Such a Quiet Place: A Novel(6)

Our backyards collided, high white fences in a grid, granting the illusion of privacy. We couldn’t see one another, but we could hear everything, though we pretended we couldn’t. Everyone was reduced to a caricature of themselves on the other side of the fence, winnowed down to their most defining features. Sometimes you could see colors moving through the thin slats, the movement of a person, when you thought you were alone.

On a typical weekend morning around this time, most people were up, working on house projects or reading in their backyards. Others would ride their bikes around the lake into downtown, or go for a walk before the heat really kicked in.

But on this particular Saturday, the neighborhood appeared quiet. Sleepy is what the news reports once called us, as if we were collectively lazy, oblivious to the danger among us.

In truth, summers here were always dangerous. In their luxury. In their sleepiness. With their lack of structure and sudden influx of time. Time to notice the things we were too busy for during the rest of the year. Time to fixate. Time to make a change.

Anything taken to an extreme was dangerous. Here, in the summer, there was nowhere to hide—not from others and not from yourself.

On the surface, Hollow’s Edge could still give the illusion of a quiet little neighborhood, but that was a lie. Even if it had been true at one time, the reality was a very different thing now. One thing I could say for sure: We had all awakened.



* * *



THE POOL WAS NOT crowded, for which I was grateful. Ruby had already claimed a blue lounge chair, setting herself up by the pool steps. But she had my key, and I couldn’t get in without calling her attention.

Chase, thankfully, wasn’t here. Neither was Mac.

There was a man in the far corner, a dark hat pulled low over sunglasses, chair angled directly toward the sun, tanned arms resting beside his pale torso. Preston Seaver. Mac’s younger brother. I wasn’t surprised; he could usually be found at the pool on the weekend, probably on a mission to even out his tan. Preston worked in security at the college during the week and always seemed to know what was happening, in and out of work—and he was usually all too willing to share.

Preston Seaver, who had told the police how one time, when Ruby and Mac were fighting, someone had broken into their home and smashed some dishes, establishing a pattern. Preston, who now held me at arm’s length, like I was not to be trusted.

But it was a mutual distrust, and I wasn’t sure which of ours was the strongest. The way he’d turned on Ruby so fast. I warned my brother, he’d told them. As if he had always sensed some menace lurking in her, threatening to emerge.

Sometimes, when he looked at me, I wondered if he saw in me something untoward. Something worth warning his brother about, too.

Now he remained perfectly still, but I couldn’t tell whether he’d noticed Ruby or was sleeping. They had never gotten along, not even before. Preston believed Ruby was full of herself; Ruby believed Preston was irrelevant, an unfortunate extension of Mac’s existence. Even before, they could circle each other without interacting. It was a skill, but it worked only by joint agreement, some sort of pact they had entered into together.

Margo Wellman had noticed Ruby, though. She had the baby in the pool, and every few seconds she sneaked a glance—but she didn’t change her own plans. She was pulling the baby—a toddler now—in a yellow float, in lazy circles.

I stood at the gated entrance, not wanting to call Ruby’s name—not wanting to declare an allegiance, disrupt the balance—when she approached the edge of the pool, crouching down. “Is this your little one?” she asked Margo.

Margo didn’t move any closer, but she didn’t retreat, either. She was just out of reach of Ruby, and she pulled the float subconsciously closer. “Yes, this is Nicholas.” Nicholas had the same curly red hair as his mother, fine and wispy but undeniably hers. Margo had her hair tied up in a bun on top of her head to keep dry, though tendrils had come loose and clung to her neck, waterlogged.

“Hi, Nicholas,” Ruby said, waving. She smiled when Nicholas waved back, all chubby arms and baby-faced delight. “Congrats, Margo, he’s precious.”

“Thank you,” Margo answered.

Nothing about Ruby being out or here. No apologies or condolences or congratulations. Their entire interaction was exquisitely, painfully civil. Nothing about the fact that it was Margo’s camera, with its wide-angled view of the lake and the path cutting into the woods, that had caught Ruby running down through the trees that night—making us wonder if she might’ve been disposing of some evidence in the lake or the surrounding woods, though nothing was ever found.

When she stood back up, Ruby noticed me at the gate and smiled as she let me in. “Look who decided to come after all.”

“Hey,” I said. I held up my pool bag. “I have towels and sunscreen. And the food.” As if her lack of preparedness was my reason for coming. The scorching summer Virginia sun, which she might’ve forgotten about.

“I can always count on you,” she said.

Margo caught my eye as I passed. I wanted to explain. To tell her I was here to diffuse any sort of situation. To keep my eye on Ruby; to deescalate.

With her free hand, Margo hitched the navy blue strap of her swimsuit farther up one shoulder, then the other, her gaze trailing after us. It seemed like Margo’s body kept changing by degrees ever since the baby was born, month after month, in subtle realignments, so that she was constantly fidgeting with a strap, or cinching a waistband, or holding a neckline in place.