The Maid's Diary(31)

Vanessa motions for a server. They place their orders and Daisy asks for a glass of water. As soon as the server retreats, Vanessa leans forward, lowers her husky voice, and says, “Okay. Spill. What’s the matter? Is it the baby? Because I can see something is going on.”

Daisy glances out the window as she clasps her hand around the diamond pendant at her throat. She desperately racks her brain for an excuse for her jittery behavior. Instead, something crumples inside her chest, and she cannot hold it in any longer.

“I feel like I’m losing my mind,” she says, meeting her friend’s warm gaze. “I’m this crazy roller coaster of emotions. One second I’m sky high, next I’m at the bottom of despair. I feel nervous, scared, even paranoid. And so forgetful—my memory is totally screwed. I can’t regulate my own body temperature. I’m craving food all the time. I feel fat. My skin’s breaking out. I feel ugly.” Emotion blurs her vision. “Look at me. I can’t control a damn thing. I’m going to sit here bawling into my harvest soup.”

Vanessa covers Daisy’s hand with her own. “It’s okay. It’s normal, Daisy.”

“Not for you. Christ, look at you. You’re—”

“Oh, believe me, I’m having my moments. I even spoke to my ob-gyn about it. She told me that during pregnancy and postpartum periods, a lot of women experience at least some degree of cognitive change. Colloquially it’s known as ‘pregnancy brain.’ My ob-gyn said the most common symptoms are forgetfulness, memory disturbances, poor concentration, increased absentmindedness, difficulty reading and concentrating. Pregnancy can even make you fearful, or paranoid. She gave me some material to read. I can pass it on if you like.”

They sit back in their chairs as the server arrives and places the soup bowls and glasses of water in front of them. When the waitress leaves, Vanessa says, “My doc tells me it’s the body’s way of preparing for motherhood, for nesting, becoming biologically primed to protect your baby at the exclusion of everything else in the world. You become afraid of things that you were not scared of before—to keep yourself and your baby safe.” She laughs. “Pregnancy can literally make you a stupid, fearful beeotch.”

Daisy smiles halfheartedly and picks up her soup spoon.

“Don’t worry so much,” Vanessa says, taking a sip of water. “It’ll pass—it’ll all pass.”

“I don’t know.” Daisy stirs her soup. She glances up. “I think I’m being watched, followed. I’m pretty sure I am.”

“What?”

She’s done it—she’s said the quiet part out loud; now she has no choice but to follow through. She inhales deeply. “Someone has been watching our house from the lane behind our yard. And while we were at yoga the other day, there was this guy in black lurking up on the sidewalk.”

“I didn’t see him.”

“Well, I did, and I’m sure he was watching us—me. And I . . . I’ve had some weird text messages via my apps—texts from unknown numbers that disappear. And—”

“Disappear?”

She can see the doubt in her friend’s face.

“Yeah, you know those self-destruct texts? You can program them to vanish after a set time. And then today, for the first time, I got a bunch of really horrendous—threatening—comments on my Insta post.”

“What did they say?”

“They said they wanted my baby to die.”

Vanessa goes pale. “Can I see them?”

“I—I deleted them. Right away. Just reflexively killed them all on the spot. And a DM with a horrible GIF.”

“So you don’t have any way of finding out which account sent them?”

“Not unless the account sends them again. I know, I should have kept them. For proof. If I need to go to the police or something.”

“You have nothing?”

“No.”

“What did the comments say, exactly?”

“That I am nothing but the wife of a washed-up ski racer. Another that said they ‘see’ me—as though they’re watching everything I do.”

“You need to go into your settings, Daisy, and disable the comments,” Vanessa says. “And make your account private.”

Daisy’s chest constricts at the idea of cutting off all the love and approval. “It’s not just online. Someone stuck a physical note on my windshield that referenced my Instagram account handle—whoever is doing this is in this city. They knew I would be staging a condo downtown.”

Vanessa stares. “My God,” she whispers. “You need to report this, Daisy. You need to go to the police.”

Daisy inhales deeply, looks away. At all the faces passing the window. Anonymous faces. Could be any one of those faces. She has more than eight thousand followers now, and whoever posted the comments doesn’t even need to be a follower.

“How can I go to the police? Just walk into some station with nothing to show them?”

“You have the note from your car, right?”

I SEE YOU @JUSTDAISYDAILY.

I KNOW WHO YOU ARE . . .

Daisy feels as though she’s going to throw up. She doesn’t want police asking too many questions about what she might have done to incur this.