The Perfect Mother(81)
Winnie rushes to insert her key into the door, and Francie follows her, stumbling over the step and into the cool, darkened foyer. Winnie presses the door closed on the man’s fists, and Francie trails her up the four marble stairs and down the hall, the flash of his camera lighting the walls. Thick silk curtains are drawn in the living room, and Francie is overcome by the staleness of the air and the stench of decomposing food. Winnie wrenches open the curtains on the terrace doors, and it takes Francie a minute to adjust to the shock of sunlight. Two large rugs are rolled into coils, propped up against the far wall. Packing boxes are piled haphazardly in the corner. Food containers are scattered on the table and floor; an empty bottle of wine lies on its side near the doors to the terrace. Francie can’t help but notice the two wineglasses nearby, next to a pink silk robe, discarded in a ball.
Winnie removes her jacket. She looks skeletal. “I’ve gotten your messages. I’m sorry. I haven’t had the energy to call you back.”
Francie stands in the center of the room, patting Will’s bottom, trying to catch her breath. “Winnie. I don’t know what to say. Are you—are you moving?”
“Moving?” Winnie says.
Francie gestures at the rolled-up rug, the packing boxes. “The boxes—”
“Oh.” Winnie’s eyes flit around the room. “The team of detectives did all this. In the days after . . .” She allows the thought to trail off. “I saw what happened to Nell. And now you and Colette. You’re in the news.”
“Us? Don’t worry about us. How are you? I can’t—”
“I’m fine.”
“Fine?” Francie has trouble finding any other words, stunned by how different Winnie appears. So gaunt. Hollow. Nothing like the woman Francie admired so much, just a few months ago, when Francie first noticed her walking across the lawn toward the willow tree, ripe with pregnancy. Nothing at all like the beautiful, kind woman who’d sat across from Francie that day at the Spot, or the fresh-faced girl in the Bluebird DVDs Francie has watched again and again.
“What do you want me to say, Francie?” Winnie says. “My baby is gone. There’s nothing I can say to describe what I’m going through.”
Francie feels the tears beginning to well in her eyes. I understand, she wants to say. More than you know, I understand what it’s like to lose a child. But she doesn’t dare. “Is there anything I can do to help? Anything you need? Do you have any idea what happened?” The words are tumbling out too quickly.
Winnie turns toward the terrace doors. “Of course I don’t know what happened.”
“I’ve been giving it a lot of thought,” Francie says. “I can’t believe how much the police have screwed this up. At first I was sure it was Bodhi Mogaro. I believed them, you know. And then I began to think about other possibilities. Like that guy you were talking to at the bar.”
Winnie turns to look at her, a glimmer of something, Francie can’t place it, in her eyes. Or maybe it’s her face, and the way she’s speaking. It seems so stilted, empty.
“The guy at the bar?”
“The one who came up to you that night. The one who you— The one you had a drink with.”
“I didn’t have a drink with anyone that night.”
Will settles, resting his head on Francie’s chest, and she has to battle an urge to leave. Why is Winnie lying to her? “Then where were you? After you left the table?”
Winnie avoids Francie’s eyes, and then appears not to hear what she’d said. Instead she turns and walks to the kitchen, returning with a bottle of wine and two plastic cups. She pours the wine, handing a cup to Francie. Francie accepts it, but she doesn’t move, seeing Winnie at the last May Mothers meeting in the park, her lips in Midas’s hair, waving away the wine Nell offered. No thanks. Alcohol doesn’t always agree with me.
“I went to the park,” Winnie says.
“The park? Why?”
“To visit my mom.” The cup trembles in Winnie’s hand.
“Your mom? But Winnie, your mom is dead.”
Winnie shoots Francie a look. “Thank you, Francie. I’m aware of that.” She takes a drink of her wine. “There’s a dogwood tree there that my dad and I brought from our property upstate. We planted it in the park one night, at my mom’s favorite spot, near the long meadow. It’s this secret thing I’ve always had, a place to feel close to her. I went there that night.”
“Why?”
“I miss her.” Winnie opens the door to the terrace and steps onto the wide balcony. Francie follows. The shrill laughter of children playing in a sandbox in the backyard of a day-care center a few buildings down pierces the heavy air around them. Pots of dead herbs line the rail. “It’s not a great alibi.”
“Alibi? What do you mean?”
“That I was at the park. Nobody saw me. I know what people are saying. I know where—” She takes another mouthful of wine. “I would never hurt my baby.”
Francie remembers the cup in her hand and takes a sip, trying to swallow, despite the growing lump in her throat.
“I thought the worst thing that would ever happen was losing my mom. I was wrong.” Francie reaches for Winnie’s arm, but she moves away. “I don’t want any more questions. I can’t think rationally, linearly. Time is running in circles.” Her face appears to harden as she notices something in the distance. Francie looks and sees a woman standing on a small balcony across the backyard, a baby resting on a blanket on her shoulder, watering a box of pink zinnias. The woman places the watering can on the ground and prunes some of the plants before stepping inside, closing the door behind her.