I rolled my eyes. Jack and my mother exchanged jabs like this all day.
My mother was staying with us for a few days, so Jack and I could have some time to ourselves and get some much-needed uninterrupted sleep. She was leaving tomorrow to go back to the house where I grew up in Portland. Though she pretended as if she was desperate to get home to her Craftsman cottage in the city, and I even teased her about how she was dying to get back so she could see the handsome new neighbor she’d been going on about, I knew she was going to miss Jack’s pretend insults as much as she would miss Junior and me.
My mother practically shoved me toward the front door. “I order you to go have fun,” she said, smiling as Jack opened the door and stepped outside. “And don’t come home until you’re too drunk to walk.”
I shook my head. “Thanks, Mom. Please call if you need anything. And don’t answer the door for anyone. There’s a house that got broken into a few streets away.”
She waved off my paranoia. “Stop worrying so much. We’ll be fine. See you later, babe.”
I blew her a kiss, then I closed the door behind me.
“I have to admit, having sex on the waterfront was one of my favorite public throw downs ever,” Jack said, pulling his Tesla into the long driveway of our four-acre estate. “But do we really have to wait until our fourth anniversary to do it again?”
I tugged the silky fabric of my skirt straight as I pressed my thighs together. Though my body was still raw with the evidence of the dirty deed we’d just committed, I couldn’t wait to get Jack inside and pounce on him again. I hadn’t realized how much I missed the sensation of him moving inside me, and how good he was at making me feel beautiful.
“We can do that anytime we can snag a babysitter,” I replied as he turned the car off.
He made no move to exit the Tesla. “Well, babycakes, you’d better get ready to interview a fuck-ton of babysitters.”
I laughed. “Babycakes? That’s a new one.”
Jack rarely used the same term of endearment twice in a row. He liked to keep me guessing.
He scrunched up his nose. “Yeah, that one was kind of creepy. Now that I’ve tried it out, I think I can bury that one in the nickname graveyard.”
“Try the incinerator,” I said, reaching for the door handle.
“Duly noted,” he replied, exiting the vehicle.
Jack and I glided unhurriedly along the flagstone walkway, which was lined with sparkling pathway lights. As we made our way toward the steps leading up to the covered porch, I stopped in the middle of the path and closed my eyes as I inhaled the sweet scent of the lavender and honeysuckle I’d planted with my mom’s help.
That was when I made a wish, a corny wish, but I didn’t care.
I wished that every person could find someone they loved as much as I loved Jack. I wished every child could feel as loved as Junior was. And I wished every anniversary could be as perfect as this one.
“No… No, no, no!” Jack’s voice grew louder with each no.
They say mother’s intuition is scientifically proven to exist. I knew by the tone of Jack’s voice, without even opening my eyes, that my world would never be the same. I knew in that instant, I would regret leaving Jack Jr. tonight for the rest of my life.
Though I knew something was wrong, I wasn’t prepared for what we found.
At some point, while we were lost in our blissful celebration, the front door of our home had been forced open. This discovery was what had made Jack cry out in disbelief. Father’s intuition must also be a thing, because he told me later that, even though the door was still closed, the moment he saw the gouges in the wood near the handle, he had felt that same sense of dread. That feeling that the universe had suddenly tilted on its side, discarding us into black nothingness.
The house was ransacked.
Furniture upended, paintings and flatscreen televisions torn off the walls, shards of shattered vases littered the floors. Complete and utter chaos.
The master bathroom doorknob looked as if it had been shot off. We found my mother’s lifeless form huddled against the bathtub, my baby boy’s dead body clutched tightly in her arms.
Chapter 2
LAUREL
Two years later
* * *
Dear Jack,
I hate that our eight-year relationship has been reduced to a fucking goodbye letter. But I highly doubt that anything I’ve written here will come as a surprise to you.
I can’t fucking do it anymore.
I can’t look at the ever-growing galleries of Junior’s pictures you display on the walls, the walls of the house where I wander around aimlessly, like some kind of fucking mental patient, from the moment I wake until the time I go to sleep — in the bedroom you’ve abandoned in favor of the couch in your office.
I can’t spend another fucking night alone in our bed. I can’t keep wishing you would just hold me and tell me everything is going to be okay, while you sit in your office, glued to your laptop, searching for clues, obsessing over every possible lead in a search that will never end. While I lie in bed crying like a fucking bitch, you spend your time looking for the person who did this to us. You have to see the irony in this, if not the tragedy.
I can’t deal with this constant cycle of fight ➞ cool off ➞ make up ➞ fuck. Fight ➞ cool off ➞ make up ➞ fuck. I’m numb to it now. Sometimes, I wonder if every marriage is like this, then I remember that not everyone has gone through what we’ve gone through.
But surely, every married couple endures their own ups and downs. Why the fuck can’t we figure this out? We used to know how to do this.
I can’t stand by and watch you keep digging that hole deeper. You have to let him go. We’re never going to know who killed him or why. Let it go, Jack. If not for me, then for yourself and your business partners.
Yes, you’d better fucking believe that Kent has been asking me to talk some sense into you for a long time. I promised him I wouldn’t tell you about his request, but I can’t keep his secret anymore.
I’m sick to fucking death with all the secrets.
Every time I meet someone new, I lie and tell them I don’t have kids, because I don’t want to explain that I do have a child, the most beautiful child you’ve ever seen, and he’s rotting in the dirt.
Can’t you see I’m drowning, and your obsession is not helping. Don’t you remember? You were supposed to keep me from going under. You promised me you would. All I had to do was say yes.
You broke your fucking promise.
The worst part is that I could probably forgive all of that, the obsession, the abandonment, the broken promises. I would wait for you to come out of this, if it weren’t for my own weakness.
I can’t bear looking at you and seeing him, in the shape of your face and the blue of your eyes. I can’t stand the constant reminder of how close I came to having everything I ever wanted.
I can’t keep blaming you for fucking me on the waterfront while our boy gasped his last breaths. I can’t keep blaming myself for lingering over that extra glass of wine at dinner.
I’ll never love anyone the way I’ve loved you. That is the one thing in this fucked up life I’m certain of. But there are so many ways to love someone. I just wish I knew how to love you in a way that would bring you back to me. If you figure that out, you know where I’ll be, waiting and wishing to say yes… again.
* * *
Yours always,
L
I sat at the table in the dining area of the house we moved into two years ago, staring at the handwritten letter for hours. I thought of tearing it up. I thought of rewriting it. I thought of changing it from a goodbye letter to a suicide note.
The truth was that none of those options made sense. I couldn’t tear it up because that wouldn’t change the many reasons I’d written it in the first place. I couldn’t rewrite it because I’d already rewritten it at least a hundred times, and I was just so fucking exhausted. And I couldn’t change it
to a suicide note because I could never do that to Jack. I still loved him, even if I could no longer live with him.
Finally, with my hands trembling exactly as they had when Jack first slipped the ring onto my finger, I slid my platinum wedding band off and placed it on top of the folded letter. Jack would be back from the gym soon. It was time to leave.
Chapter 3
Jack
Laurel’s SUV was gone when I pulled my truck into the garage. She didn’t usually run errands this early in the day. She liked to wait until after nine p.m. to do the grocery shopping. She’d sometimes go a few minutes before midnight, to the market that stayed open until one a.m. That way, she didn’t have to see the other mothers pushing their children in shopping carts.
I entered the laundry room through the door in the garage and found some of my gym clothes neatly folded on top of the counter. There was no trace of Laurel’s clothing. Stepping into the hallway, my blood pressure soared.
I could see straight into the guest bedroom across the hall, the room we’d been using as storage space since we moved in two years ago, right after the murders. The ’90s-era oak flooring was barely visible, concealed by stacks of dusty, unopened boxes of Junior’s baby stuff. The door to the guest bedroom was always kept closed. Always.
But this wasn’t enough evidence to say with one hundred percent certainty that Laurel had left me or, God forbid, we’d been burglarized.
I charged down the hallway and into the living room. There was no sign that the house had been ransacked. Turning my attention to the breakfast nook, I finally saw it.
Atop the dining table lay a folded piece of paper. On top of the paper lay Laurel’s wedding band.
A puff of laughter erupted from my mouth. I shook my head as I approached the table. I should have fucking known.
As I left for the gym this morning, Laurel asked me if I’d be back soon. She never fucking cared how long I spent at the gym. She didn’t care about anything anymore.
I snatched the folded paper off the table, letting the ring slide off. It landed on the wooden surface with a clink, then rolled away, falling off the edge of the table furthest from me. All day long, I’d been taking my aggression out on the power racks, imagining myself crushing the murderer’s skull with my bare hands, while my fucking wife sat at home, plotting to leave me.
I didn’t bother sitting down to read. Unfolding the paper, my gaze skidded to the top of the page, ignoring the roaring ache in my chest as I read the first two words: Dear Jack.
I devoured the letter in seconds, every word turning my stomach with disgust. She was accusing me of being obsessed with Junior’s case. I was somehow a bad person because I thought my son deserved justice. She thought I needed to see a shrink because I firmly believed the filth who stole my son’s future shouldn’t be allowed to have a future.
What was I supposed to do? Forgive the bastard?
Forgiveness was for pussies. All I wanted was revenge. And if I couldn’t have that, then I’d settle for justice, and nothing less.
I walked into the kitchen and held the letter over the stove as I turned on the burner. When the corner caught fire, I watched it burn, recalling how much I had wanted to torch our house that night. I wanted to see it all turned to ash and pretend it had never happened.
Tossing the burning letter into the sink, I watched the orange embers crawl over the paper, transforming it into a thin skin of ash. Then, I went back to the breakfast nook and rounded the table to retrieve the ring off the floor. Sliding Laurel’s wedding band into the pocket of my gym shorts, I didn’t bother taking a shower and changing out of my workout clothes. I marched straight to the garage and climbed into the driver’s seat of my truck.
Laurel was right. I knew exactly where to find her. And I’d be a damn idiot if I let her walk away from our marriage that easily, on our fucking fifth anniversary, no less. Not that we’d celebrated our anniversary today, or last year. You’d have to be pretty fucking sick to celebrate the day your child was murdered.
I pulled my truck onto the freeway, mildly thankful that Laurel had decided to leave me on a Saturday. I should encounter less traffic on the one-hour drive to Portland.
As I drove through the sun-soaked gorge, the hillsides scorched black by the summer wildfires, I felt a flame blazing inside me. Hot blood pumped through my veins, pulsated in my fingertips. Laurel always did this to me.
She pretended as if everything was fine, until suddenly everything was wrong and it was all my fault. She blew up at me at least once a week these days. I should have seen this coming.
Why the fuck didn’t I see this coming?
Taking a few deep breaths to calm myself, I turned on the stereo and put on my workout playlist. The hard, rhythmic beats kept me focused. Still, I had no fucking idea what I was going to say when I got there.
I shook my head. This wasn’t the type of conversation that could be planned out. I had to go with my gut. I had to admit that maybe I’d fucked up, but she had to admit that she’d also abandoned me. Does she think I don’t notice how she can’t look at me when we fuck? Considering how we only communicated while we were arguing or fucking — which happened at least a few times a week — I’d have to be blind to miss that.
Nope. I wasn’t going to take all the blame for this clusterfuck of a marriage. We were in this together. For better or for worse. Till death do us part.
Chapter 4
Laurel
The one-hour drive to Portland seemed to fly by without notice, much like my life seemed to pass me by lately. I found it hard to focus on anything anymore. Just when I thought I’d listened long enough to regain the thread of a conversation, I became lost again. Lost in memories of Jack Jr. Lost in a storm of anger brought on by Hurricane Jack. Lost in a maze of guilt and shame I could never find my way out of.
I was just a few blocks from the house I inherited after my mother’s death — the house I hadn’t stepped foot in since the funeral — when my phone rang over the Bluetooth speakers. “Hello.”
“Where are you? Class started twenty minutes ago,” my best friend Drea said in her glorious British accent.
“Oh, my God. I totally forgot to call and say I wouldn’t be there today. Well, actually…” I paused for a moment, realizing I was going to have to tell Drea the truth now. “I won’t be going to yoga class anymore. I’m moving to Portland.”
“You’re what?”
“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you earlier, but I didn’t want you to try to convince me to move in with you and Barry.”
She gasped. “Oh, my word. You’re serious, aren’t you?”
“Yes.”
“Oh, my…” Her voice trailed off and I stayed quiet as she got her bearings. “Well, you’re right that I would have tried to convince you not to go to your mom’s house. I know how painful that will be. Do you need me to go out there today? You know, just to hold your hand? I’m totally willing to do it.”
I chuckled. “I’m fine, but thanks for offering. I need to do this alone. But I do need to ask you a favor,” I said, tapping the steering wheel nervously.
“Anything. You name it and I’ll do it.”
“Can you ask Barry to check up on Jack occasionally? I know they haven’t been talking much lately, but I’m… worried that Jack will spiral.”
Her brief silence was followed by a stiff clearing of her throat. “You know how I feel about Jack. The man is brilliant. Even if he has gone a bit mad lately, he’s still brilliant. I’m sure he’ll handle the separation just fine. I really don’t think you have anything to worry about. But just to assuage your mind, I’ll ask Barry to check in on him next week. Is that all right?”
“That’s perfect. Thank you,” I replied as the tension in my shoulders eased up.
“Good. Now go out there and be somebody,” she said, referencing a joke from a Dave Chappelle comedy special we both loved.
“Yes, ma’am.”
The call with Drea left me feeling sufficient
ly hopeful. It was exactly what I needed as I exited the highway and began making my way toward my mother’s house. I would need all the positive energy I could get if I had any chance of getting through today.
Though Drea could be pushy at times, she always meant well. We’d been best friends for five years, since we met at a yoga class. Jack and I had just moved into our dream house. Drea and Barry had just moved to Hood River from London. Once I found out that they had moved there to accept a job offer with Jack’s company, we became instant friends.
I couldn’t believe that first yoga class was just five years ago. It felt like a lifetime had passed since then.
I was twenty-nine now, zooming toward thirty, but I felt like I was eighty. My bones ached. What little food I ate gave me heartburn. I was plagued by migraines and insomnia that kept me up most nights. The worst was the constant chest pains, which my doctor insisted were caused by anxiety. Though my doctor had prescribed me some Xanax, I refused to take it, afraid that dulling the pain would also dull my memories of Junior.
I might have to take one today, to get me through the inevitable heartbreak of what I was about to do.
I had to put my mother’s house on the market. I couldn’t stand the idea of living in that house, with all those memories. I needed to move on. I had to reboot my life or I would continue to fall into the same routines. The cycle of hurt had to end, and it had to end now.
As I pulled into the gravel driveway of my mother’s two-story house in southeast Portland, my chest muscles tightened. John Miller, the real estate agent I contacted last week, was already there, thumb-typing on his phone as he leaned against his black Mercedes. When he saw me, he quickly finished typing and tucked his phone into the pocket of his gray slacks as he made his way toward the front steps.