Chapter 18
She thought about that note again. It had her name on it.
Maybe there’s a fan who didn’t want her evening with you to end, Annabelle said. Or his. Heather said that other author brought bodyguards. You only have Henry, two thousand miles away.
Weren’t fans supposed to be—benevolent? Heather’s admonition had thoroughly disconcerted her, and probably had her seeing danger where there was only book-tour reality.
With the television on mute, she watched the flickering video of a commercial, too riled up to sleep, too weary to stay awake.
She wondered how Linny was, wondered if Zack missed her. She closed her eyes, trying to identify the noises she’d heard on Henry’s FaceTime, and wondered again about those white sheets. Henry did not like white sheets. White is for hospitals, he’d told her once. Sheets should be fun.
“What a random conversation to remember,” she said out loud. So why had he purchased white sheets?
Good question, Annabelle said. And now you have another mystery to solve. Long-distance.
It had been complicated to get used to, Annabelle talking to her, unbidden.
Once, she’d been at the grocery store, Zack balanced on one hip and vising his legs around Tessa’s thigh, and Linny in the child seat of the grocery cart, banging her strappy sandals on the metal rungs and demanding every item as they walked by.
Fwuit, she’d say. Nanas. Pitches. Stwawbrees.
“Yes, fruit,” Tessa had tried to make it an educational experience. “Ba-na-nas,” she enunciated each syllable. “Peaches. Strawberries.”
She’d known she’d be sad when Linny grew out of her baby talk, but at that moment, with the constant Muzak, and the chittering kids, and the rumble of the unaligned wheels of the cart that yanked it left no matter how she steered, all she’d wanted was quiet.
She had peeled a banana as they walked, figuring if the kids’ mouths were busy with banana, they couldn’t talk.
Zack had poked his and played with it with one finger; she’d given him the part with the peel.
Linny had popped her whole piece into her mouth, and chewed, with an expression that morphed from skepticism to curiosity to bliss.
And then she’d thrown up. Her banana, and her oatmeal breakfast, and other unidentifiable things, all over Zack and all over Tessa, and time had stopped, and the world had stopped, and it seemed as if every single person in the grocery had stopped, and focused their attention on bad mother Tessa, who selfishly had brought a sick child to the grocery store, and now all of their children would get sick, too, and the whole thing would be Tessa’s fault.
She’d heard a voice then, she thought it was someone in the grocery store. It could happen to anyone, the voice had said.
You’re doing the best you can, the voice went on. Eff them.
Tessa had turned toward it, she remembered, smiling, grateful for the support.
But no one had been there. She’d blinked, clearing her head, knowing she and her children smelled disgusting, that Linny was sobbing and Zack was wailing, and that she should do something, and someone, at least, understood her.
Was reassuring her. But no one was there.
And then Tessa had realized what she’d heard. She’d said it out loud, talking to herself, right there in the grocery. She’d said, “Annabelle?”
And you’re not losing it. It’s just life. Linny may be allergic to bananas, and now you know. And you don’t need to take any grief from any of these people.
Annabelle. Gunk-covered Tessa had burst out laughing at that moment.
The cleanup crew arrived, for the floor and for her kids, then she’d popped Linny and Zack into the car, driven them home, and whisked them into the shower, all three of them.
Peeled off their clothes under the rush of warm water.
Linny recovered, and Zack was clueless, and Tessa had made it all work.
She’d “heard,” that’s how she thought of it, Annabelle daily since then.
“Heard” her commentary, and finally created a whole fictional life for her.
Somedays, she wasn’t sure whether the book was mostly her or mostly Annabelle-as-writer-muse, but it didn’t matter.
It was simply that her imagination had a name.
She predicted successful authors, the lucky ones at least, had characters who talked to them.
She hoped.
Now she slid into her slippers and dumped the remnants of her dinner into a wastebasket.
Other authors. She’d had no time to connect with other authors—she’d known about conferences and conventions, but how could she take that time from the kids?
And social media was no place to make real friends, let alone find a writer colleague to bare her soul to.
It was time to sleep. She had to sleep.
Wait. Had she set her alarm? What time had she decided to get up, to leave, when did she have to be at the airport? She unzipped the pocket of her suitcase and pulled out her green book-tour itinerary folder.
“Get organized,” she muttered, half expecting a snarky comment from Annabelle, but it did not come.
The green file folder, already fraying around the edges— like I am, Tessa thought—was right where it should be.
But she stopped. Envisioning. Remembering.
She jammed her hand all the way into the suitcase pocket, searching and patting as if it would make a difference, as if the laws of physics had reversed, and created matter from nothing.
The rose-gold locket with the photo of the T-shirted family, the one she’d double-wrapped in hotel plastic bags, was not there.