The Wrong Family(43)
“Ohh, that’s not it.” She pressed her lips together so hard she imagined they looked like Nigel’s.
“Isn’t it?” Something else had settled across Nigel’s face. Winnie recognized it; Nigel got like that when he was playing a game and winning. She thought about the way he moved his bottle of liquor around to throw her off. Everything was a game to him.
“I don’t want to talk about this anymore, Nigel.” The truth was that she didn’t feel capable of talking about it anymore. A line had been crossed, the trust they’d worked so hard to rebuild, kicked out from under them like a wobbly stool. She didn’t know how to put into words what she was feeling because there were no words for it.
Everything in her life was coming off the rails: her marriage, her relationship with her son, and her mental health. She was either being stalked, or she was imagining being stalked, and quite frankly Winnie didn’t know what was worse. There was no one to turn to, not a soul who would understand. She couldn’t leave him because of what she’d done, and he couldn’t leave her because of what he’d helped her do. They were tied together in this life. Winnie locked herself in the bathroom, wishing she had a bottle of wine.
Nigel retired to his den, where Winnie assumed he’d be spending the night. After he’d gone, Winnie made some tea and sat at her computer, trying to get her mind on something else besides the storm that was her life.
She was checking her email, aggressively sipping at chamomile tea, when she clicked on a message sent by the King County Library system. Winnie had seen enough of these back in the day to know what it was before she clicked on it. After Samuel was born, she’d read voraciously for years, making regular trips to the library with him strapped to her chest. Occasionally she’d read a book she really liked and then, instead of returning it, she’d read it again; that always amounted to fines. But she hadn’t cared, they’d been worth it. And sure enough, when the body of the email downloaded to her screen, Winnie’s suspicion was confirmed: a library fine.
But that couldn’t be right. Winnie hadn’t been to the library in years, like at least four or five. Not to mention she didn’t have a clue where her library card was. It had to be an error in the system, or a ghost email haunting her from her inbox past. Looking more closely, she saw that it was a fine for a book that had been checked out on October 5 of this year. Winnie leaned closer to the screen to read the name of the book she’d supposedly checked out; it was in fine print like a little librarian elf typed it—Child Abduction: A Theory of Criminal Behavior.
For a moment it felt like someone had plugged her into an electrical socket. Fear charged through her limbs, settling in her bowels like greasy food. She doubled over, hitting her forehead on the lip of the desk, but hardly feeling it. Bent with her head between her knees and her hands clutching her calves, she pushed air through her lips to keep from wailing. Everything inside Winnie was screaming, but she had to keep control. She lifted her head again, glanced briefly at the screen before exiting out of it, and turned the computer off. She wanted to ask Nigel if this was some sort of cruel joke, but she knew in her gut he’d never do something like that, not when his hands were as covered in guilt as hers. There was also the fact that neither Nigel nor her son liked to read library books; it was new or nothing. Either way, she had to find out.
She texted Samuel. Did you check out a library book lately?
Last time I went to the library was on a fourth-grade field trip.
Why couldn’t he just answer her? It was yes or no—that simple. Everything had to be a snarky little game with him. If she’d said that to her own mother when she was Samuel’s age...
And then all of her anger evaporated. She was lucky he’d even answered; lately, he wanted nothing to do with her. That was the essential difference between her mother’s parenting and her own: her mother didn’t care what her kids thought of her. Winnie tried not to think about how much she cared as she got up from the desk to check the junk drawer for her library card. She rifled past a hairbrush with a broken handle, a jump rope, and a box of press-on nails before she found it. It was under the stack of instruction manuals and receipts, pushed to the far corner of the drawer. She held it in her palm, staring at it hard. The library must have made a mistake; she’d sort it out.
But when she called the library, they said she had indeed checked out Child Abduction: A Theory of Criminal Behavior on October 5.
“It wasn’t me,” she said firmly. “I haven’t been to the library in years. I don’t even know where my library card is!” She glanced guiltily at the junk drawer.
“Well then somebody else has your card,” said the guy on the other end of the line. “And they owe five dollars and seventy-two cents in fees. Will you be paying it? I can take your debit card right over the phone.”
When Winnie ended the call, she cried. She hadn’t cried in a long time and it felt good to let the drama loose, as her mother used to say. She’d been too busy to be scared lately, but here it was: a library book, reminding her that at any moment her entire life could be torn apart.
If she told Nigel about this, he’d just blow it off, and then it would end up in another big, fat fight. She was tired of those, obviously, since she even refused to fight about his infidelity. She was desperate for peace and for her son to like her again, and for her secrets to stay secret.