately from your husband, if I have the vehicle registrations sorted correctly.”

  Priya met the woman’s stare. “I did,” she said.

  “Why is that?” Detective Harris asked.

  “Because I had plans after,” Priya blurted, and then wanted to kick herself for mentioning something that Brad’s statement would probably contradict.

  “You had plans after the open house? In a storm like this?” Salinas asked, arching his eyebrows in mock incredulity. “Really?”

  “Really,” Priya repeated. She lifted her chin and tried to appear confident. “My neighbor is having troubles,” she added, thinking about how Alex’s husband had been laid off this week, and how that made it less of a lie, and in fact she’d planned to pick up Elliot and Robby at Alex’s after the open house and bring them back to her own house for a day of play. That’s what happened when two only-children lived next door to each other.

  “So you were going to be a good friend,” Salinas said. “That’s kind of you.”

  Detective Harris smiled, but it was far from friendly, and it made the bags under her eyes pooch and crinkle. “I just interviewed your husband,” she said flatly. “And he told me that you were in a fight, and that’s why you drove separately. So which thing is true?”

  “Both are,” Priya lied. “We got in a fight, and I was going to my neighbor’s after to pick up my son and his friend. I don’t see what my marriage has to do with this.”

  Salinas nodded as though Priya were a child he felt terribly sorry for, and she tried to steel herself. They were wrong to think she and Brad had anything to do with this. She was sure of it.

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  Emma

  Ten years ago

  Just meet me. Talk to me.

  I’m still slumped in the back of Noah’s Jeep as I read Brad’s latest text. We’re parked now, and even though the sky is dark there’s a full moon, plus a lone streetlight shedding a golden glow across the parking lot. It’s not really a proper lot; it’s more like a tennis court–sized gravel clearing in the woods that we’re sharing along with a few other cars whose owners are probably already at the party. An aging wooden sign with a chalky yellow arrow marks the entrance to the trail that leads to the campsite. Josie unbuckles her seat belt and makes fun of Noah for needing to cheat off her test this week in their sociology class, saying that he’s going the way of his Dartmouth-dropout sister, and I can tell she’s pissed him off by the set of his jaw. But he pretends she hasn’t gotten to him, telling her to please shut up because he’s trying to write a text. Finally they both spill out of the car, and I stay in my seat for a bit longer, exhausted just thinking about trekking all the way there and setting up camp with Josie and Noah like one big happy threesome when we’re not. And I’m nervous thinking about what Noah has planned for the tents: Are we all sharing one? Josie’s email to Noah is really bothering me, and I know I need to ask her about it, but I also need to deal with Brad. The weird thing is that I do kind of want to see him, to have closure, and maybe also to get a break from this night with Josie and Noah. I unlock my phone and dash off a text:

  Meet where? I write back, just to see what he’ll say, and maybe just to keep it going, really. Maybe some part of me likes the drama; I can admit that, at least.

  Not here, he sends back a moment later.

  Obviously, I write back. How dumb does he think I am? I’m camping tonight, I write. Why don’t you meet me here? I can find a spot where no one will see us.

  Perfect, he writes back. Governor’s Trail?

  Yep, I text. There are only three real trails. The woods behind campus are only five or so square miles. I close my eyes and try to steady myself, but I feel even sicker from the sounds of Josie and Noah ribbing each other as they unpack the trunk. When I turn to look through the window, I see Josie sock Noah across the shoulder. It’s childish, and I don’t think Noah likes it. Josie is so incredibly beautiful, but he’s just not under her spell like other guys are, and I think she knows it. I study him through the glass, the way he glances sideways at her, the way his smile looks forced, and the way he turns and buries his gaze in a red-and-white cooler. He’s all mine.

  It gives me a buzz of pleasure; it fortifies me. I push open the door and say, “Dibs on the fleecy one,” because as juvenile as it sounds, I know that if I don’t say it, Josie will claim the warmest sleeping bag, and I’m not going to shiver all night.

  “They all have fleece lining,” Josie snaps.

  “You guys go ahead,” I say to both of them.

  Noah turns to look at me. “What are you talking about?” he asks.

  “I’m meeting a friend on the trails.”

  “What friend?” Josie asks, making a face like I’ve said something absurd.

  “A friend!” I say, laughing. They exchange a glance I can’t read, and Noah shakes his head. “What?” I say testily. “Can’t I have other friends?”

  “Emma,” Noah says, his voice sounding way too sure that he’ll be able to convince me to stay with him. “I’d rather you not be in the woods by yourself. You don’t really know the trails that well.”

  “I do, actually,” I say. “I know them from when I was little and we used to come here.”

  “That’s a nice memory,” Noah says rudely, “but it’s different at night.”

  I roll my eyes.

  “Just tell your friend to meet us at the party,” Noah goes on, stuffing a half-drunk grape Gatorade into his backpack. My heart starts beating faster. I really need to get rid of them.

  “Maybe I just need a little break from you guys,” I say, knowing it will work. I reach down to grab the black backpack I think is mine, but Josie leaps toward me and snatches it from my hands.

  “Don’t open that!” she says. And then, “That one’s for Chris and me.”

  I look up, startled. “Um, okay, sorry,” I say. The streetlight flickers, then makes a dull buzzing noise like it’s about to die.

  Her face is flushed. She breaks my stare and grabs a smaller bag. “This one’s yours,” she says, still not looking at me. “It’s just waters and stuff.”

  I take the bag and wonder what she has in hers. Probably drugs, something harder than pot, or else she wouldn’t be so weird about it.

  Noah finally gives up on me. “Do you have your phone?” he asks, nudging his boot into the side of his pack, pushing it upright.

  “I do,” I say. “Do we definitely get service in the woods?”

  Josie nods. Her blond hair is piled high on her head, and wispy tendrils frame her heart-shaped face. She always thinks she knows everything, but she’s barely been in the woods this year. “Noah?” I ask, and he nods at me.

  “We get service,” he says. “But don’t take too long to find us.” He towers over me, and smiles. “The wolves come out at night,” he says.

  I roll my eyes. “Thanks,” I say, making my voice sound a lot tougher than I feel right now.

  I lift my hand in a wave, watching as they sling their backpacks onto their shoulders. Noah grabs the cooler and asks Josie, “Ready?” But she doesn’t answer him. She just starts walking toward the woods, seeming as confident as she always does, even though I know deep down she’s scared of where she’s going. Sometimes I think it’s that current of fear that keeps Josie moving forward toward something intangible, something she knows she wants but doesn’t quite know how to get.

  I pull out my phone. Meet me at Governor’s Trail marker two, I text Brad.

  I watch Josie’s slim form and Noah’s tall, broad back as they make their way into the woods and the cold night. I stare until they become swallowed by the darkness and disappear completely.

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  Haley

  Haley let her eyes glaze over as she stared out the police car’s windshield at the frigid white sky. An officer drove her toward Waverly Memorial Hospital, the audio from his radio buzzing in and out. Haley noted how much better the front seat of a police car felt than the back, a
nd wondered if she’d been upgraded because the cops were now operating on the assumption that she hadn’t done anything wrong. She tried to relax and close her eyes, but snapped them back open when images of bodies flooded her mind. She tried to blink the bodies away, to think of anything else. Her mind settled on Dean—on his pensive, handsome face and strong hands. She wanted his arms around her; she wanted the cops to release him to her so they could be a family again.

  A family.

  The cop slowed for a yellow light, and Haley thought about the word as they idled. She could admit to herself that it wasn’t how she usually thought of Dean, but increasingly she found herself imagining what they could be to each other with time. She fantasized about holding a little boy between them who looked just like Dean, and she imagined the way she would love her child. She imagined all the ways Dean and the little boy would be her new family, and all the ways she would protect them from the fate that had befallen her old family.

  The cop cleared his throat as he cruised toward the hospital. “Here we are,” he said, and Haley wiped tears from her eyes as he pulled into the parking lot of Waverly Memorial. She just needed to make sure Josie was okay, and go from there. One day at a time, her mom was fond of saying. Haley had her laminated badge from med school in her bag, and she was pretty sure, with her credentials as a medical student whose college was affiliated with the hospital, that she’d be allowed in the room—unless they were forbidding visitors because of the investigation. It was worth a shot.

  The officer pulled up to the front entrance and parked. Wipers slashed away the snow, and Haley fought the temptation to ask when he thought Dean might be released. “Thanks for the ride,” she said instead.

  She didn’t look back as she stepped onto the curb, feeling thankful that no one she knew was standing outside the hospital to see her exit a police car. The last thing she wanted was to see any of the other med students with whom she’d made tentative friendships and have to explain any of this. Freezing air blasted her face, and wet snow landed on her nose as she hurried toward the revolving doors. Inside the hospital it felt so stifling that she tore off her scarf and jacket. She flashed her badge at the guard sitting behind the desk, and the mere action of that strengthened her. She was going to be a doctor. She didn’t know which kind, or what it was all going to look like, but she knew she was going to help people. The thought of it kept her buoyed during every day of class and every night spent studying past midnight.