The Rabbit
I’m near the entrance to the glass box they call the Scriptorium, watching Sam Vetiver write. Supposedly. What she’s really
doing is nothing. She’s just staring out at the lake. I know writers do a whole lot of that. I used to do it myself. But that
woman has not written more than four words since she’s been here. I don’t know why she even bothers to come to the desk. Her
writer brain is basically toast.
You’d think losing her authorial self-respect would be enough reason for her to leave. Or maybe seeing a woman in the bedroom
closet at night with a box cutter. But no. That would be something a sane person would do, and we are not dealing with a sane
person. We’re dealing with a woman under the spell of William Corwyn. The D*ckmatizing, the gaslighting—I’m sure he’s told
Sam Vetiver I don’t exist, she dreamed me up, like Scrooge telling Jacob Marley he’s just a bit of potato. Dickens and Alfred
Hitchcock have nothing on this guy.
Well, I’m not a figment or a spud. I’m here and I’m real, and if Sam Vetiver’s not going to leave on her own, I’m going to
make her. I thumb the blade in and out of my trusty box cutter, psyching myself up. She’s in here alone. William’s in his
study, actually writing. If I do this right, she won’t make a sound.
The problem? I can’t make myself move. This part is not fun.
It’s so hard. I’ve been slapped. Punched.
Kicked. Screamed at. Pepper-sprayed—that’s how I found out I’m allergic to chilis.
It took days for the swelling to go down enough for me to see, let alone until I stopped looking like a goggle-eyed goldfish.
I had to hide at home in my sh*thole, I lost a whole week’s work at my store.
And those are the encounters that have gone well.
Plus it’s extra risky here. Unlike in the outside world, there’s no quick escape off the island. The snow and ice will slow
me down, make me easy to track. Even if I’m fast, I’ll be more visible.
But this f*cking woman. As I feared, Sam Vetiver is stubborn. And just because she’s a pain in my @$$, just because she’s
made it harder for me by moving in with William, it doesn’t mean I can break my promise.
I size up the room. Who would choose to write in a glass box like this? It’s so creepy how the walls are invisible. Like being
outside. A sitting duck. But whatever. Luckily it’s a cloudy day. There won’t be any reflection to let Sam Vetiver know I’m
coming. And I’ll make no sound on the slate floor in my socks.
I focus on the hollow at the base of Sam Vetiver’s skull, exposed by her stupid side braid with the pen in it, above the top
knob of her spine. Slide one foot over the threshold. Then the other. Clutching my box cutter like a rabbit’s foot for luck,
hot in my hand. Blade out. Rehearsing what I will say. Don’t move, and do not scream—
“Simone? I’m making a sandwich. Do you want one?”
William, pounding through the great room. I hit the floor just in time. Scrabble backward on hands and knees to beneath the
dining room table.
“Jesus,” Sam Vetiver says as he bounds into the Scriptorium. “You startled me! I should make you wear bells around your neck.”
For once I one hundred percent agree with Sam Vetiver.
“That would be one place for them,” he says. He tweaks her dumb braid and smacks a kiss right on the spot I was just looking
at, then guides her hand into his sweats. “I know another.”
As they get going again, I creep back through the house toward the basement. It’s my own fault for being such a weenie. The
longer I wait, the more entrenched Sam Vetiver gets, and the harder it is for me to do my job. This is not like the previous
times with the other women. This is worse. And even if it does go badly, I have to risk it. Because my vow. Next time he’s
really distracted. Next time she’s alone. I’ll take the first chance I can get.