The Guest Room (24 page)

“You didn't hear a single word I said, did you?”

“I heard a few.”

Spencer looked at his watch. “God. You're incredible.”

“Okay, I'm listening. I promise.”

“They were threatening me with sexual assault on a minor. They were threatening me with managing a sex tourism business. Even that's a Class D felony. Do you have any idea how many years in prison I was looking at if I were convicted of sexual assault on a minor? Do you realize how completely fucking ruined my whole life would have been?”

“You wouldn't have been convicted. You just used a stripper service that had benefits.”

“But I knew they had benefits. And I did have sex with that blonde.”

“You weren't alone.”

“Anyway, if you care, I told them everything—and I mean everything—and I've agreed to testify. So instead I'm not even looking at a Class A misdemeanor: promoting prostitution. My lawyer, at first, thought that was the goal. Get this shitstorm down to a misdemeanor. But by testifying, I'm getting off scot-free.”

“And that nasty business with Chuck and Brandon?”

“Really, Philip, I might have been talking to the fucking wall.”

“I'm sorry.”

Spencer sighed, exasperated. “Brandon's wife is still claiming to be out for the count, which my lawyer says is all part of the negotiations. But the settlement—assuming we reach one—won't be pretty. And Chuck's lawyer has gone off radar. Not responding to e-mails or phone calls.”

“Which may mean Chuck has come to his senses, right?”

“Hah! That, too, is part of the negotiations. Any way you look at it, no matter how or when or if we settle, I am financially fucked. My legal fees alone are going to be a world of pain.”

“That whole night now is nothing but pain. None of us have gotten off easy.”

“But some of us are in far deeper shit than others. So, tell me…”

Philip looked at Spencer and raised his eyebrows expectedly. It was unlike Spencer to stop in mid-sentence. “Go on.”

“So, tell me…you hear from your brother?”

“Often. Why?” Philip noted how his friend wouldn't meet his eyes, and thought this was odd: it was as if Spencer was actually experiencing a little guilt over the tsunami he had unleashed.

“Just curious.”

“God, are you getting a heart?” He clapped him good-naturedly on the shoulder. “Are you getting a moral compass? I'm proud of you, Spencer! You're feeling bad about this natural disaster, aren't you?”

“He's your brother. He's smart. I was just wondering what he was saying.”

“Mostly he's saying he's pissed at Franklin McCoy. Mostly he's saying his house is a mess.”

“Interesting.”

“He'll be okay. He is smart, you're right. And he's loaded. His wife is pretty. He's everything I'm not.”

Spencer nodded, but he didn't disagree with him. Philip rather hoped—expected, in fact—that he would. And so they both were quiet for a moment. Finally Spencer said, “Can I ask you something?”

“Of course.”

“Do you ever think about those Russian dudes? I can't get that moment when they were killed out of my head. The poor bastards. I've had nightmares about getting attacked just like that. I keep thinking of the knife in that one guy's neck.”

“Well, that's cheery.”

“A few times, I've woken up with the sweats. I know it's unreasonable…actually, I don't know that at all…I
tell myself
it's unreasonable, but I really do worry sometimes that those Russian guys are going to come after me for ratting them out.”

“I know you do.”

“I mean, if you were them, wouldn't you want a guy like me dead?”

“You didn't rat them out. You told the police the name of the service you used.”

“And that might be all it takes to get a person killed, right? Some of those dudes are already back on the street. They paid their bail and they're out. And now I've agreed to testify. That can't be good.”

“Remember,
those dudes
didn't kill anyone. I'm serious. The killers here were those two girls. And I don't think those girls have got anything against us,” he said, and he recalled the way the blond one had ravenously clawed at him, the muscles in her beautiful neck growing taut as she arched back her head. Afterward, he'd imagined he would somehow find the right words to ask Nicole to grab him just like that. To roll her head back like that. Alas, he could now take that little bit of wordsmithing off his to-do list.

“I guess. But don't you wish you could somehow delete the images of those poor bastards bleeding out from your brain?”

“Honestly? I don't think about that so much.”

“Are you serious?”

He shrugged. “Look: obviously I'm never going to forget it. Obviously I was a second away from wetting my pants when it was going on. But mostly I think about how amazing those girls were before they went banshee.”

“Well, I've learned my lesson. I have so learned my lesson.”

“I have, too,” Philip said, but in one of those moments of rare and uncharacteristic self-awareness, he thought of that woman in white upstairs now in the hotel room, naked atop the older guy, and he realized he hadn't. He knew in his heart he'd learned nothing at all.

“I'm really not hungry,” Kristin said, dropping the menu back on her placemat at the restaurant. It was a single sheet of paper, calligraphed and copied that day because the menu changed daily at the little bistro near the school—though rarely did anyone from the school eat there, at least during the school day. Today the restaurant was filled with ladies of a certain generation who lunched. And that generation was her mother's. Other than a table with an elderly gentleman in a bowtie surrounded by three women, Richard was the only male in the small dining room.

“Really? You have to eat,” Richard said.

“I did. I had some soup during my first break. If I'd known you were coming, I wouldn't have…but I did. Sorry.”

“Have some coffee. Please. So I'm not eating alone.”

“Of course.”

“I just thought a surprise lunch would be nice.”

“It is,” she said, and she reached across the table and took his hands. “This is really sweet of you. I appreciate it. And it is nice. It really is.”

“I have to admit, I was a little afraid you wouldn't want to be seen in public with me. I was afraid it might be too embarrassing.”

“Oh, I'm fine. Or I'm getting fine. I don't know. I think I'm actually more worried about your embarrassment at the moment.”

He turned toward the table with the four older customers. They were indeed glancing surreptitiously at him. He gave them a small wave, and instantly they all looked down at their entrées. “Well, I earned it,” he said to Kristin.

“I know. But a lot of men get away with a lot worse.”

“Thank you.”

“You're welcome.”

“But you're still not hungry.”

She shook her head. The truth was, however, that she was famished. She had lied about the soup. And she had eaten nothing for breakfast. She was haunted by dual images: the sight she had seen when she had studied herself in the mirror and the fantasy she had created in her mind of the prostitute who had led her husband upstairs. Quickly she drank the entire glass of water before her, hoping she could trick her brain's hunger center.

“I thought this afternoon I might research wallpaper designs for the front hallway,” he said.

“Are you kidding?” She couldn't imagine him taking the time to find wallpaper designs. But then again, just yesterday he had come home from a furniture store with iPhone photos of possible couches to replace the one they were getting rid of on Saturday, as well as a stack of catalogs from the showroom. She was shocked, a little awed, by his initiative.

“Yeah, why not? Maybe find some paper with that great CBGB's bathroom feel,” he said.

She smiled. The bathrooms there had always been appalling. But she and Richard had danced at the club and listened to music at the club and—one memorable evening—made out at the club. “Retro graffiti? Spray paint chic?”

“Absolutely. Did you have a chance to look at the catalogs I brought home? Think about what sort of new couch you'd like?”

She had carried the catalogs upstairs, but after reading with Melissa and then grading papers, she had turned out the light and gone to sleep—though first she had stared for a moment at Richard's side of the bed. At her daughter, asleep there instead of her husband. “I didn't. Sorry,” she answered. She felt a little sheepish.

“It's okay. No need to apologize.” He looked once more at his menu. Then: “Remember that old joke about men and quiche?”

“I do. Are you thinking of ordering the quiche?”

“I am.”

“I never thought a man was less of a man because he liked quiche.”

He smiled. “Thank you.”

She sat back, wondering how this had all become so awkward. They had been married for nearly a decade and a half. They had been in love even longer. How was it they were struggling to make conversation? How was it their relationship had become an uncomfortable first date? She hated this. She loathed this. It was pathetic and…awful. Hadn't they once been at least a little feral? A little less tamed? What the hell had happened to their nights at places like CBGB's? What the hell had happened to the ease with which they would go to dinner and a movie and make love while Melissa was at a friend's house for the night? She watched him look around for the waiter and made a decision. It was a snap decision, but at the moment she wanted nothing more than to find their way back to where they had been—to who they had been. To who they once were.

“Don't order,” she commanded him.

He looked confused.

“We've got almost an hour,” she told him. “We're going to go home and go upstairs. And there you are going to fuck me silly.”

The next morning, Friday, Melissa was finding it easier not to be mad at her father. A little, anyway. After all, her mother seemed now to have forgiven him. Last night her parents had slept in their bedroom together for the first time since before her uncle's bachelor party. She had even seen her mom kiss her dad on the cheek when she had come into the kitchen for breakfast, as her dad was making her lunch for school. (She tried to recall if her father had ever made her lunch before. She had to restrain herself from making suggestions; she had to trust that Mom had told him what she liked.)

But she still found herself unsettled by what he may have done at that party and a little adrift in his presence. The expression
sex slave
kept coming back to her. Moreover, her father still wasn't allowed to go back to work: he was still being punished by his bosses. Their house was still awash in unsettling vestiges from the party last Friday night, such as that awful couch.

And her uncle's wedding was off. She was no longer going to get to be a flower girl, and she had been looking forward to that; she had been looking forward to that a lot. She loved the dress, and she had no idea now if she would ever have the chance to show it off. It was red velvet; it had a white collar and pearl buttons. When else would she have the opportunity to wear it? She'd probably outgrow it before she was asked again to be a flower girl.

When the phone on the kitchen wall rang, both of her parents turned toward it as if it were the smoke alarm. Then she noticed that they both looked at each other. Her father answered it; her mother leaned against a counter, holding her coffee mug with both hands. Melissa finished chewing the bite of toast in her mouth and swallowed. She planned to listen carefully. But then her father took the phone with him and wandered through the dining room and into the living room, and she couldn't hear a word of what he was saying.

“Who is it?” she asked her mother.

“I don't know, sweetie.”

“You look worried.”

“No.”

She didn't believe that—her mother
was
worried—but Melissa could only sit against the back of her kitchen chair and wait. Both she and her mother waited.

A minute or two later, her father returned. “I'm…I'm going into the city today, after all,” he said.

“Really? Was that someone from Franklin McCoy?” her mother asked. “Was it that lawyer you despise?”

“Nope.”

“Dina Renzi?”

He had gotten dressed that morning in blue jeans and a black hoodie. Now Melissa watched him put both hands in the kangaroo pocket. At first, she thought he looked a little bewildered. But then she understood that this wasn't confusion at all: he was stunned. “Not her, either.”

“Don't keep us in suspense,” her mother said. “Who was it?”

“It was the police.”

“That detective? Detective Bryant?”

“A different one. A man. He was in the city. He…”

“Go on.”

Her father looked at her. “Melissa, your mom and I are going to talk about this in the other room. It's nothing you need to worry about, I promise. So, why don't you finish your breakfast and then I'll finish making your lunch.”

She motioned at her plate and the cereal bowl, empty except for the last of the milk and a few floating Cheerios. “I'm done,” she said. She noticed the little pieces of toast left like bits of bark on her plate, and added, “I don't eat the crusts.”

“Sweetie—”

“No!” she cut her father off, that disgusting expression—
sex slaves
—bubbling to the top of her mind, incapable of being repressed. She was about to say more, but the words caught in her throat. She blinked, but her eyes already were welling up. Her parents were stunned at the way she had silenced them with that one definitive syllable.

“Okay, Melissa,” her father said gingerly. “What?”