Confessions on the 7:45(104)

Selena had severed ties with her father. She had no room in her life for someone who’d invited so much darkness into his family.

Their other house languished on the market for a time—no one wanted to live where a killer had lived. But people had short memories, and a few months after Graham’s conviction, the story seemed to fade from the public consciousness. The house sold for a bit less than market value. But it was worth it to move on from a place where, as her mother put it, the ghosts of broken dreams lived around every corner.

The house they lived in now, an 1880 farmhouse in an upstate New York town called The Hollows, was a project. It needed work, and it occupied much of Selena’s time and attention when she wasn’t writing or caring for the boys. Which is exactly why she bought it. The last thing she needed was free time.

Outside, she heard tires crunching on the drive. She saved her work and headed downstairs in time to watch Will come through the front door, holding a large bouquet of tiger lilies, her favorite.

He’d recused himself as Graham’s lawyer to become hers after the attack. Another lawyer defended Graham when he went to trial.

Now, Selena and Will were—friends. She knew he wanted more. He knew she was nowhere near ready. She needed space to find herself. Finally.

“What’s this?” she asked, taking the flowers. She gave him a squeeze and a kiss on the cheek.

“It’s—you know,” he started. “Just something to brighten the day.”

“Thank you,” she said. “You’re good to me, Will.”

It was Friday. Will came over most Friday afternoons to play with the boys in the yard, then for pizza and movies. Sometimes, Marisol and her kids joined, as well. It was something they’d set up to create a sense of normalcy for Oliver and Stephen—and it seemed to work. Their therapist said that she was doing all the right things, that the boys were dealing with things in a healthy, normal way. Only time would tell.

But did Oliver seem more sullen and dark? Was the pitch of Stephen’s tantrums more desperate? Would any of them ever be whole again? Would the darkness from their father, from her own father, infect them? Was it wound into their DNA?

These were the things that kept her up at night, worrying about the contagion of secrets and lies, dark impulses, violent tendencies.

At the kitchen table, she and Will chatted a while—about her book, about a case he was working on, what movies they should watch tonight. When he offered to pick up the kids so that she could get a workout, she agreed. The boys were always happy to see Will; he filled a space that was empty in each of them now. And she was grateful for his friendship, to all of them. A good man, if flawed in some ways, if not a perfect match for Selena, an honest and respectful one. Paulo, too, was a strong and positive influence. Her boys had men to look to, role models of the kind of quiet strength that comes from integrity and a heart that can love women well.

When he left, she went upstairs and put on her running shoes, her workout clothes. Then she hit the rural road that led away from the house. The air was warm, and the sky clear. It took her a while to find her stride after sitting at her computer all day. But the music pumping in her headphones—Nirvana today, Kurt Cobain’s ghostly voice raw and wild—brought her energy up. She’d gone a mile when her phone pinged. She slowed to check it, in case Will had run into issues at the school.

Instead there was a text from an unfamiliar number. It wasn’t the first time. She hadn’t told anyone, but Pearl reached out to her every few months—usually coinciding with a news cycle that included something about Graham. There was a connection there, something strange but true.

I’ve been thinking of you. I’m happy-ish. Hope you are, too.
Selena never answered. She knew she wasn’t expected to. There wasn’t going to be more to the relationship than there was. Pearl had disappeared completely, gone without a trace. She was a wanted woman, charges pending for fraud, extortion, blackmail. Apparently, the list of people she and Geneva had scammed and conned was long—most of them men, most of those men guilty of something themselves. Selena was supposed to report contact to the police, but she wasn’t going to do that. In her heart, there was a painful kind of gratitude. She’d destroyed Selena’s life. She’d saved Selena’s life. She’d taken something. Given something. It was complicated.

I saw a picture of Graham in the joint. He really looks like shit. What did you ever see in him?
Selena laughed a little; sometimes Pearl was funny. Sometimes her texts sounded sad, lonely. Other times they were inane—a comment on the price of gasoline or some news event. Occasionally, she sounded angry. The day Graham was convicted: I’m glad he got what he deserved. Now you’re free. If she knew about the book Selena was writing, she hadn’t said. Selena imagined that Pearl would have a comment or two about that. But whatever the missive, Pearl always ended her communications the same way, a kind of inside joke.

Selena waited, watching the little gray dots pulse.

It’s Martha, by the way.
From the train.


ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Every novel is a journey. It starts with a germ, a thought, a moment. And even though the writing of it is a solitary thing, a quiet and daily evolution from idea to finished novel, there’s a whole universe of people who help in all kinds of ways bring it out into the world.

For me, everything begins and ends with my husband, Jeffrey, and our daughter, Ocean. They fill my life with love and laughter and keep me grounded in the things that are important, offering endless support and encouragement. I would be a lesser person and a lesser writer without them.