"Hello, sweetheart," Blythe said. "You remember Freddie, don't you?"
Mary looked at the short man with the red silk shirt and black glasses and struggled to recall him. Before she could answer, Blythe stuck a heavy plate in her hand and sailed off with Gillian in tow. Freddie smiled, handed her a fork and napkin, and trotted after Blythe's trail of exotic perfume.
After Fiona died, Mary began feeling resentful toward her mother. Not toward Blythe herself, but about what she was doing with her life. She'd felt that any kind of art was a ridiculous waste of time. What good was music, and parties, and laughter? Innocent children were being killed. The time to laugh was over. Done with. You could laugh as long as you didn't know how bad the world was, but how could people keep laughing once they knew? Kids were out there dying. What good did a piece of baked clay do?
It kept the soul alive.
I've wasted so many years.
Not wasted, she told herself. How can it be a waste? I've stopped murderers in their tracks. I've rescued kidnapped children.
But through all that, had she really lived? She'd been shut off. Numb. Harboring a deep hatred, a deep darkness of spirit.
She directed her gaze to the plate in her hand—it contained a slice of white cake with white frosting. She looked up and saw Anthony staring at her from across the room, a champagne glass in his hand.
He smiled at her. It was the kind of smile that passed between people who knew each other's deepest secrets.
She smiled back.
Anthony watched as she crossed the room. On the way, she put down the plate and grabbed a glass of champagne. "I thought you were going back to Virginia this morning," she said, taking a sip and looking at him over the edge of the glass.
"I was, but you know how persuasive your mother can be. I'm leaving first thing tomorrow instead. How about you?"
"Late tomorrow evening. I have a few things I need to finish up here."
He let out a slow breath, realizing that after what had happened with Gillian, he'd half expected her to say she wasn't coming back at all.
"I need to talk to you in private." She put down her glass, took his hand, and pulled him through the kitchen into her mother's pottery studio, shutting the door behind them.
A nightlight covered in blue glass bathed them in a velvet hue. From beyond the closed door came the sound of laughter and muffled voices. Sounds of life. It was one of those poetic, crystalline moments he recognized as two-thirds magic, one-third reality.
"I talked to Gavin Hitchcock."
Business. Spell broken.
Anthony took a swallow of champagne and waited. It was always business with Mary.
"I think Gillian might be right. I think it's possible Gavin Hitchcock didn't murder Fiona."
"Really?" He had trouble being as interested as he should have been.
"I'm going to suggest that Elliot get permission to reopen the case. Oh, look—your cup. It's been glazed."
She picked up a shrunken, misshapen cup in the most godawful yellow he'd ever seen. He didn't recognize it. "Are you sure that's mine?"
"Of course it's yours." She turned it around.
He didn't think he could have made something so ugly, but wasn't in the mood to argue. Instead he said, "I had a nice time that night."
"Me too." She smiled. "Remember when you kissed me?"
"Vaguely."
"I was drunk."
"I suspected as much."
"But I'm not drunk now."
"What are you getting at?"
She put the cup back on the shelf, then took his champagne glass from his hand, and set it beside the cup. "Ever since then, I've been wondering if it was the alcohol that made it seem so nice."
Mary was someone who required a good three feet of personal space. Now she was standing absurdly close. An invitation if he'd ever seen one. Mary, Mary, quite contrary. "Are you suggesting a test?"
"It might answer some questions."
"And you're always looking for answers, aren't you?" He put his hands lightly and impersonally on her arms, then thought, What the hell, and pulled her snugly against him.
He could feel her chest rising and falling against his. And he thought it would be a cruel world to bring them together like this only to have her tell him she felt nothing, that it had been the alcohol after all. He'd better make the kiss an artistic masterpiece. What was he thinking? He glanced at the yellow cup, then back to Mary. He was no artist.
So he just kissed her. Lips to lips, breath to breath.
When she finally opened her eyes, he asked, "Fireworks?"
"Sparklers."
He would have been disappointed, except that her breathing was funny, and he could feel her heart thundering against his. As always, she would give him only so much. It was a game they played. She was tormenting him, and he liked it. Their time would come. However long it took, he would wait for her.
Chapter 36
Abigail Portman picked her way through the darkening woods. The weather had taken a warm turn the way it often did in early November, and much of yesterday's snow had melted. She'd read in the paper that the Cantrell girl had been found alive. That wasn't the news she wanted to hear. She'd wished she'd died, because it made her feel better to know other people were suffering, that other people's lives were as miserable as hers.
When she reached the memorial, she removed the dead roses and replaced them with a fresh bouquet. Then she straightened and stood in silence, staring at the white cross. . . .
She and Fiona had fought the morning of her death.
That's what people always talked about after a loved one died. The trivial argument they'd had beforehand. Maybe an argument over a messy room, or milk that had been left out of the refrigerator.
In their case it had been about sex.
Abigail recalled the folded note she'd found that had fallen from Fiona's coat pocket. She'd pretended it was a list, or maybe something she herself had dropped. But she'd known it was Fiona's, and she'd been curious. Not in a sneaky way, but in an oh-what-fun way. A we-share-everything way.
Fiona won't mind. We're best friends.
She opened the note, fully expecting to find some light chatter from Mary Cantrell or someone else Fiona hung around with. Instead, it was a note from a boy—or a male anyway. The fact that it was written on lined paper and had been folded into a small square made her think it must have been someone from school, but that didn't really have to be the case.
It had been a shock to find that her daughter was a slut.
The note outlined every disgusting thing the person had done to her daughter, and outlined every disgusting thing Fiona had done back, wondering when they could meet again. The word fuck appeared again and again. Fuck. In a house that had never as much as allowed the word damn.
For a short time, Abigail's mind shut down, refusing to believe what she was reading. It was a joke. A stupid, sick game.
"What are you doing?"
The unfolded note, on wide-ruled paper torn from a spiral notebook, was still in Abigail's hand. Fiona stood in the doorway, dressed in a cute plaid skirt, knee socks, and dark sweater. Her hair was shiny and straight, falling from a middle part. She looked so sweet and innocent that Abigail wanted to give her another chance. Maybe this was something this boy did to hurt good girls.
"Are you reading my note?"
Fiona crossed the room and snatched the paper from her mother, her face contorted with rage. "That's mine!"
There was no respect in a single cell of her body. Only rage. This wasn't her daughter. This was a stranger. A vicious, hateful stranger.
Where had the other girl gone? Abigail's daughter?
The girl she babied and worshiped and spoiled? The girl who got everything she wanted and more? Had she ever been there? Or was she someone Abigail had made up? Someone she'd created in her own mind, bestowing false traits on the person standing in front of her?
She thought about the mother and daughter day they'd shared a year ago. They'd gone out to eat at Cafe Noir on Hennepin. Over crepes, they'd had a timid discussion about boys and sex, with Abigail nervous but dead set on getting through the conversation. The subject had come up in the past, before Fiona had even started her period, and Abigail thought it would be good to have a refresher, this time going into things a little deeper. She knew Fiona wasn't having sex, and wanted to reassure her that a girl didn't need to have sex to be popular with the boys.
"I've gotten you something." She slid a small, wrapped box across the table.
Fiona unwrapped it, then opened the black velvet case inside.
"It's a promise ring," Abigail explained. "All the kids are getting them. It's a statement that lets people know you plan to remain a virgin until you marry."
Fiona smiled and slipped the ring on her wedding finger. At the time, the smile had seemed sincere, but now Abigail felt it had been a sly smile, a mocking smile.
"Thanks," Fiona said, examining the ring. "What a cute idea."
Now Abigail could see that the word cute had been issued in a mocking way too. Fiona had been making fun of her for years, and Abigail hadn't even known it.
Parents were blind. She'd often said so herself, but she'd been talking about other people. She'd ridiculed parents who didn't have a clue about their children, but she'd never thought she could be one of them. She and Fiona had a special bond, a special relationship. They could tell each other anything.
Their relationship had been a lie.
Fiona was wearing the ring now.
Had she laughed about it to the boy who'd written the note?
"Why didn't you tell me you had a boyfriend?" Abigail asked.
"I'm going to be late for school."
"How long has this kind of thing been going on?"
"You don't really want to know. Just forget it. Forget all about it. This is my birthday, remember? My birthday."
Even though their district had a perfectly acceptable bus system, Abigail had always taken her daughter to school. She had to be the best mom she could be.
"I want to know. As soon as you tell me," Abigail said woodenly, "I'll take you."
"This note?" Fiona shook the wrinkled paper. "This note isn't from a boyfriend. I don't have a boyfriend. I don't want a boyfriend. This is from a guy who is dumb but good when it comes to fucking. There. Is that what you wanted to hear? Do you feel better now?"
Abigail was afraid she might throw up. Like a robot, she went to the kitchen and got a drink of water. Then she came back, put on her shoes, and drove Fiona to school.
"Don't forget Mary," Fiona said when Abigail flew past the Cantrell house.
She braked, backed up, and honked. Did Mary know? she wondered. Was Mary a friend of the bitch or the sweet girl?
Brown-haired Mary came running across the lawn and threw herself into the backseat, laughing and breathless. "I thought you guys were going to forget me! Happy birthday, Fiona!" She reached over the back of the front seat and tugged playfully at Fiona's hair. "Sixteen! Finally!" Mary herself was seventeen. She'd started school late.
Was this all an act, part of the charade?
Abigail blocked out their chatter, driving but unaware of turning corners or obeying traffic lights. She must have done okay, because nobody ridiculed her. She let the girls out near the front of the school.
"Bye, Mrs. Portman!" Mary said, giving her a wave as she ducked to see inside the car. "Thanks for the ride!" The girls spun away, latching arms, laughing, and falling into each other as they skipped up the wide walk.
Abigail wanted to go home and crawl into bed, pull the covers up over her head. Her husband was out of town, but it would do no good to talk to him. They had grown apart years ago. A man with no personality, he was the ghost who occasionally showed up at their home. Tonight, if he thought about it, he would call his daughter and wish her a happy birthday, saying he was sorry he couldn't be there. Now Abigail wondered if he'd ever really wanted to be there.
She wished she'd never read the note. She wished she'd picked it up and slipped it back into Fiona's pocket. And now, even though she had read it, she guessed that Fiona would be perfectly willing to continue as if this morning had never happened.
People did that all the time. That's how they got through their days. But no, Abigail thought with anguish. Not when things had been so perfect. She could never forget, never go back.
It was over. The life she'd known was over because her daughter was her life. She'd read dozens of child- rearing books, so adamant had she been about doing things right. In almost every one they'd warned against getting too wrapped up in your child. Don't give up an important goal for your child. Don't give up a dream job for your child. Don't give up a once-in-a- lifetime trip to Africa for your child.
She'd laughed about that, and she'd secretly looked down upon Blythe Cantrell, who was always busy with her pottery and her art friends and her causes. What kind of life is that for a child? When the mother is never there when her children get home from school?