The Lies I Tell(65)

I tap it and the phone awakes, no password protecting it, as if whoever owns it isn’t worried about stolen data.

There are no photos, no contacts, outgoing or incoming calls. I toggle over to the web browser to look at the browsing history.

My breath hitches in my chest as my eyes scan the list, the familiar names of gambling sites that have haunted my dreams and my darker moments lining up to reveal how well Scott lied.

I scroll down further to the date of the concert in the park. The time of the attempted breach at the bank. It was Scott who’d tried to access my account.

Quickly, I toggle over to the settings to see what email is linked to the phone. And even though I’m expecting it, even though I’m bracing for what I know I’ll find, it still feels like a punch in the chest.

Calistasniece at Yahoo.





Meg


September

Eight Weeks before the Election

All roads lead back to Canyon Drive. Once again, I find myself sitting in my car, staring at my childhood home. How many times have I parked in this exact spot? How many hours have I lost, remembering the way we were tossed out, clothes hastily shoved into garbage bags, no time to even put on my shoes as the sheriff stood in the foyer and neighbors wandered onto their driveways and wide lawns to watch.

But today is different. Today I’m doing the final walk-through with my buying clients, Gretchen and Rick. Clients I poached from a colleague after I overheard him talking about what kind of a house they needed. A few phone calls, a coincidental encounter at an open house, an off-the-record opportunity, not even listed yet. Who wouldn’t jump at the chance to snag a property in today’s competitive market?

Canyon Drive will be closing tomorrow, and Ron has moved into a hotel until we can find him something more fitting for a state senator, a necessary pivot away from income properties that were never part of my plan. And now I will be going back inside my home—not for the first time, but for the last.

The first time had been just over a month ago in early August, to show the house to Gretchen and Rick. Ron had been there as well, so I’d had to keep my expression curious and open.

I’d been surprised by how much had changed. The floors were now stained dark instead of the blond wood I remembered. The brick fireplace had been refaced in marble, and the kitchen was completely new. But as I’d stood at the sink staring out the window and into the backyard, the view had been exactly as I’d remembered it. The same lawn sloping down toward the tall hedges in back. The sycamore tree, the shape of its branches exactly the same, all the way down to the pocket where two of the larger limbs met, the width of my hips, the perfect spot to read or hide from my mother and Ron.

I’d led Gretchen and Rick through the rooms on the main floor, Ron opting to wait outside while we looked around. Upstairs, I somehow managed to show them the features — the primary bedroom and bath, a balcony off the seating area, gesturing to the doorway of my old bedroom. “Guest plus bath,” I’d said, letting Gretchen and Rick enter alone, not wanting the memories of those last few months to clutter my mind.

Today, though, I’m early. I glance at my phone again, hoping I’ll see something from Kat. She’s been quiet for weeks, ignoring my texts and calls. Veronica hasn’t heard from her either. A flicker of worry passes through me as I imagine her trying to figure out how to pay off that credit card on her own. There’s no way she can manage it on what she’s been writing lately—articles about cuticle care and the power of essential oils.

I’m almost certain Kat believes I was the one who opened the credit card and ran up all that debt. I don’t know exactly how much she knows about where I’ve been for the past ten years, but every job I’ve done would indicate I’m exactly who she thinks I am—a con artist, an opportunist, twisting reality to suit my purposes. Setting up a politician with one hand while simultaneously stealing money from a down-on-her-luck journalist with the other. Which means she’ll be even more determined to expose me. To write something that will not only pay well, but finally open the door to bigger publications. I knew this was who she was from the beginning; I can’t be angry with her about it now.

I flip through my keys until I find the right one. “The front door is made of oak, milled from a forest in Virginia. A tree that probably greeted the colonists of Jamestown before arriving here to keep us safe.” My words a quiet whisper under the covered porch that still smells exactly as I remember—grass and mildew from stucco that never completely dries.

I step into the cool foyer, taking in the space. The house is now empty of Ron’s horrible chrome and leather furniture, and I can let the ghosts return. Take the time to finally say goodbye. I move through the downstairs, past the main staircase with a window seat on the landing, passing into a family room once lined with bookshelves.

The house may be different, but its landmarks are the same. The railing on the wall as I ascend the back staircase is the same texture, with the same divots and dips in the wood. I run my hand along it, reacquainting myself. The fourth stair still creaks in exactly the same way I remember, and I spend a minute there, passing up and down, just so I can hear it. I close my eyes, pretending my mother is still alive, still in the house with me, just out of sight around the corner; any moment she’ll speak. Hurry up, slowpoke.

A dog barking from a distant yard snaps me back to the present. I continue up the stairs, making my way to my old bedroom, the one with the dormer window overlooking the backyard and the walk-in closet where the slant of the roof meets the floor at a 45-degree angle.