Reese
“What’s that?” Emily asks. It’s the next morning. She and I are outside on the deck, her with her coffee. It’s cool out. Fog
rises up over the lake.
“What’s what?” I ask. I’m leaned against the deck railing, looking down at her, her hair wet from a shower, drying. She sits
at the table, her hands around a chipped mug. Emily doesn’t wear makeup. She’s one of the few women in the world who doesn’t
look naked without makeup, mostly because I’ve almost never seen her with it on.
My hand follows her eyes. It goes to my neck, coming down on the necklace Daniel gave me last night, fingering the beads.
I forgot all about it. I fell asleep with it on.
“That necklace,” she says.
“What does it look like?” I ask.
Emily takes a sip of her coffee. She sets the mug back down. “But what does it mean?”
“What do you mean? It doesn’t mean anything. It’s just a necklace.”
“The beads,” she says. “They form a pattern.” If they do, I hadn’t noticed. “Where did you get it?”
My throat tightens. “Does it matter?”
Emily raises her eyebrows. “It’s just that I’ve never seen it before.”
“It’s Skylar’s, okay? She let me borrow it,” I say, getting defensive, and then, turning around to look out over the water instead, I mutter, “I didn’t know I had to ask your permission to wear my friend’s necklace.”
She’s onto me, I think.
That afternoon, we’re at the pool. I lie face down on my chair, listening to Mae and Cass scream and run around the pool deck,
which Emily has told them at least a thousand times not to do because someone might fall and get hurt.
“Mae, please. I said no running,” Emily says again, for the millionth time, as Mae runs and cannonballs back into the pool like she’s invincible or has some
death wish.
“Cass!” she screams out when her head surfaces. “Let’s play Marco Polo!”
Cass gets back in the water, and then all I hear until Aunt Courtney says she’s heading back to the cottage to make peanut
butter and jelly sandwiches for lunch is, “Marco! Polo! Marco! Polo!” screamed at the top of their lungs.
I put my headphones on to drown out the sound. I close my eyes and think about Daniel.
A few minutes later, I feel drops of water like from rain.
I look up, lifting my head. Mae stands next to me, her wet hair raining pool water down on me. I look over. Uncle Elliott
is gone. I don’t know where he went, but beside me, his chair is empty, Mae and Cass trying to squeeze together into it, soaking
wet, wrapping themselves in his towel.
“Can you two stop?” I ask.
“Stop what?” Mae asks. “We’re not doing anything.”
“Stop getting me wet.”
I put my head back down. I try to ignore them, but not ten seconds later, they start to laugh, a big belly laugh that’s impossible to ignore even over the sound of my headphones. I lift up, propping myself on my elbows just in time to see them tuck something under the towel to hide it from me.
“What’s that?” I ask, pulling the headphones off.
“What’s what?” Mae asks, looking over at Cass, who presses a hand to her mouth to stop herself from laughing, though they’re
not fooling anyone.
“That,” I say, pointing at the towel. “Whatever you’re hiding.”
They look at each other and crack up, saying in unison, “We’re not hiding anything.”
“You two are such liars.” I reach out. I tug on the towel. Beneath it, they have Uncle Elliott’s iPad, which they’re not supposed
to use unless they ask. He must have forgotten all about it; he must have left it behind in his chair when he went wherever
he did.
“Put that away, you idiots. You’re not even supposed to be on that thing.”
They don’t put it away. Instead, still giggling, Cass lifts the iPad and starts taking pictures of me, which is what they
were probably doing before I noticed, so that there must be a dozen of me on that stupid thing.
“Say cheese,” Mae says.
I don’t say cheese. Instead, I flick her off and say, “Put it away, or I’ll tell Uncle Elliott when he comes back.”
I don’t have to ask for a third time, because they know they’ll get in trouble for being on the iPad. They leave it behind
on the chair. They throw the towel off and go running across the concrete, ignoring Emily, who tells them not to run again,
calling out, “If you’re not careful, you might fall!”
I wish they would at this point, to teach them a lesson if nothing else, though thinking thoughts like that is bad karma.
That night, I put Daniel’s necklace on. I run my fingers over the beads, thinking about what Emily said, about them forming a pattern, though I don’t think she’s right, I think they’re just beads.
I slip back into my jean shorts from my pajamas, pulling a different shirt over my head.
There is body spray in my bag. I spritz some on, hoping Daniel notices and that he likes it, and then I move from the porch toward the cottage to leave, like I’ve done every night for the last couple nights.
It doesn’t get easier. I’m never not scared of getting caught.
It’s black in the cottage when I go in. I feel my way with my hands.
I haven’t gotten more than a couple steps when a lamp in the living room flicks on. Dull, yellow light enters the room, not
reaching the corners so that they stay dark.
I flinch, taking a step back, my hand going to my heart.
Emily is on the sofa.
“What are you doing?” she asks, pulling her hand away from the lamp, her voice doomy.
Slowly, she pushes herself into a sitting position as I ask, without answering her, “What are you doing? Why aren’t you in bed?” But then I see. The pillow. The blanket. She is in bed. She and Nolan must have gotten in another fight and she’s sleeping on the sofa. I wonder what this one was about.
His job or lack thereof. Her being overly controlling or him questioning her parenting in front of us kids, or D: All of the
Above. The possibilities are endless.
“I fell asleep on the sofa,” she says, as if it happened by accident, as if she didn’t intentionally lift a pillow from the
bed and bring it downstairs with her, as if Nolan didn’t intentionally close the bedroom door after she left.
“Well?” she asks before I can really feel sorry for her.
“Well what?”
“You didn’t answer my question. What are you doing awake? It has to be almost midnight.” It’s not just that I’m awake. It’s
that I’m fully dressed, though, if she notices, she doesn’t say.
“I was thirsty, okay? I wanted water,” I say, moving around the edge of the sofa for the kitchen, her eyes following me as I go.
“Did you sleep at all, or have you been awake all this time?”
“I was asleep. I woke up and I was thirsty,” I say again. “Is that not okay? To drink water?”
“No, it’s fine. I was just curious.” She pauses, then asks, “Is that what you wore today?”
I look down, like I don’t even know what I have on. It isn’t what I wore today. But I say, “Yeah. Don’t you remember? I guess
I must’ve fallen asleep in it.”
She stares too long. Nods. Says, “I guess so.” There’s another pause, and then she says, tilting her head, “You smell good.
Is that perfume?”
My stomach tightens. Dramatically, I inhale. “I don’t smell anything.”
I reach into the cabinet for a glass, filling it with water that I don’t even want, that I won’t drink. “You should go upstairs
and sleep,” I say. I tell her good-night. I go back onto the porch with the glass. I sink down into bed, lying on my side.
I pull the covers up to my neck, feeling this nagging pain in the pit of my stomach that I won’t be able to see Daniel tonight
after all.
It’s not only that I want to go, that I want more than anything to be with him.
It’s that I wonder what happens when I don’t show up. I wonder what he’ll do.