The Wife Upstairs(9)

“Sweetheart, it’s probably not safe to have the dogs out of the neighborhood.” The words are cooed, sugar-sweet, a cotton candy chastisement, and I hate her for them.

Like I’m a child. Or, worse, a servant who wandered out of her gated yard.

“We’re not far from home,” I say, and at my side, Adele whines, straining on her leash, her tail brushing back and forth.

Home.

There’s a shopping bag dangling from Mrs. McLaren’s wrist as she steps closer. It’s imprinted with the logo of one of those little boutiques I just passed, and I wonder what’s in it, wanting to catch a glimpse of the item inside, so that when I see it lying around her house later, I can take it. A stupid, petty reaction, lashing out, I know that, but there it is, an insistent pulse under my skin.

Whatever this bitch bought today, she’s not going to keep it, not after making me feel this small.

“Okay, well, maybe run on back there, then?” The uptick, making it a question. “And sweetie, please don’t ever take Mary-Beth out of the neighborhood, okay? She gets so excitable, and I’d hate for her to be out in all this…” she waves a hand, the bag still dangling from her wrist. “Rigmarole.”

I’ve seen maybe three cars this morning, and the only rigmarole currently happening is Mrs. McLaren stopping me like I’m some kind of criminal for daring to walk a dog outside Thornfield’s gates.

But I nod.

I smile.

I bite back the venom flooding my mouth because I have practice at that, and I walk back to Thornfield Estates and to Eddie’s house.

It’s cool and quiet as I let myself in, and I lean down to unclip Adele’s leash. Her claws skitter across the marble, then the hardwood as she makes her way to the sliding glass doors, and I follow, opening them to let her out into the yard.

This is the part where I’m supposed to hang up her leash on the hook by the front door, maybe leave a note for Eddie saying that I came by and that Adele is outside, and then leave. Go back to the concrete box on St. Pierre Street, think again about taking the GRE, maybe sort through the various treasures I’ve picked up on dressers, on bathroom counters, beside nightstands.

Instead, I walk back into the living room with that bright pinkish-red couch and floral chairs, the shelves with all those books, and I look around.

For once, I’m not looking for something to take. I don’t know what it says about me, about Eddie, or how I might feel about Eddie that I don’t want to take anything from him, but I don’t. I just want to know him. To learn something.

Actually, if I’m being honest with myself, I want to see pictures of him with Bea.

There aren’t any in the living room, but I can see spaces on the wall where photographs must have hung. And the mantel is weirdly bare, which makes me think it once held more than just a pair of silver candlesticks.

I wander down the hall, sneakers squeaking, and there’s more emptiness.

Upstairs.

The hardwood is smooth underfoot, and there are no blank spaces here, only tasteful pieces of art.

On the landing, there’s a table with that glass bowl I recognize from Southern Manors, the one shaped like an apple, and I let my fingers drift over it before moving on, up the shorter flight of stairs to the second floor.

It’s dim up here, the lights off, and the morning sun not yet high enough to reach through the windows. There are doors on either side, but I don’t try to open any of them.

Instead, I make my way to a small wooden table under a round stained-glass window, there at the end of the hall.

There’s only one thing on it, a silver-framed photograph, and it’s both exactly what I wanted to see, and something I wish I’d never seen at all.

I had wondered what Bea and Eddie looked like together, and now I know.

They’re beautiful.

But it’s more than just that. Lots of people are beautiful, especially in this neighborhood where everyone can afford the upkeep, so it’s not her perfect hair and flawless figure, her bright smile and designer bathing suit. It’s that they look like they fit. Both of them, standing on that gorgeous beach, her smiling at the camera, Eddie smiling at her.

They’d found the person for them. That thing most of us look for and never find, that thing I always assumed didn’t exist, because in this whole wide world, how could there ever be one person who was just right for you?

But Bea was right for Eddie, I can see that now, and I suddenly feel so stupid and small. Sure, he’d flirted with me, but he was probably one of those guys for whom it was second nature. He’d had this. He certainly didn’t want me.

“That was in Hawaii.”

I whirl around, the keys falling from my suddenly numb fingers.

Eddie is standing in the hallway, just at the top of the stairs, leaning against the wall with one ankle crossed in front of the other. He’s wearing jeans today and a blue button-down, the kind that looks casual, but probably costs more than I’d make in a couple of weeks at the coffee shop or walking dogs. I wonder what that’s like, to have so much money that spending someone’s rent on one shirt doesn’t even register.

His sunglasses dangle from his hand, and he nods at the table. “That picture,” he tells me, as if I hadn’t known what he was referring to. “That’s me and Bea in Hawaii last year. We met there, actually.”