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WEDNESDAY
A door slammed, waking Nina. A red 6:30 glowed from the clock. She squinted when the light switched on.
Rodney stood over her. “Nina, what the hell has been going on? You’ve been holed up in this room since Sunday and going to bed at nearly six every evening.”
“I’m tired and not feeling well.”
“What’s wrong with you?” Rodney’s eyes were concerned.
Nina’s eyes wanted desperately to close. “I’m not sure.”
Rodney placed his hand on Nina’s forehead. “You say you aren’t feeling well, but you don’t have a temperature.”
Nina didn’t answer.
Rodney huffed. “Is it mental problems? Are you okay?”
Of course she wasn’t okay. She was a murderer. “Something like that.”
Rodney’s palms went up. “What’s happened? You’re acting strange.”
He didn’t want to know. “Nothing, Rodney. I just want to go back to sleep.”
“Is something going on with Deja? She’s been over here constantly.”
She turned her back to him.
“Dammit, Nina.” Rodney’s hand tugged her shoulder. “I can’t help you if you won’t open up to me. I can’t deal with you having another breakdown. I didn’t want to upset you, but the girls and Miles got in a fight with a kid in their class. He said something mean about you, and the girls defended you. I’m trying to help you, Nina. But I won’t be successful if you don’t let me help you. This family won’t stay together if you relapse right now.”
Nina didn’t want that either. She hated that the girls were affected by her health problems. But she couldn’t tell Rodney the truth. He couldn’t handle it. “I’ll be fine.”
“I want you to see your therapist. I know you cancelled this week’s visit since you saw Dr. Franklin on Monday, so I’ll call her and see how soon you can get in. If you won’t talk to me, maybe you’ll talk to her.” Rodney grabbed his phone and typed on it, probably creating a reminder. “I’m going to take a shower and get ready for work.”
As the water pounded the shower floor, Nina wished she could disappear like the drops down the drain. After all, she belonged in the sewer. She was absolute trash. Her husband would hate her if he found out what she’d done. Everyone would hate her. Maybe she should have been locked up for good after her breakdown. Then she wouldn’t have been able to kill... again.
Nina desperately needed to talk to someone, to confess. But she couldn’t confide in Rodney. They didn’t have that type of relationship. She’d never even told Rodney about what had happened with Isaiah and Damien. When they’d met, she’d only told him that her brother had died. Rodney hadn’t asked for more details. The fact that he preferred to talk almost exclusively about himself and his saint of a mother was one of the things that Nina had liked about him.
But not speaking of the past didn’t mean it hadn’t happened.
The past had a way of not only hopping in like a hitchhiker catching a ride, but hijacking the present. Maybe that was what happened now. Maybe her past had caught up to her. She covered her head with the pillow, closed her eyes, and tried to forget everything.
***
THOUGH SHE HADN’T BEEN able to fall back asleep, Nina hadn’t gotten up yet when her bedroom door opened. Deja walked in, holding Nina’s planner.
“What are you doing here, Deja?”
“You’ve been ignoring my calls all morning, and I wanted to see how you were doing. The calendar says that you see your mom on Wednesday. So you need to get up and get going.” Deja handed Nina her planner.
“No. I can’t.” Nina tucked the planner into the drawer on the nightstand.
“I know you see your mom every single week. If you don’t see her, it will be strange. We can’t do anything out of the ordinary. We have to, you know, go through the motions.” Deja turned to the closet. “Let’s get you dressed and—”
“I’m a murderer. I deserve to go through a death chamber, not the motions. The only place I should go is the police station.”
Deja sat next to Nina. “It’s not a secret that Laila and Bree had a hard time after your breakdown. How do you think it would affect them if they found out their mom had killed someone? How would the other kids treat them? And what would they do without their mom for the rest of their lives? You didn’t mean to kill Kevin, and your daughters don’t deserve to lose you over an accident.”
Tears welled in Nina’s eyes. Deja was absolutely right. She couldn’t do that to the girls.
Deja disappeared into the closet and returned with a yellow shirt. She slipped it over Nina’s head then placed each arm through the holes. After disappearing a few seconds, she returned and pulled a pair of pants onto Nina. “Come on, now. Go wash up.”
Nina let Deja help her up then trudged to the bathroom. She avoided the mirror when she brushed her teeth and washed her face, too scared of what she’d see.
When Nina left the bathroom, Deja held out Nina’s pills and a glass of water. Nina gulped them down.
“Good.” Deja placed a baseball cap on Nina’s curly mess. “Get in the car, go see your mother, and we’ll talk after.”
Somehow, Nina was in her car, driving to her mom’s place. She was thankful she had a friend like Deja, who helped her gain perspective on the situation. Nina really hadn’t meant to kill Kevin, and she couldn’t subject her girls to the torment surely to come if she confessed to the murder. Living with the guilt weighed on her unbearably, but she’d have to get used to it.
She parked outside her mom’s place but couldn’t move. Her eyes remained glued to the empty street. Hot tears streamed down her cheeks, but she didn’t wipe them away. She couldn’t act like everything was normal. Everything was very far from normal.
The fifty-something, heavyset supervisor, Dr. Lawrence, appeared, walking down the path that led to the residential house, and waved at Nina. When he approached the car, he knocked on Nina’s window then circled his hand, motioning for her to roll down the window.
Nina quickly brushed away the tears.
“Hi, there. I saw your car outside my window,” Dr. Lawrence said, slightly out of breath. “I had started to worry that you weren’t going to come for your visit. I’m certainly glad you did. Your mom’s not doing too well.”
Of course she’s not. She’s never doing well. “Well, I’m here.”
“Great.” Dr. Lawrence gestured for her to get out of the car. “Come on in, and I’ll catch you up.”
Nina put on her sunglasses, hiding her bloodshot eyes. The last thing she needed was Dr. Lawrence suspecting something was wrong with Nina and locking her up. She followed Dr. Lawrence to his office, a tiny room in the front of the house. Her body slumped into the metal chair across from his.
He searched through his desk. “Here we go.” He grabbed a highlighter and proceeded to streak fluorescent yellow across a paper then placed it in front of Nina. “These are the notes on your mom. As you can see, her depression’s worsening, and she’s even voiced suicidal ideation. She’s refusing exercise and barely eating.”
Nina’s heart sank. She’d been so preoccupied with her own problems, she hadn’t even known how sick her mom had become. Apparently, things could get even worse. She wished she could fold up into the metal chair and just disappear. “This is awful. Can you do anything?”
“We’re going to add an extra antipsychotic medication, since some of the newer drugs act as a mood lifter as well.” Dr. Lawrence paused. “Did you hear me?”
Nina pictured the log they’d hidden Kevin’s body under. “Yes, I heard you. Extra medication.”
“Since it’s getting serious, and if she doesn’t improve, we might transfer her to the hospital to get her stabilized.”
Nina shuddered. The psychiatric hospital was the last place a mentally ill person wanted to go. Firsthand experience. The screams emanating from the locked room still haunted her. “Let’s see if the new med helps first, please.”
“Yes, that’s the plan.” Dr. Lawrence closed her mom’s file and raised his eyebrows. “Are you okay, Mrs. Taylor?”
Nina gulped for air. “I’m fine. And, well, uh, thank you for telling me about my mother. I should be going.” She rose from the chair and fished for her keys.
“Going to see her, right?” Dr. Lawrence’s eyebrows arched high.
“Oh, yes. Going to see her,” Nina stammered.
Dr. Lawrence hefted himself out of his chair. “Maybe you’ll help cheer her up.”
Frowning, Nina passed the regulars watching TV in the common room without a word. She followed Dr. Lawrence down the hall to her mom’s room. “That used to be my brother’s job. He was always her favorite.”
Nina’s knock on her mother’s door didn’t elicit a response. “Mom, it’s me.” Still nothing.
Dr. Lawrence took a turn. “Ms. Henderson, your daughter’s here to visit you. Open up, please.”
Silence.
Alarm bells rang in Nina’s mind. Her mom might have done something, maybe like Isaiah. “I’m worried.” She couldn’t hide the panic in her voice.
“I’ll grab the key.” Dr. Lawrence started down the hall.
A second later, the door crept open. “Oh, Nina. Wasn’t expecting you,” her mom said.
Dr. Lawrence stopped in his tracks. “There you are.”
Nina’s heart struggled to resume its normal rate. “Mom, I was worried about you.”
“Child, ain’t nothing to be worried about. I was just slow waking from my nap with all these extra meds they got me doped up on.” Her mom’s eyes were barely open, and her movements were slow when she opened the door. “Come in before you let in a draft.”
“Okay, then. Have a nice visit.” Dr. Lawrence left.
Though everything else in her life had changed, Nina resumed her usual spot in the chair next to the desk.
Her mom stood over her. “Do you really have the nerve to come in here like that and expect me not to notice?”
Nina froze. “Excuse me?”
“The sunglasses and baseball cap indoors. Didn’t I raise you better than that?” Her hand rested on her hip.
“Oh.” Nina removed both. She patted her hair that must have looked like a bird’s nest, avoiding her mom’s gaze.
“What happened?” Her mom drew near to Nina to inspect her forehead.
Nina touched the bump she’d completely forgotten about. It had shrunk in size. “I banged my head pretty bad. That’s all.”
“Are you sure?” Her mom stepped in closer to examine the damage. “I had one girlfriend in college who started having bruises all over and whatnot. She’d say she bumped her head or fell. Eventually, found out her boyfriend was beating on her.”
“Oh.” Nina didn’t know her mom used to have friends.
“You’d tell me, right?”
Confusion blanketed Nina. “What?”
“If Rodney was beating on you,” her mom said.
Oh, the irony. Nina was the murderer. Yet her mom acted like Rodney had done something wrong.
“Would you?”
Nina had forgotten what they were talking about. “Would I what?”
“Tell me if Rodney was beating on you. I never liked that guy or the way he treats you. He’s arrogant, inconsiderate, and money hungry.”
Her mom’s feelings about Rodney were well known and one of the reasons her mom didn’t visit their house. Well, other than the fact that she really didn’t visit anywhere. But if Nina’s mom knew what Nina had done, she would know Nina didn’t have a halo over her head, either. “He’s my husband. Yes, he’s flawed, but so am I.”
Her mom sat on her bed. “I’m tired and don’t feel like arguing with you. I was sleeping before you interrupted.”
“Dr. Lawrence said you’re not doing too good. I’m concerned about you.”
“I appreciate that. But you got too many other things to be thinking about. Don’t waste your time on me. I’m too old for help, really. Just ready for my time here to be done.”
“It’s the depression talking. You know that, right?”
“That’s what they say, at least. I’m too tired to visit.”
Nina stood. “Well, I’ll be back next week.”
“Are you going to answer me before you go?”
Nina felt lost in a maze talking to her mother. “About what?”
Her mom’s eyes got big. “If that man’s beating on you.”
“No, he wouldn’t beat on me.” Unlike Nina, Rodney didn’t have a violent bone in his body. “Bye, Mom.”
Her mom waved her away like she would a fly that was bothering her. “Bye. And will you quit just surprising me out of the blue?”
“It’s Wednesday.” Nina opened the door. “I come every Wednesday.”
“Kiss those granddaughters of mine.”
Nina closed the door behind her. She wished the girls had a relationship with their grandma, and if she wanted to continue having them in her life, she’d have to get the money for the body removal and make sure someone disposed of Kevin’s body permanently. Though she hated to involve her dad, she would need to ask to borrow the money from him. She needed to come up with a good story.