Five
FIVE
VANESSA
“Likely story, buddy.”
Murphy circles my legs as I make my way in the door, weaving dangerously close to having his tail stood on.
Or me on the floor with a broken neck.
“Out of the way.”
As appealing as the break from reality sounds, I’ve got shit to do. Namely, figure out who this fucking lawyer is and how they found my address.
The address that I’ve been super careful to keep secret since I found the house.
The clock in the kitchen reads four-fifteen as I drop my shoulder bag on the counter and head for the fridge. I’d hoped a solid week of work would have let this stress ease—something to distract my brain. But all I’ve done is delay the inevitable.
And my nervous system knows.
Repeated panic attacks throughout the days have left me seriously fatigued, and constant nausea from said moments of existential dread means I ate sweet fuck all. Mama needs a snack. And she needs it quick.
I shove a limp celery bunch aside and tug out a slim container of salami sticks. Something sugary would probably be better for a quick fix, but I don’t think my fragile gut flora could handle the sweetness right now.
Murphy alights onto the counter, curling his whiskered lips back in a yowl.
I shove a stick in my mouth, bite off a section, and chew, maintaining eye contact with the con artist as I do.
“Not yours.” I wave the mutilated stick between us. “Mine.”
He launches to the floor, and sashays from the room to no doubt scratch the fuck out of my favorite shoes. Or shit in a corner. Anything to assert his dominance.
I pop the rest of the cured meat in my mouth and retrieve my phone from my bag. It’s a simple old-school brick with no browser capabilities or internet connectivity.
Call me paranoid, but things have happened in my life that have left me questioning the security of anything connected to the information superhighway. Risking it being how he found me was not a chance I was willing to take. Although, given the letter I slide onto the counter, it seems too late for that.
I navigate down to my one and only friend in this shithole’s number and type out a quick text.
Takeout and whiskey? I need your help—urgently. Love you. Thanks.
Given how far out of town I live, she'll have to bring the takeout, but I’ll pay her back when she gets here.
My lifeline responds promptly.
Chinese and red wine or no deal. I’ll be there in thirty. Mwah.
I let loose a sigh and smooth my hands over the wrinkled pages.
I would have known. But then, it’s been years since I’ve heard her voice. Maybe these papers are correct? Even so, it doesn’t give him reason to accuse me of being at fault.
What the fuck does he think I did?
What the hell could I have done to give my mother cancer?
I force myself to start a new salami stick as I make my way to the spare bedroom. Afternoon light filters through the windows, touching the prism hanging in the center of the middle pane. A kaleidoscope of color sprinkles across the floor, turning the sky blue comforter on the spare bed shades of purple and green where it touches the fabric.
I take a deep breath and shove the last of the meat in my mouth as I move toward the armoire. My palms slick, and my breaths feel inadequate as I set my hands on the brass handles and tug.
The lone box stares back at me. A predator ready to strike.
It’s okay, Ness. It’s just paper. A bunch of paper with printed letters of the alphabet and colorful pictures.
It’s the box I shove my nightmares into.
With shaky hands, I pull it off the top shelf and then sit it on the bed behind me. I put these things in here for just such emergencies, and yet, opening this lid feels akin to opening Pandora’s box: I can’t be sure of what evils I’ll let loose.
On myself, my mind, and the world.
Stop being so dramatic and find what you need. I flick the lid off the top using the backside of my index fingernail. I half expect snakes and cockroaches to crawl out, but all that lies before me is a stack of papers, with photographs safely tucked inside a thick envelope to avoid accidentally seeing his face.
I gingerly push the redundant memories aside and pluck out what I need. My aunt’s number.
At least, what I hope is still her number. It’s been eighteen years since she scrawled it on a torn-off piece of a cereal box and shoved it in my young hand, making me promise never to let him see. “In case you need a friend,” she’d said.
Turns out, I’d needed many.
I hastily reseal the rest of the nightmares and shove the box back where it belongs, slamming the armoire doors closed. Dusk progresses as I carry the scrap of colorful cardboard through my house and then pace the polished floorboards between my kitchen and living room while I try to figure out the best way to go about this bullshit. I need clarity, but I also need to stay hidden. He wants me to reveal myself, to put myself in arm’s reach again, and I’m not willing to do that. No matter how badly I need the truth.
I end up lying on the teal rug between my mismatched armchairs, card held over my head while I practice what I’d say to my aunt—if I can muster up the courage to call. “Oh, hey. Not sure if you still want to help me or if you’re still untouched by his influence, but can you tell me? Is my mother dead?”
I’m onto my sixth rehearsal of the best line I can conjure up when my best friend arrives, letting herself in and immediately cursing Murphy when he hisses at her.
“Swear to God, I have no idea why this asshole hates me so much. I’d never seen the damn cat until you found him here.”
I click my fingers, summoning the furry overlord. “He can sense dog people. I’m sure of it.”
“Sure.” She huffs out her nose. “Doug won’t let me have a dog. So this little fucker hates me preemptively.”
“He’s clairvoyant,” I tease. “Knows you’ll have one in the future.”
She shakes her head, setting a Chinese bag on the kitchen counter. The clink of a wine bottle follows. “What’s going on, Ness?”
“Nuh-uh.” I slip the phone number beneath a chair. “Tell me about your week first. Close any big deals?”
“Well,” Marianna says with a slight smile. “I may have sold the farm across the road.”
I jerk upright to a seated position, startling Murphy. “What?” I like it with no neighbors. Quiet. Undisturbed. Solitary. “To who?” It’s what fucking sold me on the place when she brought me here.
“Can’t say yet. Not until it’s finalized.”
“Why?”
“Because they don’t want people getting in a tizzy and interfering in the purchase.”
I narrow my eyes on her as she pops the cork. “Why would people get in a tizzy?” A.K.A. Me.
She gives a non-committal shrug, pouring us each a glass. “Can’t say.”
I flop to my back again, shuffling left to capture the last of the sun’s rays through the windows.
“Where do you want it?” She kicks her heels off as she approaches, drinks in each hand.
“Set it on the side table, thanks.”
I admire her curves as she bends to place the wine down, her fitted dress hugging her hourglass figure. She hasn’t said much about why she finds it hard to make friends around here, but I’d wager it has a lot to do with jealousy and not much to do with her actual character.
“So what’s going on, chicken?” She settles on the front edge of the closest armchair; head tilted a little as she stares down at me.
I reach for the ends of her long blonde hair. “I got a letter on Monday.” My fingertips manage to brush the silky tips.
“From who?” Marianna frowns. “I thought nobody knew you lived here.”
“I thought so, too.” I swat the curtain of hair to make it swing then drop my hand on the floor. “A lawyer sent it. From him .” I haven’t told her much about where I came from or why I need to stay incognito, but she knows he exists.
“Shit.” She takes a healthy swig of her drink. “Why?”
“Here.” I push up on one elbow and retrieve the letter from where I left it atop the coffee table.
She takes it from my hand and sets the information on her knees, fingers tracing the page as she skimreads the text. The scratch of the paper as she flips the page to the next one damn near echoes in the silent room.
I lace my hands over my stomach and close my eyes. Focus on your breaths. In. Out.
“Holy shit, Ness.” Marianna’s exclamation snaps me from my trance. “He actually wants to blame you for your mother’s illness?” Her face falls. “Wait. Did you know she’d died?”
“I don’t think she has.” I’d feel it in my heart if she was gone. “I think he’s using it as a shock tactic to force me home. He’s tried messed up shit like that in the past.”
A beat passes before she whispers, “Will you go?”
“Fuck no.” I roll to my stomach, propping myself on my elbows. “If I go back there, I’m not coming out again.” And not by my own choice.
“He can’t make you stay.” She smiles softly.
I envy her innocence. “He can if I’m dead.”
It’s not called being dramatic if it’s true. He tried once. He almost succeeded another. Willingly re-entering my childhood home carries as much risk as walking out in front of a full-speed semi on the highway. Neither one lauds much chance of survival.
“What will you do, then?”
I flop down, burying my face in my hands. The darkness brings with it an awareness of my steady, thumping heart. “I don’t know. My gut says to find out if it’s true, first and foremost. But that’s hard to do when everyone close to her is under his spell.”
“Public records,” she says, rising from the seat. “You’d be able to find her death notice in public records, wouldn’t you?”
I stay frozen as she steps over me to head for the kitchen. “Only if he reported it.”
“He must have if he has a lawyer involved.”
“Unless the lawyer is part of his inner circle.” I roll over and adjust myself to a seated position. Murphy promptly makes himself at home in my lap.
Marianna hesitates unpacking our dinner to stare at me. “He’s really that influential?”
“Worse.” I absently scratch Murphy’s back, eliciting a content purr from the critter. “How much do I owe you?”
“Nothing. You paid for the last, like, I don’t know, four times we had takeout? It’s my turn.”
“I pay because it’s my existential crisis that means you end up here.”
She smirks, shoving forks into the takeout boxes. “And you repay me by listening to me bitch about my asshole husband.”
I tilt my head, accepting dinner from her with thanks. “Why did you marry him?”
Marianna settles in the chair again with a sigh. “It’s complicated.”
I wave a hand the length of me. “You’re talking to the very definition of complicated.” I swat Murphy’s attempt at sniffing my Lo Mein.
She smiles, pausing to chew a forkful of noodles. “I knew people would lose their minds because he’s older than my daddy.” She shrugs, eating another small mouthful. “But he was the first person who told me I could achieve anything I wanted out of life, you know? And I think that the part of me who was so desperate for praise latched onto him even though I knew he was a fucking asshole.” She chuckles, pulling a smile from me. “I shouldn’t complain. He helped me get my realtor’s license, paid for my initial advertising, and bought me a car that gave the impression of success to clients, all for letting him fuck me three or four times a year.”
“You’re such a sell-out,” I tease.
She smiles, ducking her head. “Honestly. He lets me keep the lights off so you could call him chivalrous.”
We pause a second before I let rip a snort that has Murphy scrambling for safety. The two of us erupt into peals of laughter, gasping for air as it dies down. I fucking love how she manages to make my issues feel normal—trivial.
For those fleeting seconds of joy, I forget who I am. I’m exactly who I want to be instead.
Marianna nods toward the discarded letter. “What happens if you ignore it?”
I shovel warm ramen into my mouth and shrug as I stare at the offending pages. “Dunno.”
“Don’t speak with your mouth full.” She fills hers and mumbles around the food, “It’s un-ladylike.”
I shove more in. “Terrible.” The word comes out as one smooshed syllable.
We both chuckle—Marianna shoving the back of one hand to her mouth to stop anything from falling free.
A pang of sadness sears outward from my heart. I wish I’d had a sister like her growing up. I wish I’d had a best friend like her while I was inside my childhood home. But then, would I have wanted to leave? Did having nothing to tie me there make it easier to make that choice?
I glance at the lawyer’s letter again. Not exactly nothing. I always had her in the back of my mind. That niggling curiosity. What would she have been like outside his influence? Would she have loved me as much? Been as sweet and kind? Or was that all part of her supplication toward him?
“I’ve got one possible option,” I mutter.
Marianna sets her fork in the box. “Yeah?”
I place the Chinese on the floor between my folded legs and lean left to retrieve the torn cardboard. “My aunt gave me her number long ago when I was still there.” I hold it up for Marianna to see. “I don’t know if it’s still her number or if she’d still want to help me.”
My bestie plucks the digits from my fingertips. “Only one way to find out.” She sets her dinner aside and crosses the room to retrieve her phone. “What’s her name?”
“Evelyn.”
“And you think she might know because your mother is her sister?”
I roll my bottom lip between my teeth. “Sister-in-law.”
“Oh.” Marianna’s eyes widen. “ Oh .”
“Yeah.” I retrieve the food and idly push it around the box. “I don’t even know if she’s still on the outside or if he’s got to her too.”
Marianna waves the number while she thinks, phone poised in her other hand. “From what you’ve told me about the place, if she has been sucked in, then she probably wouldn’t have been allowed to keep her phone, right?”
“I guess.”
“What’s her full name?” She swipes her thumb across her phone, unlocking the device and navigating the apps.
“Evelyn Faith.”
Marianna pauses, lifting an eyebrow as she looks at me. “Seriously?”
“Their parents had their names legally changed.”
“The fuck.” Her eyes widen as she returns to scrolling through her phone. “And she didn’t think to change it back when she was legally an adult?”
I shrug. “Guess it was too indoctrinated into her life by then.”
“Evelyn Faith,” Marianna mutters, thumb tapping at her phone. “Where did she live when you knew her last?”
“Oklahoma.” I glance at the paperwork again.
“Does she look like you at all?”
“We’re not blood relations, babe.”
“Of course.” Her tone softens with understanding. “She looks like him.”
“Yeah.” I barely croak the word out as I set aside the food. Any appetite I’d managed to scrounge up has left for the night.
“Can I show you a picture, then? I don’t want to have you check this is her if it’ll trigger you.” She makes the statement with the utmost care, gaze soft as she holds the phone at an angle. “Is there another way I can be sure?”
“She was a nurse back then.”
Marianna checks her phone. “Her profile is locked down, so I can’t tell.”
I rub my chest with the heel of my hand and sigh. “Show me.”
She crosses the room and gently lowers the device so I can see it.
My throat closes, and a wash of adrenalin makes my head swim. So much like him. “Yeah,” I croak out. “That’s her.”
“You’re sure?” Marianna straightens.
“Positive.”
She thumbs at her screen for what feels like an age before ditching the phone on the side table. “Done.”
“Done what?” My heart rate kicks into overdrive. “What did you do?”
“Sent her a friend request.”
“Why?” Heat envelops my face and neck. “If she’s on the inside, they can trace me through you.”
“They already know your address, babe.” Marianna’s voice softens as she points out the obvious.
Shit. “Yeah. You’re right.”
“It’ll be okay.” She nods toward my dinner. “Eat your food, babe.”