Chapter 8

8

Naomi lifts up one of my dresses. “Where did you get this? From the Sister Wives collection?”

We’re back in the cottage after spending the afternoon at a wine tasting. We behaved badly, ignoring the sommelier and making stuff up. I’m getting notes of citrus fruit and man tears. This one is full-bodied, peppery, intense, and satisfying, would pair nicely with leftover pizza and an episode of Cold Case Files . This one is jammy, very jamlike, very Bonne Maman.

Now we’re wine buzzed—blundering and impish—as we get ready for tonight’s mystery activity.

“Very funny,” I say, snatching the dress out of her hands. “And I don’t remember where I got it.”

I do. I just don’t want to admit that it’s from Target. I doubt she would care, but part of me is still the girl in the food court wanting her to think I’m cool.

“I’m sure it’s cute on you,” she says. “Perfect for church.”

“All right, I get it. I need to dress conservatively for work, not show up on calls with full cleavage. And I could never pull off…” I gesture to the getup she’s in. A denim minidress, fishnets, her cowboy boots, a cropped cardigan with fringe.

“False,” she says, taking my hand. “Let’s go play dress-up.”

There’s no point in resisting. I let her drag me to her room and choose outfits for me.

“If I knew what we were doing I could dress myself,” I say as she rifles through her giant, overstuffed suitcase. “I don’t know what’s appropriate.”

“Are you wearing cute underwear?”

“Are you kidding?”

She laughs maniacally. Which could mean she’s kidding, or it could mean she’s dead serious. I’m too afraid to learn the answer.

We come to terms on the third outfit, a vintage T-shirt long enough to pass as a dress over a pair of black faux-leather leggings and under a long camel-colored cardigan. I’ll wear my own boots. My own frumpy winter coat.

“Let’s get some music on,” she says as we move into the bathroom to do our hair and makeup. She slides her phone over to me. I let my own die, avoiding contact. Avoiding reality. “You can DJ.”

“You’d so readily relinquish your power?”

“For you and you alone,” she says. “Don’t play anything depressing.”

“And you accused me of having no faith. Let me do my thing,” I say. I put on “Another Night” by Real McCoy.

“Oh, okay, okay. I see what we’re doing here,” she says, dancing around, swinging her hips.

“You forget that I can be fun, too.”

“Never. I never forget that,” she says, heating an eyelash curler with the Waterfront-provided blow-dryer. She starts to sing. “?‘Another night, another dream, but always you…’?”

“?‘In the night, I dream of a love so true.’?” The words “love” and “true” leave a vinegary taste in my mouth. The bathroom shrinks around me, becomes claustrophobic. In the last few hours, I’d been successful at not thinking about Joel, about his ulterior motive for sending me on this trip. His choice to brand it as a present for me.

I remember his other present. The gift box that’s currently up in the loft, that’s wrapped in gold paper with a pretty pink ribbon.

I’m tempted to go open it, but then I hear his voice in my head. Present shaker.

His voice was what first attracted me to him. We met standing outside of a bar in Morristown, New Jersey. It was December, and the trees in the park across the street—the Green—were all wrapped in bows and string lights. I heard Joel’s voice—he was saying something about how public executions used to be held on the Green, right where Santa’s house was now set up for the season—and I turned to look over at him, and he looked back at me. I remember thinking that everything about him was ordinary except his voice. He has this 1930s radio voice.

He walked over and introduced himself. He was confident but not cocky, well put together but not showy. I liked him immediately. I liked that he knew nothing about me, my past. He seemed like the perfect person to start over with, start fresh. I remember thinking that he seemed right . I remember that word, “right.” Not charming or sexy or handsome or polite. Right. Like trying on something that fits, that distinct feeling of relief in the dressing room.

I could tell straightaway that he was nothing like my father; or any of the men my mother dated postdivorce; or any of my high school boyfriends; or Smith, my first love, who tossed my heart in a meat grinder before setting it on fire, who made it impossible for me to trust anyone, especially myself.

Joel took me inside and bought us ginger beers; I was sober at the time, and I appreciated that he didn’t seem to mind. We sat talking for so long that we closed down the bar. He was witty and he was smart, studying law at Seton Hall. He wasn’t religious, if you didn’t count Sunday worship of the Buffalo Bills. He liked hiking and cooking and watching documentaries. He was stable, financially and emotionally—came from a happy family. He told me that after he graduated he planned on moving back to western New York, and I knew then that I wanted to go with him. I pictured this nice life with us together; I could see it so clearly. It seemed very low-risk, very easy, very practical, which was exactly what I’d been searching for. A partner. Someone to split the bills with, share the burden. And the joys, too, I guess.

We’ve been together ever since that night, the night we met. Almost fourteen years. In those fourteen years, I’ve caught him cheating three times. The first time was just after we got married. The girl messaged me on Facebook. She said it’d been going on for a while, that she wasn’t the only one, and she felt bad, and fuck him. When I asked him about it, he denied it, and I didn’t believe him, but I pretended I did. I deleted my Facebook.

The second time was four years ago. A different woman. One of his coworkers. I found texts on his phone. This time, when I confronted him, he copped to it. He apologized and told me he loved me, that it was a one-time thing, and it would never happen again. I stopped looking at his phone.

The third time was last night.

“Another night, another dream, but always you.” The song plays again. The air is thick with hair spray, and for some reason it makes everything seem surreal. Like I’m lost in the mist, crossing into the Twilight Zone.

I’m not quick to dismiss his indiscretions because I’m so in love with him. I do love him, but it’s never been about that. Nothing about my compliance is for his benefit. It’s for my own. It’s because I made a choice. I committed to the life I built with him, a life I like just fine. That’s familiar. That’s comfortable. I fear losing it if I lose him.

I fear the unknown.

It’s true that I can’t control whether he’s faithful, but as long as I turn the other cheek, I know he won’t leave. That gives me some semblance of control over the situation. Over my fine little life.

“Earth to Sloane,” Naomi says.

“Yeah?”

“You’re out in space.”

“I’m not,” I say. “I hate space. It’s so smug.”

“For real. It’s always like, I’m so dark and deep and unknowable . Who cares?”

“Nerds,” I say, rubbing my forehead. My hangover headache is back with a vengeance. The wine was a bad idea.

“You know what, though? I fuck with Carl Sagan. He could get it. If he were still alive.” She picks up her phone. “Sorry, but you were sleeping on the job. Lost your DJ privileges.”

And now it’s Lesley Gore, singing, “It’s my party and I’ll cry if I want to, cry if I want to…”

“Too on the nose,” I say.

“Uppity hipster bitch,” she says, knocking my hip with hers.

“Takes one to know one,” I say, grabbing my red lipstick. The shade Killer.

—

Once again, we stand shivering outside the cottage, waiting for the shuttle. At least I assume we’re waiting for the shuttle. Naomi will neither confirm nor deny.

I’m not particularly jazzed to venture off campus for this surprise, and normally I would put my practical, no-fun, buzzkill foot down, but right now I really don’t have it in me to fight.

The wind whips off the lake, through the trees.

“Why are we doing this, again?” I ask.

“Hmm?” Naomi says. She’s hunched over, checking her phone.

“Waiting outside. We did this last night. The shuttle is never on time. Let’s go in.”

Naomi doesn’t respond. She puts her phone in her pocket and stares down the dirt driveway. She’s uncharacteristically anxious.

“Nay?”

“I don’t like it in there at night,” she says.

“What?” I ask. A gust of wind lands like a kick in the teeth.

“In there. In the cottage. Too many windows. It’s creepy, don’t you think?”

The memory of my nightmare returns, heavy and searing, like someone has dropped a hot stove on my chest. Above me, behind me, is the window with a smear that looks like a handprint.

“Did you see something?” I say, my voice too high.

“Yeah. Too many horror movies. Obviously.”

“Right,” I say, sinking my head between my shoulders.

“Oh!” Naomi says. “There he is.”

I force my gaze against the tantrummy air. There’s a car approaching, but it’s not the hotel shuttle. It looks like the goddamn Batmobile.

“Um, what is that?” I ask. “ Who is that?”

“It’s Ilie,” she says. “The guy from last night.”

“What guy?”

“The guy I met at the bar,” she says. “He has a house on the lake. He’s staying there with some friends. He gave me his number and told me to call him if we were looking for a good time. So I called him.”

If my face weren’t frozen, I’d be giving her a death glare.

“We’ll hang out,” she says. “Meet some new people. It’ll be fun!”

“The thing is, I know you’re familiar with the concept of stranger danger, but until we’re tied up in this guy’s murder lair, you’re not going to believe it’s a real thing.”

“Well, if that happens, you can tell me I told you so ,” she says. “Your favorite.”

“Naomi. I’m not getting in a car with someone I don’t know. That you don’t know.”

“I do know him. I know his type. He’s a rich European. Old-world old money. We’re gonna go over there and drink top-shelf liquor and do the best fucking drugs and stay up and talk and—I don’t know—get naked.”

“What?” I shout, so loudly, the wind withers.

This argument is happening too late. The driver slams on the brakes right in front of us, and the passenger-side door opens.

“Good evening, my loves,” says the impossibly handsome stranger apparently named Ilie. He has a strong accent I can’t quite place. Russian? “Come, come. Let me take you to the party.”

Naomi turns to face me. She puts her hands firmly on my shoulders, looks me in the eye, and says, “You have to live your life, Sloane. You have to live .”

Then she lets me go. She turns back around and climbs into the car.

Snow starts to fall, flakes as thick and wide as doilies. I forgot to check the weather forecast.

Naomi beckons me from the passenger seat. She lifts up a lollipop, waves it around. She singsongs, “I have candy.”

“That’s not funny,” I mutter, staring down at the ground, which is powdered with snow. It’s sticking.

“Sloane,” Naomi says. Something about her tone snaps my head up. She’s pleading with me.

“Come, love,” Ilie says, grinning. “I don’t bite.”

This isn’t my decision. It’s Naomi’s, and she’s already made it, so I get into the car. Because I won’t let her go alone. I can’t.

She’s all I have.