Total pages in book: 89
Estimated words: 82883 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 414(@200wpm)___ 332(@250wpm)___ 276(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 82883 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 414(@200wpm)___ 332(@250wpm)___ 276(@300wpm)
Instead, my eyes drift to the window, where the sun is already disappearing, leaving only a bluish-lavender haze and the faint grid of security lights across the yard. Somewhere out there is the garden where Jeannine once made me pose for family Christmas photos, Kent’s hand on my shoulder, his wedding ring a bright punctuation mark.
I imagine him now, at the hospital, lecturing a room full of residents or working some double-blind trial in the bowels of the research wing. I can’t picture him sick. He’s not the type who goes soft, even in private. But I can picture him angry, or worse, bored— prowling the empty house, hunting for something to break or seduce.
A shiver runs through me, not entirely unpleasant.
I try to distract myself by going to the bathroom and splashing cold water on my face. The en suite is a showroom, all marble and gleaming silver fixtures, with a drawer full of hotel-sized perfumes and expensive soaps. I towel off and catch my reflection again. My eyes look huge, almost swallowing my entire face. I force a smile, then give up.
Back in my room, I open the old jewelry box on my nightstand. Inside, every trinket is arranged like a time capsule: the chain necklace Kent bought me on my seventeenth birthday, the tiny gold charm from Jeannine (for luck, which never seemed to work), a cheap glass ring I bought at the Renaissance Festival with my high school boyfriend. I close the lid and place a palm flat against it, as if blessing the ghosts inside.
For a while, I just sit cross-legged on the bed, picking at the hem of my leggings and listening for any sign of life in the mansion. There’s nothing. No car in the driveway, no voice on the intercom, not even the distant thump of the household staff moving about.
I wonder if Jeannine will actually show up, or if I’ll have to spend my first night alone. I wonder if Kent will come home later, or if I’ll have to go to bed, seeing a glimpse of his face only in my dreams.
Finally, I give up and flop onto my back, arms flung wide, breathing in the cold linen. The ceiling is painted with glow-in-the-dark stars, painfully juvenile, come to think of it. I trace a faint crack in the wall with my finger, sensing the familiar crannies.
After a few minutes, my mind goes blank, or at least as blank as it can get. I think about Italy, about the ancient stone and the little dogs in sweaters, about getting lost in some foggy alleyway with nobody watching.
But then, always, the thought comes back to the house. To the man who occupies the master bedroom, or to the phantom of him, pacing, hands in pockets, eyes lit up with all the things he never says out loud.
I close my eyes and try to will myself to sleep, but I know it won’t work. Not with the echo of his name in my head, and the phantom ache of his thumb on my cheekbone.
Eventually, I give up, and just lie there, waiting for the next voice, the next footstep, the next sign that I’m not alone.
And all the while, the house listens, patient and hungry, swallowing my secrets and waiting for the rest.
The next voice in the house isn’t Kent’s.
It’s the sharp, familiar cadence of Jeannine, high heels ticking down the corridor, a suitcase rumbling behind her like a petulant dog. I know her rhythm before I see her, the way she pauses at the end of the hall, the precise interval she waits before rapping once on my door and breezing in.
“Mary Berry?” she calls, the old nickname flickering across her tongue. She’s already halfway through the doorway, pearl earrings glinting, hair blown out and pulled tight at the crown, as if she’s running late for a photoshoot. There’s a whiff of La Mer and travel-size Purell in her wake, clinical and expensive.
She surveys the room, taking in the half-unpacked suitcase, the open laptop, the girl on the bed curled like a question mark.
“Hi, Mom,” I say, voice hoarse from not talking. “Sorry, I fell asleep.”
She smiles the practiced, TV-ready smile—teeth flawless, corners just slightly softened by the crow’s feet she’s recently decided not to have Botoxed. The lines make her look more human, not less. “Look at you. You’re back, and looking wonderful.”
“Thanks,” I say, sitting up straight. “How are you?”
Jeannine sets her purse on the desk, inspects the bottle of Juicy Couture perfume as if expecting it to have changed since my high school years. Her eyes are blue like mine, only hers have a little steel at the center, a chip of something harder than glass. She glances at the window, then at the old trophies, and finally at me.