The Wife Upstairs(35)

The grill turned over, the burning coals spread over the gravel yard, Jane, the real Jane, crying, Mr. Brock’s red face, a sweating beer can in one hand, a pair of tongs in the other.

His KISS THE COOK apron with a giant frog on it, its lips red and obscene in a pucker, me sprawled in the rocks, my hand burning, my face stinging, thinking how stupid that apron was, how stupid it was that a man like him had this much power over all of us.



I haven’t thought about that for such a long time. I’ve pushed it all away, but now here it is, this ugly memory, in this perfect place.

Looking down, I study my engagement ring again, turning my hand this way and that, catching the light of the flames.

That’s over. That can’t touch you. No matter what John says.

Next to me, Eddie sighs, his long legs stretched out in front of him.

He really does look good tonight. I think of how slightly ragged he was when I first met him, how those edges have smoothed a little in the past few months, and I feel a little surge of satisfaction. I did that, I think. I’ve made him happy. He’s like this because of me.

And soon, I’m going to be his wife.

I think about the wedding dresses I saw today, the veil there in the window I’d itched to put on my head.

“I think we should elope.”

I don’t know I’m going to say the words until they’re out, but then they are, and I realize I don’t want to take them back.

Eddie pauses, his beer lifted to his mouth. Then he takes a sip, swallows, and lowers his arm before looking over at me and saying, “We don’t have to do anything you don’t want to do.”

“It’s just … I don’t have a big family,” I say. “And I hardly know anyone in Birmingham, or at least no one I’d want at my wedding.”

Eddie smirks slightly at that, raising his eyebrows.

“I don’t want that John asshole at my wedding, either.”

Reaching over, he takes my hand, his thumb making circles on the heel of my hand.

“Janie, say the word, and we’ll get married at the courthouse tomorrow. Or we’ll go to the lake. Hell, we can go up to Tennessee if you want, rent one of those cheesy mountain chalets. I think they even have drive-through wedding chapels in Gatlinburg.”

I smile, but don’t say anything, ignoring the weird sinking in my stomach at the idea of marrying a man like Eddie, but still having the kind of wedding girls like me always get. Cheap, fast, tacky. When I suggested eloping, I was imagining saying our vows on a white-sand beach, an intimate wedding night in a big bed with gauzy mosquito netting. I wasn’t imagining pulling up to a window like we were grabbing french fries and heading to a motel advertising free parking on a neon sign.

Still, what I know for certain is that I can’t get married here. I can’t walk down an aisle at a big church in a big dress and see the Campbells and the Carolines, Bea’s friends, comparing me to her.

I head inside, picking up our empty beers as I go. When I slide the patio door open, there’s a sound from somewhere above me.

I freeze there in the doorway, one ear cocked toward the ceiling, waiting.

There’s another thump, followed by a second, a third.

Sliding the patio door closed behind me, I glance back out at Eddie.

He’s still sitting in his Adirondack chair, hands behind his head now, his chin lifted to the evening sky, and I creep a little deeper into the house.

The sounds are rhythmic now, a steady thump thump thump like a heartbeat.

I think about that story they made us read in middle school, the one with the man buried under the floorboards, his murderer thinking he could still hear the old man’s heart, and for a horrified moment, my brain conjures up Bea.

Then the sounds stop.

I stand there, practically holding my breath, the empty beer bottle dangling from my fingers as I wait.

Three sharp raps at the front door make me nearly jolt out of my skin, one of the bottles crashing to the floor as I make a sound somewhere between a shriek and a gasp.

It’s coming from the front of the house, though, not upstairs. Someone knocking at the door.

“Jane?”

I see Eddie through the glass door, still sitting outside, the words tossed casually over his shoulder, his head barely turned toward me.

I scowl at the back of that head, that perfectly tousled hair. “I’m fine,” I call back. “Just someone at the door.”

There’s another knock just as I reach the foyer, and when I open the door, a woman is standing there.

She’s wearing khakis and a blue button-down, and there’s a badge snapped to her waist.

She’s a cop.

My heart is beating so fast in my chest that I feel like she must be able to see it, and I lay a hand there against my collarbone, suddenly grateful I have the diamonds and emerald on my finger, to let her know I am somebody.

I have no reason to be afraid anymore, I remind myself. The woman standing on the porch doesn’t see the girl I used to be, doesn’t know the things I’ve done. There’s no suspicion in her gaze, no narrowed eyes and thinned lips. She sees a woman who belongs in this house, a woman wearing Ann Taylor and real jewels, a woman whose dishwater-blond hair isn’t pulled back into a scraggly ponytail, a woman wearing the kind of expensive makeup that’s meant to make her look like she’s not wearing any makeup at all.