I stand in the doorway, watching them, wishing we could go back to that time when we were a family, whole and unfractured.
Nate raises the blinds (cordless, of course), and my pulse hitches.
“Oh no,” I say. “Keep the blinds closed.”
“Who’s looking? It’s morning. Sun’s out.” He points at the blue sky as if I were an idiot.
My voice lowers a register. “Please close the blinds.”
He tilts his head at my request. “Are you taking a higher dose of—”
“Nate.” Quick and sharp. This is all I have to say. We’ve had this discussion before. No open talk about medications in front of either child.
Wyatt crosses the hallway into his room, a Goosebumps book in his hand. Chloe continues jumping on the bed, singing, “See how they run.”
“Close them,” I say, but movement beyond Chloe’s window catches my attention.
Behind my neighbor’s second-story window, a small hand presses against the glass at the bottom ledge. Above the splayed fingers, brown curls frame a little girl’s face. Her cheeks are soft and round, still holding tight to baby fat. Her lips are slightly parted; she was going to say something, but forgot. Air shimmers before my eyes as if it hangs above an asphalt road on a hot day after a steamroller pressed new oil. I blink. Her fingers are so small. I rub my palms into my eyes and blink again.
She’s gone. The window glass has a slight ugly green tint, a characteristic of energy-efficient windows. Even if someone had been there, you wouldn’t be able to make out detail through the tint. You’re seeing things. You’ve been here before. You just need sleep.
Nate lowers the blinds and softens his tone. “You seem anxious, Grace. Everything OK?”
Skin along my back and shoulders tingles. Heat is coming off me. Why, yes! Everything is dandy since you fucked a handful of nurses and I moved into this crumbling house next door to a possible child killer and several times a day I feel the floor drop an inch away from me and now I’m seeing things. Everything is fabulous, dear.
I smile. “Everything’s fine.”
7
FERRET OUT THE ASSHOLE
Even though unpacked boxes still linger in corners—as if I’m expecting them to eventually cave and unpack themselves—I seriously consider selling my house. After Nate leaves, I dig out my financial statements and punch numbers into a calculator.
It doesn’t take long for me to realize I can’t do it.
My mortgage is underwater or upside down or fucked sideways. Whatever derogatory name bankers use for crummy mortgages as they stare condescendingly down their noses, that is my mortgage. The housing market has dipped since I bought. I have accrued debt from the divorce. I swear my lawyer charges me if I even think about calling her. Also, I make a hair above minimum wage. Money-wise, caring for people’s most beloved cargo, stimulating these small children’s brains, teaching them manners and kindness and important life-coping skills, ranks just above dropping a wire basket of frozen French fries into boiling oil.
Yes, my ex is a surgeon. But the student debt he amassed is massive, and his salary has chipped it to a smaller, yet still nauseating size. Three more years of student loan purgatory and he will be free; birthed, wet and shiny, into upper class. To my shaky mind, three years sounds like eternity, abstract and useless.
I have no financial safety net. My two living relatives are working stiffs.
Mom is sixty-seven, works as a receptionist in a cancer screening center, and has far less money saved than she’d ever envisioned. My father’s Alzheimer’s and lung cancer combo lasted too long, required too much at-home care, and ate away at their retirement at the steady, persistent pace cancer ate away at his innards and Alzheimer’s at his memory.
My older sister works as a night auditor at a Holiday Inn to support her out-of-work-electrician husband and their four kids. She has been doing the zero-interest-rate-for-the-first-six-months credit card musical chairs game for years. At my mom’s house on Easter, she joked about holes in her underwear. I mailed her underwear and socks on her birthday as a joke, and when she called to thank me, she laugh-cried.
Even if I had enough money to sell, how could I do that to the next family?
I am furious at the guy who sold me this house and have considered (several times in the middle of the night) hiring a PI to track him down. I have fantasized about spray-painting “soulless” on the front door of his new house.
Tony Durtato, the roofer.
I met Tony’s three teenage daughters: thirteen, sixteen, and seventeen. If he moved to get away from the freak next door, how had he sold this house to me, a woman with a daughter?
Tony met Chloe. I held her on my hip, her sleepy head on my shoulder, a pacifier in her mouth, her security blanket cushioning her soft baby cheek. While we stood on his back deck and gazed at the swing set he’d built, he touched Chloe’s little socked foot with the thick, callused knuckle of his forefinger, smiling and seeming to take in the moment. “I miss that stage,” he said.
“So,” I said, trying to sound casual, “are you moving because of a job change?”
“No,” he said, still smiling at Chloe’s sock.
“Why are you moving?” I said, upbeat, airy, eyebrows lifted.
He looked down at the deck, his eyes drifting to my right. I followed his gaze to a greasy stain he probably wished he’d covered with a pot of flowers. “Change of scenery,” he said, his eyes lifting to me and Chloe. “We bought a house that has a little more space. My younger ones have always shared a room.” His answer made sense and didn’t seem rehearsed. Wanting more space was a good answer.
How could he have allowed me to think I was lucky, getting this house for such a great deal, when there’s a copperhead den steps away?
Because he was out of his mind. Desperate. Not thinking.
The spray paint job is nothing more than vengeful daydreaming. I don’t have money to ferret out the asshole.
Doesn’t matter. Your neighbor is not dangerous.
In high-profile cases like child kidnappings, there are probably two or three dozen suspects. Leland Ernest gave a Happy Meal toy to a girl who later went missing. Untimely generosity and kindness were his crimes.
Yeah? What about Lou’s daughter?
Maybe a misunderstanding. Lou seemed easily triggered, which might make him prone to misunderstandings.
I shouldn’t have bought this two-story, three-bedroom house. Yes, the rooms are all tiny, but still, it was indulgent. I should have bought a two-bedroom townhome. I just, well, I wanted a yard for the kids. When I was a kid, I had a yard.
* * *
Back home from grocery shopping, I sit Chloe in front of the TV so Wyatt and I can bring in the groceries. He brings in the milk, but gets distracted by Chloe’s show, The Backyardigans. Wyatt loves the songs. I don’t bother nagging him because it will take too much effort. Besides, they’re sitting side by side on the couch, their shoulders touching, and that gives me a sense of peace. With the cheery backdrop of cartoon music, I bring the groceries inside and put away the food. I set a pot of water on the stove. Spaghetti night. Most nights are spaghetti night.
“Hey, Chlo, would you like a piece of cheese while you’re waiting for dinner?” I say, turning on the flame.