Acts of Violet(54)
Fortunately, the shouting man sounds farther and farther away.
Unfortunately, because everything around me is already dark, I don’t realize I’m blacking out until a split second before I hit the floor.
It’s light out when I open my eyes. How did I get back here, back in my own bed?
Did I sleepwalk offstage, out of the theater, and back home?
That doesn’t seem plausible. Instead, it could be I’m remembering a dream for the first time in my life.
Except, when I sit up and swing my legs out of bed, a piece of gold braiding falls to the floor.
Behind me, Gabriel asks, “Where did you go last night?”
I sweep the braiding under the bed with my foot and turn around to find my husband watching me with solemn professional detachment. It reminds me of the time a police officer came by the salon to ask about a nearby break-in. I had no connection to the incident and no helpful info to offer, but I felt an undercurrent of fear and guilt the entire time he questioned me. As if he were going to reveal I perpetrated a crime I had no knowledge of.
That’s how I feel now as I urge myself to stay calm and neutral, as I mentally draft an appropriate response. Meanwhile, Gabriel has more to say.
“It used to be, I’d wake up in the middle of the night, and if you weren’t in bed, I could search the other rooms of the house and find you crashed out on a sofa or armchair, once in a while at the kitchen table. But last night, when I saw you weren’t in bed, I couldn’t find you anywhere in the house.” He rubs a spot in the center of his forehead where he gets stress headaches. “I checked the backyard, but you weren’t out there, and you weren’t wandering the front yard trying to get back into the house either—yeah, Quinn told me about that. You shouldn’t have asked her not to.”
Annoyance at Quinn for not keeping my secret is quickly superseded by shame at asking her to keep it in the first place. I open my mouth to speak, still unsure of what to say, but Gabriel puts up a finger. He’s not done yet.
“If you left the house, it would’ve made sense for you to take your car keys or wallet or phone, but those were all here. I didn’t know what I should do. Wake up Quinn to see if she knew where you’d gone? Search the neighborhood? Call the police? I did another sweep of the house, this time checking the basement and closets. You weren’t there. So I went back upstairs, intending to get dressed and drive around until I found you, or go to the police if I didn’t. Wanna guess what happened next?”
I shake my head, a nameless turmoil scrambling my thoughts.
“I found you.” A lifeless laugh as he rakes his fingers through his hair. “In bed, like you’d never left. Fetal position, blankets thrown off you, dead asleep.”
“Oh.” My surprise ushers in no relief.
“I know, right?” he says, as if I’ve just delivered an insight-filled soliloquy. “How could I not have seen you coming back to bed? Our house isn’t that big and the floors creak like a mofo, so it shouldn’t be possible. And yet…”
And yet.
“I don’t know what happened,” I say. “I must’ve been sleepwalking. And the other week, too, when Quinn found me outside.”
“There’s more to it. More you’re not telling me.” His gaze intensifies, and I have to peer closely to find the flecks of amber hiding in his dark eyes. “Obviously tomorrow’s vigil is fucking you up, but I wish you’d … I don’t know…”
“Tell you the nitty-gritty of exactly how it’s fucking me up?”
“Kinda, yeah.”
I can’t keep withholding, but I can’t tell him the full story, either. “It’s all these pictures of pseudo-Violet everywhere. I saw one the other day … and I could’ve sworn it was really her.” Unsure if I should be impressed or repulsed by my double-talk, I aim for more sincerity. “But it’s more than that. I’m worried about Quinn speaking at the vigil, but it’s more than that, too. For the last few years, it seemed like we were finally settling into a rhythm. Sure, the weeks around the vigil would suck, but then we got to carry on in our post-Violet lives. Now, with the whole world obsessed with my sister again, everything seems so much more chaotic.”
“Do you think it might be time to—”
“Get professional help? Already on it. I recently started seeing a counselor. From the looks of it, she and I will have plenty more to talk about in our next session.”
Most of the storm has cleared from his face, but a few dark clouds keep his eyebrows knitted together. “I’m not a fan of you hiding things from me. It’s one thing for us to choose to protect our daughter from certain unpleasant realities, but I’m your husband. I thought we had that whole trust-and-open-communication thing going that’s supposed to keep marriages healthy.”
“We did. We do.” Tears spring to my eyes and I blink hard, furious with myself. “I thought I could handle this on my own, without burdening you.”
“Well, knock it off.” Gabriel grabs the nearest pillow and swats me with it. “I’ve burdened you plenty with my crap over the years.” He counts off on his fingers. “Alcoholic dad, absent mom who only reappears when she needs money, celebrity sister who went missing—oh wait, that one’s yours.”
We exchange crooked smiles.