The Night Shift(4)

As she struggles to get her giant, eight-month-pregnant body out of the bed, the text finally arrives.

Yes.



Always an economy of words with Stan. She’ll call him from the car.

After showering—a precarious endeavor of stepping into the tub without crashing to the floor—Keller puts on her maternity suit, one of two that still fits. She smells something coming from the kitchen. She’s not one to buy into old wives’ tales about pregnancy, but her senses really are heightened.

Bob’s out of bed and washing a pan in the sink. On the small kitchen table, he’s set a plate with scrambled eggs and grilled tomatoes on a bagel. All month he’s been preparing recipes from a website catering to pregnant women.

“You didn’t have to get up,” she says.

“When Clarice Starling gets a text at five in the morning, I know I’d better cook or my bambinos will only get a PowerBar to keep ’em going.” He pulls back the chair for her to sit.

“I’ve gotta run. Stan needs me to—”

“Ah, ah, ah, when Stan has two humans in his belly he can tell you to hurry up.” Bob sits across from her. He has bags under his eyes and looks ragged.

“What time did you get home last night?” she asks. He’s a soundman at a recording studio, his schedule at the whim of the artists.

“Three or so,” he says. “A rowdy polka band,” he adds, as if that explains the late night. She doesn’t know if he’s kidding. It’s hard to tell sometimes.

“You shouldn’t have gotten up, I can get my own—”

“I almost forgot, I made you something.” He jumps out of his chair and retrieves a thermos from the counter.

“Please, not the pregnancy smoothie you’ve been going on about?”

He raises his eyebrows up and down.

When she finishes the bagel, Bob helps her out of the chair.

“I’m pregnant, not incapacitated, you know.”

Bob doesn’t reply. He kneels so he’s facing her belly. Looking down at his bald head—the dome surrounded by the doughnut of hair that is ironic without him intending it to be—Keller feels a surge of warmth run through her.

“Take care of your mama, little Feebies,” Bob tells her tummy.

Keller has never discharged her firearm in the line of duty, yet her husband treats her like she’s a serial-killer hunter.

Today, though, maybe she is.





CHAPTER 4


ELLA





The survivor, Jesse Duvall, sits in the corner on the floor, her arms wrapped around her knees, head down.

The room is too bright, the paper covering the exam table wrinkled and ripped.

Without looking up, the teen says, “I already told you assholes that I don’t need an examination. Now leave me the fuck alone.”

It’s not a yell. She sounds more tired. Matter of fact.

Ella says, “No one’s going to touch you without your permission.”

Jesse’s head pops up. She has a pretty face, large, almond-shaped eyes. A curious expression. “Who are you?”

“My name’s Ella. I’m a counselor.”

This seems to amuse Jesse. “Where do you counsel—a strip club?”

Humor—even dark humor—is a good sign. Ella’s instincts tell her that this girl is strong. Ignoring the jab, she says, “I know right now you want nothing but to be left alone. To go home to your own bed.”

“Home.” Jesse says the word with derision.

Ella realizes she’s already made her first mistake. Mr. Steadman told her that Jesse’s a foster kid.

“The thing is,” Ella continues, “that whoever hurt you and your friends, he’s still out there. We need to make sure he can’t hurt anyone else. You may have seen something that can help the police catch—”

Jesse murmurs something; her head’s on her knees again.

“What was that?”

Jesse says nothing.

“I know this is hard and—”

Jesse’s head snaps up. “How would you know? Because you read it in some book? Or because you talk to housewives about their feelings? Or rich kids about their anxiety over getting into a good college? Lady, I’ve talked to dozens of you people, and the only difference between them and you is that they weren’t dressed like a ho.”

“But I do know, Jesse. I do.”

Jesse listens while Ella explains. About coming into the break room on New Year’s Eve 1999. About the crushing blow to her head. About not remembering much else until they found her in a ring of red in the snow after she’d come to and run outside. She tries to keep it clinical but she feels the tears filling her eyes. She leaves out the part about awaking to Katie’s nearly decapitated head on her lap, as if her friend had crawled to her for help and died there. And she leaves out the recurring nightmare of the figure bending down, sliding the blade into her as he whispered: “Good night, pretty girl.”

“They weren’t my friends,” Jesse says when Ella’s finished. “I barely knew them.” For the first time, her voice breaks.

“You were buying ice cream?”

She shakes her head. “I just needed to use the bathroom. When I came out…”