Thirty-Four
THIRTY-FOUR
JULIA
Julia has never once thrown a dinner party, let alone a black-tie event. Well, back in high school, she’d thrown a few parties, but high school parties are guaranteed to be fun as long as you’ve got cheap beer and music so loud that it permanently scars your eardrums. What Vera has insisted on throwing is something else altogether.
The three of them spend the entire day preparing for the event, Julia and Emma putting up decorations while Vera cooks up a storm in the kitchen. Since Vera has told her that she is planning on uncovering the truth behind Marshall’s death during the party, Julia isn’t sure what kind of vibe she should go for. In the end, she settles on black and white streamers and a handful of gray and black balloons. The balloons are more for Emma to play with. Julia isn’t sure about having balloons at a dinner party discussing the events of her husband’s death. But then again, she is no longer sure of anything.
She’s so nervous about seeing Oliver tonight. Vera tells her not to confront him about the manuscript, that Vera will bring it up when the time is right. But will Julia manage not to blurt it out the moment she sees him? She imagines herself flying at Oliver and hitting him, shouting, How could you? She’s not even really sure, technically, what she’s angry at him about. Surely there’s nothing wrong with having a crush on someone, especially when they were in their teens. But then she thinks of the manuscript and how he’s described the obsession with Aurelia and Randall, and she thinks again of how much time he’s spent with her and Emma ever since Marshall died, and the newfound knowledge that he’s been doing it with the hope of replacing Marshall makes her skin want to crawl right off her body.
Enough of that , Julia scolds herself as she dresses Emma in a black velvet dress. Emma beams at her reflection, turning this way and that to admire herself.
“Don’t tie up my hair, Mommy,” she says. “I’m too pretty already.”
Julia’s heart squeezes at Emma’s self-love. It breaks Julia a bit to see how much little kids love themselves, how natural it is for them to accept their bodies. She thinks again of how Marshall broke her self-confidence down so insidiously that she hadn’t known it was happening at all. I would kill to protect you , she thinks. I would kill to make sure you are never in a relationship like Mommy and Daddy’s.
The thought surges through her so fiercely that it stuns her, but it’s true, every bit of it. She would kill, and quite easily too, for Emma. She stands behind the little girl and puts her hands on her tiny shoulders and they both smile into the mirror. “Yeah, you’re right, baby. You don’t need anything else to make you pretty.”
···
The dinner party is a huge success. Well, as huge a success as it can be with just five people in attendance. Oliver seems to be running late, something Julia can’t decide whether to be relieved or disappointed about. She keeps glancing at the door, expecting him to show up, and going over her impassioned speech over and over. But aside from that, everything is going great.
As always, Vera’s cooking exceeds all expectations. And everyone looks amazing. Vera has done something to her hair to make it three times the size it usually is, and it looks like a little cloud has floated down and decided to settle atop her head. She’s wearing a jade pendant and a tweed jacket she has been telling everyone is a knockoff Chanel, though “you wouldn’t know it, would you? Would you?”
“Riki, you look so dashing!” Julia says when Riki arrives, and he really does. His hair has been very carefully messed up in a way that makes you want to run your fingers through it, and he’s wearing a suit that makes him look—there is no other word for it—dapper.
Sana arrives a minute later, looking very elegant and yet alluring in an LBD. “Sorry, my Uber ran late.”
“I told you I could pick you up,” Riki says, putting his arm around her waist and giving her a kiss.
“Nah, your office is in the opposite direction. But you can drive me home.”
Julia’s eyebrows have disappeared into her hairline. “Wait, are you two a thing?”
Sana giggles as she squeezes close to Riki. “Yes. Did Vera not tell you?”
“No! Vera!” Julia calls out. “You didn’t tell me these two were a thing!”
“Hm?” Vera looks up from the dining table, where she’s been busy the past five minutes rearranging the dishes to make sure the spread looks perfect. “Oh yes. Riki and Sana are things. Keep up, Julia. Emma knows, don’t you, Emma?”
Emma nods solemnly, eyeing Riki and Sana. “Are you going to kiss again?”
“Um...” Sana says. “Do you want us to?”
Emma shakes her head.
“Okay, then we won’t,” Riki says with a wink at Emma. “Wow, Vera, this looks amazing. You’ve really outdone yourself.”
“Oh, it’s nothing,” Vera says, grinning from ear to ear. “I just spend the whole day cooking, but is no big deal.”
For the next fifteen minutes, they chatter easily, sipping champagne and updating one another. Julia is excited to update them about her growing business; it’s been such a long time since she’s had anything remotely interesting to say about her life that isn’t about Emma. Sana and Riki seem genuinely happy for her until Vera says, “Oh, Julia, you can take Sana and Riki’s engagement photos!” upon which both Sana and Riki choke on their drinks while Julia laughs, then the conversation moves on to how Riki is planning on refurbishing Vera’s teahouse furniture.
Strangely, Vera doesn’t seem too enthused about this. “Oh, you don’t have to. It must be such a bother. Just take it slowly.”
“Vera doesn’t want to move back to her teahouse,” Sana teases. “She’s enjoying staying here too much.”
“Such rubbish!” Vera snaps, without any bite to it. “Of course not! I hate being a bother. You know that, don’t you?” she says to Julia.
“You’re never a bother, Vera,” Julia says, giving her a one-armed hug. “Emma and I love having you here. You can stay as long as you want. Right, Emma?”
Emma nods, then says, “I’m hungry.”
“Ah, yes, let’s eat, before food gets cold,” Vera says.
Riki glances at the door. “Should we wait for Oliver?”
At the mention of Oliver, Julia’s heart rate quickens.
“He is twenty minutes late already,” Vera moans. “No, we should eat first, then when he comes he will feel guilty for being so late.”
And so they retire to the dining room, where they dig into the food. Everyone agrees that Vera’s cooking is out of this world and that meeting her has been very bad for their waistlines. It’s right in the middle of eating that the doorbell rings. Before Julia can even get out of her seat, it rings again. And again. They all exchange curious glances as Julia gets up.
“Wow, sounds like Oliver really needs to come in,” Sana says.
As Julia walks to the door, she rehearses what she will say to Oliver. She will be calm and cool, she decides. She will trust that Vera has a plan for tonight. That Vera will make sure that everything goes well. And if it doesn’t, well, Julia is prepared to tell Oliver exactly what she thinks. She opens the door.
“Vera!” Oliver shouts, barging in and storming right past Julia.
“What the—” Okay, so she wasn’t expecting that. And the unexpected rudeness triggers something inside her. She hurries after him. “You can’t just—”
But Oliver stops at the dining room and points at Vera. “I can’t believe you did that,” he thunders.
Conversations stop in mid-sentence. Emma looks up from her high chair, startled, a piece of broccoli halfway to her mouth. Seeing how surprised Emma looks seems to shake Oliver. When he speaks again, his voice is lower, more level, though anger is still simmering beneath the words. “Vera, can I please talk to you?”
“This is not what I plan,” Vera complains.
“I’m serious, Vera.”
Julia’s gut turns sour. She is angry and upset and everything else, but Vera only nods and leaves the table. The two of them go into the living room. Julia takes Emma out of her high chair and hugs her close as she, Sana, and Riki follow, stopping to listen from behind the door.
“I can’t believe you handed my manuscript to the police,” Oliver is saying.
“Why? Is there something you are hiding in it?”
“Wha— No! But I let you take it because I thought you were—I don’t know, I didn’t think you would betray me like that. I thought we were friends!”
“We are. But your story...”
Julia bites down on her lip so hard that she tastes blood. Vera is fishing, prodding for answers, pretending that she’s finished reading Oliver’s manuscript in the hope that he might reveal what the ending is. Sensing Emma stiffening in her arms, Julia whispers, “Hey, baby? Do you want to go into your room for a bit? Maybe spend some time in your relaxation corner?” The mention of the corner reminds Julia that it was Oliver who came up with it. Ugh. Everything is tainted now. But she’ll have to deal with that later. For now, it’s more important to make sure that Emma isn’t being frightened. Emma nods and Julia lowers her to the floor, where she toddles off into her bedroom. Julia sighs with relief and turns her attention back to the argument.
“Is fictional!” Oliver is barking. “That’s exactly what it is, a story. And thanks to you, the cops think I might have had something to do with Marshall’s death.”
“Why?” Vera says. “What is inside your manuscript?”
“What? Did you not even read it before handing it to the police? Jesus, I can’t believe that, of all the fucked-up things—”
It’s too much. His anger at Vera, a helpless old woman, his stupid, ongoing rant. Julia strides into the living room and says, “She didn’t do it. I did.”
Both Oliver and Vera turn and gape at her. There is a long silence, then Oliver says, “What?”
“To be fair, I didn’t mean to. I wasn’t planning on doing anything—well, I hadn’t decided yet, I was still skimming through it when Officer Gray dropped by. She found the manuscript on the couch and took it with her.”
While Oliver struggles to come up with a response to this revelation, Julia gathers her strength, sharpening her fury until it becomes a single, sharp point. “And how dare you, Oliver?” Her voice is soft but steady. She is done with letting men’s bullshit go.
“What?” Oliver says.
Can he not say anything else? she thinks. He’s supposed to be a writer, and yet here he is, stuck with repeating the same word over and over again. “You’ve been in love with me since we were teens? And even after Marshall and I got married, you were still—what, pining for me? And fantasizing that Emma’s your kid?” By now, Julia’s voice is a poisonous hiss. Behind her, she can hear Sana’s and Riki’s soft gasps.
Color drains from Oliver’s face. “No, Julia, it’s not like that—”
“Really? Then tell me what it’s like. You’ve hated Marshall your entire life. And okay, granted, that’s understandable, because you know what? Marshall was a fucking asshole. Yeah,” Julia says, nodding at everyone in the room. “I really did just say that about my dead husband. He was a total shit. And so I get it, Oliver. You hated him. I do too. But see, you actually wrote in your book that you’re going to make sure that he no longer gets away with it. So tell me, what did you do? Because I didn’t get to finish reading the book before Officer Gray showed up, but obviously, the ending was disturbing enough for her to question you about it.”
“No, I didn’t—”
“What,” Julia says, enunciating every single word, “did you do to Marshall?”
“I planted drugs in his bag!” Oliver shouts.
The room falls silent except for the sound of Oliver breathing hard. “I was fixing up the plumbing at one of the apartment units and I found this little bag full of pills taped to the inside of the toilet tank. The unit had been recently vacated, so I had no idea what to do with them. I looked them up. They were ecstasy. I think? I don’t know. I took them back to my place and I thought about throwing them away, or turning them in, but then I thought—hey, maybe this is a sign. Maybe these pills are a gift from the universe, a chance for me to finally get Marshall in trouble.” Oliver rubs his hands down his face and groans. “I know how that sounds. I know it sounds completely stupid, but you don’t understand, Marshall’s been getting away with everything ever since we were kids. He’d do shit like shoplift or cheat during exams, and if he ever got caught he’d blame it on me, and no one—” His voice hitches with unshed tears, and despite herself, Julia wants to cry for him. “No one ever believed me.”
The thing is, Julia understands completely. She’s been there, after all. She’s experienced firsthand the irresistible charm that Marshall had. The way you knew, deep down inside, that he was no good, but still you couldn’t help but go along with it, you couldn’t help but let him get away with it. And when she looks around the room, at Sana’s and Riki’s expressions, she knows that they get it too. That they’d seen for themselves what Marshall had been like. They were all, despite themselves, feeling horribly sorry for Oliver. Because sure, she’d been married to Marshall, but Oliver had shared a womb with him, had gone through all of his childhood and formative years as his twin brother, tethered to him. What would that have been like, to have to be so close to someone whose shine dazzled everyone and be the only person who knew that the shine came from a poisonous radiation?
“So I met up with him. The day before he died, and I slipped the drugs into his bag when he wasn’t looking. I was going to call the cops on him, but then... I chickened out.” Oliver snorts. “I guess that’s what I do. I’m just a coward, after all. I thought of taking it back, but I couldn’t figure out how to do that without making him suspicious, so I did nothing. The next night, he died. I was scared shitless. I had no idea what had happened. I thought maybe Marshall had found the drugs in his bag and took them. Maybe he had an overdose. Maybe the drugs had been cut with something toxic? I don’t know! But then the autopsy report came out and, well, you all know the rest. Bird dander.” Oliver snorts again. “After all that, it was fucking bird dander that got him.”
Julia is staring at him, mouth agape, her mind on fire. The thing is, she believes him. She’s known Oliver since they were practically kids. She knows when he’s telling the truth. Slowly, she looks around the room. Everyone else is looking just as stunned as she feels.
“So you are not killer?” Vera muses, after the shocked silence becomes unbearable.
“No,” Oliver says. He turns to look at Julia, and his face falls. “Julia, I—I’m so sorry for writing about you like that. It wasn’t about us, it—”
Julia shakes her head. “I don’t wanna hear it. Just don’t talk to me.” He might not have killed Marshall, but it doesn’t make everything he’s done okay. And, in a way, she feels even worse now, because her emotions are all over the place. Does she get to be furious at Oliver still? Even though he didn’t kill Marshall? And who the hell did kill Marshall? It’s all too much, all of it boiling over. “I don’t understand. So who killed Marshall? Vera, you said you’d figured it out! Who was it? Who killed him? Who broke into your shop?”
“I don’t know who kill Marshall,” Vera says quietly, “but I know who break into my shop.”
“What?” they all say as one.
“I break into my shop,” Vera says.
“ What? ” they all say again.
Vera sighs. “I come down one morning and I see that things have been move around. Some jars go missing.”
“Which jars?” Riki asks. “I mean, are you sure?”
“Yes, of course I’m sure. I know how I arrange my shop, don’t be silly. But I think to myself, would the police take me seriously? They don’t take Marshall’s death seriously, why would they take me seriously when I tell them that someone steal into my shop? They will ask, how much did the thief take? Well, no money is missing. What was taken? I don’t know, I just know that my jars are moved. And I am sure it’s the killer come back to look for the flash drive. So I decide, okay, I will take control of situation. The killer is too cunning to make it obvious, so I will make it obvious. Make it clear that someone break in, keep all of us working on a common goal: solving Marshall murder. So I do that.”
“You smashed up your own shop to make it look more obvious that someone broke in?” Sana says, her eyes as round as dinner plates. “All those jars—”
“It hurt me to break them all like that,” Vera says, “but I am willing to do anything to find killer.”
“Wait,” Julia says, “hold on. What do you mean, the killer would come back to look for the flash drive? What flash drive?”
At this, Vera looks strangely guilty.
“Vera,” Julia says in a warning tone. “What flash drive?”
Vera releases a long, tired breath. “When I find Marshall’s body, he holding a flash drive in his hand.”
“What. The. Fuck?” Julia doesn’t even know who said it. It could’ve been her, it could’ve been any of the others.
“And you just took it?” Oliver says.
“My god, Vera,” Riki cries. “You—that’s tampering with a crime scene! You could go to prison for that.”
“I just know, you see, that police won’t take case seriously.” Vera looks so tiny and helpless, her cloud of hair waving this way and that as she shakes her head.
“Well, maybe they would’ve if you hadn’t taken away evidence!” Oliver says. He rakes his fingers through his hair. “So what was on the drive?”
“Well, it turns out the drive is a key to unlock his computer. And the computer has these NFT and, oh yes, the bot that Riki make.”
“Wait, what bot did you make?” Sana stares at Riki, who looks like he has half a mind to run away.
“Uh...” He glances guiltily at Sana. “Um. Marshall asked me to build a program. Um, and then he didn’t pay me.” For a moment, it seems like he’s done talking, but then he takes a breath and blurts out, “It was a scalping bot. He wanted me to make a bot to scam people on the NFT marketplace.” He turns to Sana, taking her hands. “I didn’t want to—I felt so shitty the whole time I did it, and I didn’t know he was stealing art at the time, I just thought—”
“You were part of his scam?” Sana says. Her words are hissed with such acidity that even Julia feels the sting.
“No!” Riki says. “No, I swear I didn’t—it was the first time I had met Marshall, I didn’t know—”
“You didn’t know because you chose not to know,” Sana says. “Did you ask him what his freaking NFTs were? No. Did you think about all the people being scammed by this bot you were building? No! People like you and Marshall are the reason I couldn’t even stand to look at a canvas!” With that, Sana wrenches her hands out of Riki’s and runs out, slamming the door behind her.
“Sana, wait!” Riki shouts, going after her.
Julia stares at the door, everything inside her a screaming mess. She makes an effort to sort through what she’s just learned. “Where’s the flash drive now? And the laptop? We should—ah, we should probably hand that over to the police—”
Vera shakes her head. “I been looking for it since yesterday and both of them are gone.”
For a moment, Julia and Oliver are speechless. Then the enormity of the situation crashes down on Julia. This woman, this stranger, found her husband dead in her shop, and the first thing she did was to swipe the very piece of evidence that might have led the cops to his killer. And then this very same woman smashed up her own shop to make it look like a break-in has happened, all so that she could come and live with Julia and her small child.
It’s a struggle for Julia to keep from screaming. She meets Vera’s eye and points at the door. “Get out now.”
For a moment, she thinks Vera is about to protest, but then Vera sees the look on Julia’s face and simply nods. Lowering her head, Vera heads toward the door. She seems to have shrunk over the last few minutes, her shoulders drooping, her head wilted. The sight of it tugs at Julia’s heartstrings, but her rage still burns over everything else. Vera stops long enough to take her purse, then she walks out and closes the door gently behind her, leaving behind a cavernous silence that Julia is sure will never be filled.