Confessions on the 7:45(33)

Now, he had the uneasy sense that he’d done something wrong, something that would result in having his iPad taken away from him.

As he stood outside the doorway and listened to his parents lie to the strangers, he wondered if maybe he should say something—about how he’d recorded Geneva leaving. But then he just didn’t.

Words didn’t always come out right. And he’d gotten in trouble for saying things he shouldn’t say—like the time he told Mom that Dad slept in his underwear on the couch, in the daytime when she was working. Or that Dad had let them eat toaster waffles for dinner or watch a movie that gave Stephen nightmares. Hey, buddy, his dad said. There’s a bro code. Don’t rat out your old man to your mom. It’s not cool.

Not cool.

That, according to Eli, was the worst thing you could be.

So he just stayed quiet. And when the strangers were finally gone, he was glad. He hoped that they wouldn’t come back. And that tomorrow Geneva would return from her castle and everything would go back to normal.



THIRTEEN

Selena

Lies are a virus. They spread, replicate. One lie breeds more. Selena’s mother always said that, usually when talking about Selena’s father. You have to keep lying to protect the original lie. The idea bounced around Selena’s head now as she watched from the walkway, knowing she should go back inside but frozen.

The detectives crossed the street, wind tossing leaves across the lawn, sun dipping behind clouds. Feeling eyes on her, she turned to see Graham standing in the window, his form dark, face in shadows. Once the cops had left, he’d dropped that genial facade he put on so well. He’d turned sullen, wouldn’t look at her, returned inside.

Who are you? she thought.

He was a stranger inside her house, her bed, her heart.

And where is Geneva?

There were always little things, Selena’s mother said when she came clean about Dad’s many affairs. A phone call at a strange hour. Once an earring clasp—something cheap and insubstantial—found while she was cleaning the car. A receipt in his pocket from a restaurant in a city she wasn’t aware he’d visited. He traveled for work; there were women in his life—clients and colleagues. Everything was easily pushed away. She wanted to push things away; she’d admitted this. If she acknowledged what she knew in her heart to be true, she’d have to do something about it. Incurious, that was the word she used. Willfully incurious.

Selena’s father became bolder, almost flagrant. Her mother became blinder, developed migraines. Selena remembered the closed door, how she’d push inside to the dark room and see her mother lying on the bed with a cool cloth over her eyes. Selena would slip in beside her and her mother would wrap her up in her slender arms without a word. How unhappy Cora must have been. How had she borne it?

Selena hadn’t understood, not really, when her mother finally confided to Marisol and her about the affairs—years after their divorce. She pretended to understand. But secretly she wondered—how could you, Mom? How could you let him treat you that way? She understood now, how you turned away until you couldn’t. Until the pain of knowing and doing nothing was greater than the fear of what might come next.

She should have turned Graham away on Friday night. She should have told the police he was sleeping with Geneva. But what about the boys?

Now what would happen?

Don’t you wish your problems would just go away?

Geneva wasn’t the problem. The problem was Graham.

She went inside, closed the door. The house felt hushed, as if everyone were holding their breaths. The boys were quiet; the television droned upstairs.

“I don’t have to say it, right?”

She startled. Graham was standing in the arch between the living room and the hallway. “What?”

“That whatever this is, it has nothing to do with me.”

He stood there watching her. And for a moment it was as if she was seeing him for the first time. Her husband. The adulterer. The liar. What else?

“Selena,” he said. His voice was almost stern. “Say something.”

The world spun.

Then the doorbell rang, startling them both. When she opened it, Detective Crowe stood waiting there.

“Mrs. Murphy,” he said. “I think we’ve found Geneva Markson’s vehicle parked on your street. Did you know she’d left it?”

Selena shook her head, felt something catch in her throat. “No.”

She wasn’t even sure what kind of car Geneva drove; the other woman never parked in their driveway and she always used their second car, a late-model Subaru, to drive the boys around.

She followed the detective’s gaze and saw a white Toyota parked across the street. People had started to gather. A squad car arrived.

“Were you planning on going anywhere today?” he asked.

She shook her head. “I’ll work from home.”

“Your husband.”

Something about the way he said it made her stomach bottom out. “He’s—between jobs at the moment.”

Between jobs? That sounded shady. But the detective only nodded, polite, neutral.

“So, yeah, he’ll be here, I mean.” Graham stood in the dark of the hallway, stiff, frozen.

“We may come back with more questions,” said the detective. Was there something in his tone? “We’d appreciate it if you could both be around.”