Lies That Bind Us(59)

“Sure,” said Marcus. “Fine.”

“And then there’s Jan,” said Brad.

“Can we just play cards or something?” I said. “Something grown-up, like poker?”

I’m a good poker player, but then you’d expect that, wouldn’t you?

“No, little Janice,” said Brad. “Everyone is in the band. You wouldn’t want to be left out, would you?”

I braced myself. There was something sharp in his face, something wolfish that made me want to disappear. When he was drinking and dropped his sardonic guard, he could be like a kid on the playground: maybe not the gang leader, but its principal enforcer, a master of minor cruelties, even if they were only manifested in comments and sneers.

“Rhythm guitar,” said Marcus quickly, “and,” he added before anyone could comment, “songwriter.”

“Huh,” said Simon. “Yeah, that’ll work. I think we’re all set to play the Grammys.”

“Woo!” said Gretchen, raising her glass predictably.

I shot Marcus a sideways look and smiled, but I couldn’t help noting the way Gretchen had squeezed up next to him on the couch. And the way he didn’t seem to mind.

“Oh my God!” exclaimed Gretchen. “I didn’t show you the bags we got!”

She leaped to her feet and began rummaging in a holdall behind the couch.

“Wait, wait!” said Melissa, also getting up and mouthing something at Gretchen, who dutifully stopped what she was doing and stood there, grinning about whatever was about to happen.

“You bought a bag,” said Brad, deadpan. “How shall I contain my excitement?”

“Wait, Mr. Snarky,” said Gretchen in a little-girl voice. Melissa had ducked out of the room at a run and was now shouting, “Hold on! I’ll be right back,” from somewhere upstairs. We waited. A door banged. You couldn’t hear her footsteps because she was barefoot, and the floors were ancient and solid, so her breathless reappearance was a minor surprise. She was dangling a boxy red leather purse like a runway model, her face a mask of haughty indifference for a posed second.

“Oh, that’s cute!” said Kristen.

“Wait, wait,” said Gretchen, frustrated by how Melissa had upstaged her moment. “See?”

She stood up, arms outstretched in a version of Melissa’s model pose. It was the same purse. Exactly the same in every respect. Gretchen scuttled over to the doorway and arranged herself next to Melissa to make the point, the two purses suspended side by side.

“Besties forever!” said Gretchen.

This was too much. I turned an eye-rolling look toward Marcus, but he was smiling at her and didn’t see me, though I wanted to grab him and shake him and say, “Oh my God, now she IS dressing like her! She is so fucking odd!”

Instead I looked away and, by way of cover, said the first thing that came into my head.

“So, Brad, what did you get up to this afternoon?”

“What do you mean ‘get up to’?” he said, giving me a hard look. “I didn’t get up to anything. Why do you ask?”

“No reason,” I said, backing off hurriedly. I had assumed he was over whatever snit he had gotten into after the restaurant fiasco, but I was clearly wrong. “The fortress was pretty cool.”

“I’ll bet,” he said, his tone mocking and dismissive. “Got yourself a personal tour from Professor Marcus, no doubt. Next thing, you’ll be writing his name with little hearts around it in your exam book. You know, you two really should get together. Oh wait . . .”

He stared unblinking at me, his eyes showing none of the smile that pulled at his lips.

For a second I just looked at him, keeping my own eyes open in case blinking would release a tear.

“You can be a real son of bitch, Brad, you know that?” I said.

“Yeah,” he said. “That’s quite the popular opinion of late. Still, I’m going to open another bottle of this rather excellent Shiraz and just for that remark, Janice, you won’t be getting any.”



I went outside. Though the power was still out, the storm had not come back, and the night was cool and crisp. Besides, I needed some air, and not only because the villa, with its locked-up windows, was stuffy, the air developing an old, recycled quality. I couldn’t wait to get out and clear my head, which frequently and inexplicably felt thick and slow when we were in the house.

I stood on the patio where Kristen and I had seen the pile of leaves swept, it seemed, to form the nonsense word Manos. I looked at the spot now, but there was no trace of it nor any sign of the telltale leaves. I scowled and looked around for more signs of cleaning up, wondering vaguely if the villa had a janitor or gardener who had never been mentioned. Ever since we had arrived and Simon mentioned that someone had left the front gate open, I had been fighting the sensation that there had been someone moving around the grounds just out of my line of sight. I kept stopping to look out, without any clear sense as to why, beyond the size of those floor-to-ceiling windows that made us feel so conspicuous when the lights were on and the world outside was dark. I didn’t feel watched exactly, just exposed, and Gretchen’s tales of nightmare inquisitors, combined with my own confused sense of people moving around the house at night, added to my unease.

“Jan.”