An Anonymous Girl(110)
“The authorities won’t believe Jessica. She broke in here, she stalked you, she was obsessed with me,” she says. “Did you know she was accused of stealing before? There’s a respected director who fired her because of it. She sleeps around and she lies to her family. Jessica is a very disturbed young woman. I have all her survey answers to prove it.”
He briefly slides down his glasses and rubs the bridge of his nose.
When he speaks, his voice booms through the room: “No.”
Thomas finally has the courage to confront Dr. Shields directly. He is no longer trying to escape from her with fake texts and fabricated stories.
“If our stories match, we’ll be okay,” she says desperately. “It’s two respected professionals against one unstable girl.”
He looks at her for a long moment.
“Thomas, I love you so much,” she whispers. “Please.”
Her eyes are glassy with tears.
He shakes his head and stands up. “Jess, I’m going to make sure you get safely home,” he says.
“Lydia, I’ll come back tomorrow morning. We can call the police together then.” He pauses. “If you bring up the video, I’ll tell them I gave Jess the key to our house and she was picking up something for me.”
I stand, leaving the present by my chair, at the precise moment Dr. Shields crumples to the floor.
She is splayed on the carpet, looking up at Thomas, the white fabric of her dress bunched around her legs. Tears stained black by mascara run down her cheeks.
“Good-bye, Lydia,” I say.
Then I turn and walk out of the room.
CHAPTER
SIXTY-NINE
Tuesday, December 25
Of all the losses incurred tonight, the only one that matters is Thomas.
Your job was to test him so that he could be returned to me. Instead, you took him away forever.
Everything is gone now.
Except for the present you left behind.
It is the size of a book, but too thin and light to contain one. The shiny silver wrapping paper is like a carnival mirror, contorting my reflection before tossing it back at me.
A single tug unfurls the red bow. The paper yields to reveal a flat white box.
Inside is a framed photograph.
Even when pain seems to have crescendoed, there can be yet another peak. Seeing this picture pushes me onto that jagged edge.
Thomas is asleep on his stomach, a floral comforter rumpled around his bare torso. But the setting is unfamiliar; he is not in the bed we shared.
Was he in yours, Jessica? Or April’s? Or yet another woman’s?
It no longer matters.
Whenever insomnia gripped me throughout our marriage, his presence always provided comfort. His solid warmth and steady exhalations were a balm to the ceaseless churning of my mind. He never knew how many times I whispered, “I love you,” as he slept on peacefully.
A final question: If you truly loved someone, would you sacrifice your life for theirs?
The answer is simple.
A last note is recorded in the legal pad: a full, detailed, and accurate confession. All of the questions Mrs. Voss sought will finally be answered. Thomas’s involvement with April is left out of the note. It may be enough to save him.
The sheets from the legal pad are left on the table in the foyer, where they will be easily found.
Not too many blocks away from here is a pharmacy that remains open twenty-four hours a day. Even on Christmas.
Thomas’s prescription pad is retrieved from his top dresser drawer; he kept one at home in case of an after-hours patient emergency.
It is completely dark out now; the endless sky is devoid of a single star.
Without Thomas, there will be no light tomorrow.
I write myself a prescription for thirty Vicodin pills, more than enough.
EPILOGUE
Friday, March 30
It seems as though the young woman staring back at me in the reflective glass should look different.
But my curly hair, black leather jacket, and heavy makeup case haven’t changed over the course of the last few months.
Dr. Shields would probably say you can’t judge someone’s internal state by their external attributes, and I know she’s right.
True change isn’t always visible, even when it happens to you.
I shift my makeup case into my left hand, even though my arm doesn’t ache like it used to when I worked for BeautyBuzz. Now that I’ve been hired as a makeup artist for an off-off-Broadway show, I only have to lug it to and from the theater on West Forty-third Street. Lizzie was the one who got me the interview for it; she’s the assistant costume designer.
It isn’t a Gene French production. His career is over. I was never forced to make the moral choice of whether to tell his wife that he was a predator. Katrina and two other women went to the media with their own stories of how he’d abused them. His downfall was swift; behavior like his is no longer allowed to slide by without repercussions.
I think on some level I knew why Katrina was reaching out to me, but I wasn’t ready to stand up to Gene then. There’s not much I’m grateful to Dr. shields for, but at least because of her, I’ll never be anyone’s prey again.
I lean closer to the glass, pressing my forehead against the cool window, so I can see inside.
Breakfast All Day is crowded, with nearly every red-leather upholstered booth and counter stool claimed, even though it’s nearly midnight. Turns out Noah was right; a lot of people crave French toast and eggs Benedict after a Friday evening out.