IN HIGH SCHOOL, TESSA had known a girl named Penelope who was so astonishingly beautiful she didn’t seem human. She looked like she’d stepped out of a cosmetics ad. Every detail, from the curve of her eyebrows to the glossy sweep of strawberry-blond hair to the delicate shape of her collarbone was perfectly etched. Guys stared at her. Girls stared at her. Tessa had even caught a few teachers staring at her, their chalk halting in its movement against the board, before they caught themselves and continued their lessons.
During her senior year, Penelope had a boyfriend who was already in college, a detail that awarded her even more social currency. She drove a BMW. She wasn’t catty, but she didn’t go out of her way to be nice. She was a golden girl, living an impossibly charmed life. She seemed remote, which wasn’t surprising, because how could mere mortals expect to coexist on the same plane as perfect Penelope?
Then, three weeks after beginning her freshman year of college, Penelope used a rope to hang herself in her dorm room.
The first thing that popped into Tessa’s mind when she’d heard the news was: But she was so beautiful!
You told yourself stories about people, Tessa thought. You took in superficial details and created a narrative: Penelope must have been happy, because she looked so good. But you were usually wrong.
She’d made the same mistake with Susan. She’d assumed Susan was a Superwoman. Pretty, successful, competent—a strong businesswoman who was also a great mom. Cole was polite and cheerful, and Susan had it all together. When Addison had tripped and skinned his knee on the sidewalk on the way to the bus, Susan had pulled a tiny tube of Neosporin and a Band-Aid from her purse. When Bree was struggling to remember state capitals in preparation for a geography exam, Susan not only recited them all, she gave her mnemonic tips to help her ace the test.
Now Tessa knew the truth: Susan had secret struggles, too. Sometimes Susan cried so hard that her pretty face twisted and she gasped for air.
I know, Tessa thought. I’ve done that, too.
The kids were in the living room, watching a video, while Tessa put together dinner. Harry had been away on business for two nights, and she wanted him to come home to a good meal. They’d been making so much progress lately. Before the incident at Halloween, neither of them had nightmares for a few weeks.
Tessa cut a butternut squash in half and drizzled each side with olive oil before putting it into the oven, facedown, to roast. She cleaned a chicken and slid slices of lemon and cloves of garlic under its skin before putting it into the oven next to the squash. There would also be rolls, and a big green salad, and hard apple cider for the adults. She’d light a fire, and put on music.
Superficial details, a voice whispered in her mind, but she ignored it.
When the phone rang, she was rinsing lettuce. Her hands were wet, so she dried them on the dish towel looped over the stove handle and scooped up the receiver without checking caller ID. That was her first mistake.
The voice on the other end burst out, bright and bubbly as champagne. Cindy. A friend from her past—from her other life, the one she’d taken for granted, even complained about.
“I’ve been trying to reach you forever, girl! Seems like you just dropped off the face of the earth.”
“I’m sorry,” Tessa said, her mind quickly searching for a reason to get off the phone. “Things have been so frantic, with the move, and Harry’s been traveling . . .”
“Excuses, excuses,” Cindy said, but there was no menace in her tone. Cindy had been the room mother, along with Tessa, for Bree’s first-grade class. They’d gone walking together lots of mornings after taking the kids to school. She’d been a wonderful friend.
Imitate the school principal doing morning announcements in your Sarah Palin voice! she could still hear Cindy beg, and she could see her friend doubled over in helpless laughter, her shoulders shaking, tears streaming down her face.
Oh, how Tessa missed her! Suddenly other memories of her former life came rushing back: The little pencil marks on the kitchen doorframe she and Harry had etched to capture their children’s growth—the painters would have covered those up when they’d gotten the house ready to put on the market. The lion she’d stenciled on Addison’s wall to watch over him and protect him while he slept—Larry the Lion was probably gone by now, too. The small angel statue Tessa had bought for the garden, as a remembrance of the two babies she’d lost before they were born. The bushes in their backyard that, for two glorious weeks in late June, were filled to bursting with tart, sweet blackberries—their family had always vowed they’d pick enough for a pie, but they ended up stripping all the fruit off the branches to gobble down, their fingers and lips staining purple. Those sun-warmed berries were the best thing Tessa had ever tasted.
Tessa cleared her throat. “I’m glad you called,” she said. She could do this. She could get through a simple conversation; it would be good practice. Cindy had left a few messages on Tessa’s cell, but Tessa hadn’t returned them. Instead she’d written careful emails to Cindy that were designed to appear chatty without revealing anything substantial. She’d read them through several times before hitting send, knowing that anything electronic could always be subpoenaed.
“How is everything back home?” Tessa asked, thinking she’d keep the focus on Cindy. That way she could talk less. But it was her second mistake.
Cindy sighed, and Tessa heard the whistle of her teakettle. Cindy constantly drank cinnamon tea because she was in an ongoing struggle to lose ten pounds and she’d heard cinnamon curbed your appetite. Except Cindy added a big spoonful of honey and a dash of cream to her tea, offsetting whatever gains she might make. It was one of the quirky, endearing details that sealed a friendship.
“It’s been a strange few months,” Cindy said. “The kids all miss Addison and Bree. I don’t know, everyone around here is still pretty freaked out. Detective Robinson comes around and asks questions every now and then. She’s always got that little black notebook out. She was here yesterday and I told her sometimes it just hits me that Danny is gone, and I’m so angry, because I want to—”
Cindy cut herself off. Tessa knew one of her children must’ve walked into the kitchen.
“Well, you know,” Cindy continued lightly. “Those photos!”
Tessa could feel herself shaking. Why had she answered the phone?
“Yes,” she murmured.
“But enough about that,” Cindy said. “What’s new with you?”
Tessa managed to talk for another five minutes before finding an excuse to get off the phone. “I’ll call you next week!” Cindy had said. “Let’s stay in better touch.”
More memories were roaring back now, fast and hard. Tessa sank onto a chair, her hands clutching her stomach, as images slammed into her: Harry staggering into the kitchen that night, the blood on his shoes, his face so pale . . .
“Your shoes,” she’d said, pointing to them. Harry had looked down, seen the blood, and slipped them off.
“I have a plan,” he’d said, his usually rich brown eyes appearing oddly blank. “Follow me.”
Tessa had been in shock. She’d obediently trailed him up the stairs, feeling as if she’d floated outside of her own body. Harry had gone into their bedroom first, and he’d put his bathrobe over his T-shirt and shorts. He’d tossed Tessa her robe and motioned for her to do the same. Then he walked to the threshold of Bree’s room. Harry had raised a finger to his lips. He’d slowly opened the door and had crept inside. He’d reached for the alarm clock on Bree’s nightstand. She’d just gotten it the previous Christmas and was inordinately proud of her ability to wake herself up in time for school. As Tessa watched, Harry twisted a knob to flip the numbers back, changing the time from 2:54 a.m. to 12:29 a.m.
Harry put a hand on Tessa’s shoulder. “Go to the top of the stairs,” he’d whispered.
“What are you going to do?” she’d asked, but he just gestured for her to move. He stepped into the hallway with her. Then he slammed Bree’s door—hard.
The noise crashed through the house.
“Daddy?” Bree had called. She’d always been a light sleeper.
Harry waited a beat, then opened her door.
“Sweetie, it’s so late,” he said. “Have you been awake this whole time? Don’t you know what time it is?”
Bree looked at the clock without waiting for an answer, then her head flopped back on her pillow.
“Here,” Harry had said. He handed Bree a glass of water from her nightstand. “I bet you’re thirsty. Drink some of this, then you’ll be able to sleep.”
But as Bree reached for the glass, Harry let it slip from his grasp. It landed on her chest and spilled its contents down her nightgown. She gave a little shriek and sat up. “Daddy, it’s cold!”
“Oh, sweetie, I’m so sorry,” Harry had said. “Tessa, can you get her a fresh nightgown? Bree, just run into the bathroom and change.”
Even in her foggy state, Tessa realized what he was doing. If she’d immediately dozed off again, Bree might not even have remembered waking up. So Harry was making sure the details would be lodged in her brain that morning. Bree got up and went into the bathroom, and Harry turned on the hall light, which burned brightly.
When Bree returned, her voice sounded much more alert.
“You need to go to sleep,” Harry said. “It’s so late. See what time it is?”
He pointed at the clock.
“Look, the clock says one-two-three-four,” Bree said. “It’s twelve thirty-four.”
“That means good luck is coming,” Harry had said, and Tessa had clutched the door to steady herself against the dizziness engulfing her. Bree had always loved it when clocks showed sequential numbers, and had developed the superstition that they were a harbinger of a happy surprise. Bree would not only remember waking up, she’d remember the exact time the clock showed. Harry had planned this.
He was creating an alibi.
After they’d tucked Bree in, Harry had silently walked downstairs. He’d taken a paper towel and had wiped the blood off the kitchen floor, then he’d buried the paper towel in the trash can.
“I’ll change her clock back when I’m sure she’s asleep,” he’d said.
Then he’d put his clothes into a plastic bag, even his shoes, changed into a new outfit, and had gone back outside. A moment later, Tessa heard the sound of his car engine starting up again.