Goodnight Beautiful(30)
“Bingo,” Sheehy says.
“Didn’t come home from work?” Annie says. “I hope you’re not suggesting there’s any chance that Sam . . . left?” She’s doing her best to stay composed. “He drove home in a terrible storm. He was probably in an accident.”
Sheehy and Gently exchange a look, and then Sheehy nods and returns the notebook to his pocket. “We’ve got an eye out for his car, as do the state police. If he was in an accident, we’ll find him and get him help. In the meantime, Mrs. Statler, the best thing you can do is get some rest.”
She forces a smile and stands up. “Thank you. I’ll give that a try.”
She leads them to the door, remaining at the window until the headlights of their car disappear down the driveway. Taking her phone from her pocket, she checks again—no missed calls—and opens a new text message. Hello dear husband, she types, swallowing the fear. I really hate this. Can you please come home now?
Chapter 19
I log in, stretch my neck, and begin my review.
Misery, by Stephen King.
My head is still spinning.
I stumbled across a friend’s copy, and while I planned to skim the first few pages, I read the whole thing in one sitting. I’ve noticed some reviewers are using words like deranged and lunatic to refer to Annie Wilkes, but I find that both wholly unfitting and highly insensitive. It’s clear to me that our protagonist’s suffering is the result of deep psychological wounds inflicted in childhood. As an adult, she is coping the best she can, using a variety of defense mechanisms—fixation, denial, regression—not to mention (unsuccessfully) trying to repress the anger she feels as a childless, middle-aged woman. Does she always make the best choices? Of course not. But it’s not evil that drives her, it’s anguish.
(Those interested in this topic should check out the lecture “Misery and Womanhood,” by Dr. Anne [sic] Potter, a former Columbia professor and Guggenheim fellow, available on YouTube.)
Ending was rushed. Four stars.
I post the review and push away from the computer, exhausted. I came across Annie’s lecture yesterday evening, after dinner. They’d spelled her name wrong in the description, which is why I missed it in my initial search. “Misery and Womanhood.” After seeing the title, I was looking forward to hearing her address the innumerable reasons why so many women are unhappy, but then I watched it and realized that she meant the horror novel by Stephen King, the same book Sam had been reading (how sweet). Forty-two minutes of Dr. Potter exploring Annie Wilkes’s psyche and contemplating her role as both mother and seductress—which I watched six times in a row—and my curiosity was piqued. Before I knew it, I was turning the last page at two o’clock in the morning.
Heading through the kitchen, I open the door to Agatha Lawrence’s study, taking in the clean scent of the room. I did it—I got this place in order finally. I couldn’t fall asleep after finishing the book and decided to make myself useful. At first I was simply going to put away Agatha’s papers and get rid of the boxes—be done with her for good—but before I knew it, I was sixteen miles away at two in the morning, standing in line at the twenty-four-hour Home Depot with an aching back and the supplies to fix the window myself.
You’d think I would have stopped there and gone to bed, but instead I transformed the study into a guest room with freshly laundered curtains and a single bed I dragged down from upstairs. The result is cozy chic, with a tranquil palette and the warm light of a stained-glass desk lamp I discovered in a closet.
I give the room one last look, pleased, and return to the kitchen with the mop. Wringing it out at the sink, I see today’s issue of the Daily Freeman on the table where I’d left it, the article about Sam on the front page. I was surprised when I opened the door this morning and saw his soggy and wrinkled face smiling up at me from my welcome mat. I shouldn’t have been. Of course the story is going to be of interest: local resident and beloved therapist goes missing the night of the storm. It doesn’t hurt that he’s good-looking, and the fact that he and his new wife are relative newlyweds certainly ups the intrigue. Enough, at least, for an editor at the Daily Freeman to assign the story to young and intrepid Harriet Eager, with a journalism degree and a last name that fits, tasked with reporting the bad news that Sam hasn’t been seen in two days.
Dr. Sam Statler was reported missing two nights ago by his wife when he did not return home from work. Anyone with information regarding the whereabouts of Dr. Statler should contact reporter Harriet Eager at [email protected].
He looks exceptionally handsome in the photograph they printed alongside Harriet’s story, in a smart blue suit with a tie that brings out his eyes. I imagine it was Annie who took it, sitting on the front porch of their house at 119 Albemarle Road. Four bedrooms on six acres with a newly renovated chef’s kitchen and a first-floor master, cost them $835,000. I found the real estate listing—photos and all—after Harriet’s editor proved himself eager to print Sam’s home address, where his new wife Annie is living alone now, no man around to protect her.
I take the scissors from the drawer and take a seat at the kitchen table, wondering what Dr. Annie Marie Potter would think if she knew about the overdue credit card bills her missing husband appears to have been hiding from her. Why else would he keep them stashed in his office, inside the pages of a novel, if not to keep them from her? I’ve been going through the line items, and I’m dumbfounded at what he was willing to spend on things.