Lies She Told(69)

It’s not until I reach the Staten Island ferry terminal that I see one: a massive container with corroding blue paint and white bubble letters spray-painted on its sides. The receptacle begs to be emptied. Black garbage bags are piled so high inside that they force open the rubber lid.

I stroll past the bin, glancing around to see whether there are cameras or particularly interested patrolmen. No blue uniforms stand out in the throngs of commuters. Again, I stroll to the container, this time parking my baby right beside it. I crouch to the basket beneath Vicky’s bassinet and grab the flip-flops along with an unused diaper, with which I hastily wrap the shoes. When they’re covered, sort of, I stand on my tiptoes and drop them atop a closed trash bag. There’s no need to push the thongs farther into the garbage. No one is looking for Colleen’s shoes. By the time they do, these will be in a landfill.

With the last of the evidence gone, I feel a lightness that I haven’t since before learning of my husband’s affair. Nothing in my possession connects me to Colleen anymore. I’ve discarded everything, even Jake.

I push the stroller away from the trash and breathe in my freedom. I’m single in Manhattan for the first time since turning twenty-four. And at least for the next four weeks until my maternity leave ends, I don’t have a job to worry about. What should Vicky and I do? How should we amuse ourselves?

I look down into the bassinet. My daughter’s mouth moves back and forth, sucking on an imaginary nipple. Her eyes are closed. The sunshine and fresh air has worked its magic.

New question. How should I amuse myself?

Tyler’s handsome face comes to mind. What better way to kill time?





LIZA


Bail bondsmen do not have offices on the Upper East Side. The types of establishments that grant loans to the wives of suspected killers know there’s little money to be made operating out of the ground floor of a ritzy condominium. They set up shop in commercial buildings across from jails and courthouses—the kind of locales that don’t frown upon neon lights in the window advertising “Get Out Fast.”

The closest bondsman is south of Houston. A taxi driver ferries me thirty minutes through traffic from my fertility doctor’s office to a grimy street in the financial district lined with electronics repair shops. I spot the place a hundred yards before we pass it. Who could mistake a yellow awning with spray-painted black handcuffs? I ask the driver to let me out on the corner even though he could easily stop in front of the store.

My legs wobble as I exit the cab and head to a neon sign boasting “Affordable Bail.” It’s an oxymoronic phrase if there ever was one. Securing David’s release will cost a million dollars. Seventy percent of the cost of our majority-bank-owned apartment. His entire post-tax salary for the past five years. More than the sum of my life’s earnings.

When David had revealed the price, my head had hammered so hard that I’d feared a stroke. He’d explained that we only needed to post 10 percent of the coupon, as though that was supposed to make me feel better. I’d responded that a hundred thousand would liquidate our savings, effectively bankrupting us. Any more would have had the virtue of being impossible.

David had not taken kindly to my preference that he await trial in jail. He’d assured me, voice filled with righteous indignation, that when the state ultimately drops the charges, he will sue for every penny of his bail, plus personal damages. He’d also threatened to have Cameron secure his release with a loan from the business, if I “couldn’t be bothered.” The idea of David’s secretary showered with his gratitude made me ill. After all, she wouldn’t be on the hook for the money if he skipped town.

I reach the store and loiter outside, reluctant to hand over the bank check in my wallet. In all likelihood, we’ll never get this money back. I’ve written too many stories about “wrongfully” accused characters to think that the state files charges willy-nilly against upper-middle-class people. Either the defendant is being framed, or he’s guilty of something.

The exterior of the bail bondsman’s reminds me of a dive bar: brick outside, neon signs in the picture window. Inside, however, it is set up like a miniature version of my local Chase bank. There’s a bar-height wooden desk topped by a likely bulletproof glass wall. On the other side, a heavyset man eats lunch at a blond Ikea-type desk, biting into a foot-long sub with the paper peeled back to reveal bread as thick as my bicep. He wears a pinstriped shirt and tie, no jacket. His neck has been tanned to the color of marmalade.

I wait for him to finish chewing before announcing my presence. He looks up from the sandwich, takes another bite, and points to a door in the corner. I hear it unlock as I reach it. The man welcomes me into his office. Lettuce is wedged between his incisors as he smiles and asks how he may help.

I start bawling. Adrenaline and my doctor’s wary stare kept me from crying over the phone, but I can’t maintain composure in the face of a simple pleasantry. I know that’s all his offer is. This man doesn’t want to “help” me. He wants to charge me the down payment on a mansion for a short-term loan that he’ll get back the moment David shows for his court date. Yet the offer of help, said without condescension, sounds so good.

I follow him, sobbing, to a desk stacked with file folders. As I sit in a rolling chair, he offers a tissue from a drawer, which only makes me cry harder. He walks me through the documentation I need in the manner of an oncologist delivering a bad diagnosis. Yes, he’s getting rich off of me, but he feels my pain. Everything is accessible through my smartphone or his computer. Bank statements. Property records. Twenty minutes later, my bail bondsman—I never thought I’d say those words—makes a call. I’m told that that my husband is out. I can go home.