Page 52 of The Vacancy In Room 10

“We’re not close. Not like that—she was very kind when Lily passed. She cooked the books to give me free rent for a month and had everyone in the complex drop by food for a couple weeks. No one asked her to, she just saw the need, ya know. And then one day, she opened up about her ex and money problems. Then I tried to help her. Just listened and agreed that men are scum. That’s really all. I feel like she’d have said something in those conversations where she’s bawling about what’s-his-face, Reid... She’d have mentioned another love interest, especially if it were more than some random fling. And you’re saying love was involved, I just...”

“You might be right. I saw a bunch of missed calls from you on her phone when I picked her up, so I assumed you were close,” I say, still fishing for more, for a slipup.

“She asked me to check on her because she was going to some party that night and the ex was gonna be there, so when she never came home or answered my 11:00 p.m. call she asked me to make to save her if she needed an out, I got worried. Like a normal person would. Not anything more than that,” he says.

And what he says makes sense, and he doesn’t owe me an explanation at all. I just wanted to make sure he’s not covering for her in some way. I don’t know what way that would be, but the affair has to be tied to Henry’s death, so at least it would be a thread to pull on, but nothing. I gotta believe it’s not Cass. It doesn’t add up.

“What about Monica?” he says.

“Huh?”

“I mean no disrespect, I really don’t, but she was rather...forward with me after a couple minutes of meeting her. I think she grabbed my ass when I stood up, actually, so...”

“Oh, God, no,” I say.

He quickly apologizes.

“No, I mean. Don’t apologize. I totally see why you’d say that. It’s just. She’s married. I mean she acts like that, but it’s harmless. She was like a goofy kid sister to Henry. Honestly, he doesn’t really like her. He finds her annoying and kinda self-centered. No. I would never...” But I stop and think about it for the first time.

“Okay,” he says. “Fair. Just trying to help. I don’t know her, so I’m sure you’re right.”

“Yeah. I mean. It’s not her,” I say, and he pushes another beer across the coffee table. I smile at him and take it. He smiles back.

“Sorry,” he says.

“Don’t be. I don’t even know what to think anymore.”

“I know how you feel,” he says. “Well, in a different way, of course—like it doesn’t seem possible that the person you love is gone, and nothing really seems...real anymore. Nothing makes sense. You just get through the day somehow. You don’t even know how most of the time. And all you really want to do is sleep, but when you wake up it takes a minute to remember what happened and that this is your life now, and then you have to experience it—go through it all over again like it just happened. I know. I get it.”

And he does get it. He’s the only one who does—not my parents or my friends or the police. Just him—together in our shared pain. Without questioning it or stopping myself like I might have done without the booze, I reach out, and to my own surprise, I kiss him.

For a moment his body is rigid, and I know I’ve shocked him, but then he kisses me back, and I grip his shoulders and feel the weight of him press against me. And it feels like I’m doing something terribly wrong, but it also feels like a deeply human response to pain and betrayal, and I don’t care if it’s wrong.

We push against one another as he pulls my shirt over my head, and we hold on to each other like two miserable, lonely people. He kisses me hard and passionately, and then he stops. Just like that.

“God,” he says, and I quickly move off him.

“What?” I say. “What’s wrong?”

“I don’t know what I’m doing. I’m sorry. I just. I can’t do this,” he says.

“Of course. It’s okay,” I say, and I feel this knot of guilt forming in my chest. He’s not ready for this, and what does it say about me that I am? Of course he’s not ready. He’s so obviously broken. I would probably feel that way, too, if I didn’t know about Henry’s affair. Maybe this is more revenge than lust. It doesn’t matter; I feel ashamed. I pull my shirt over my head and stand to go.

“I’m sorry,” I say, gathering my things, my head buzzing with the drinks and the heat and desire.

He stands and moves over to me. “Please, please don’t be sorry. It’s just the timing,” he says, and I nod.

“Of course,” I say again, because what else can I say? “Thanks for talking it through with me. It was helpful,” I say, and then rush out the door before I start to cry. And I don’t even know why I’m crying. Is it the rejection and humiliation, or the desperate loneliness and longing for someone’s touch that I can’t have?

When I get back to my apartment, I slam my bag down on a kitchen chair and kick my sandals off as hard as I can, pleased when they smack the wall with a satisfying thud. I sit and stare at the piles and boxes of Henry’s things. A thought suddenly materializes out of nowhere.

The police are ordering all of his phone records, and that takes time, they said, and his phone was never found...but why can’t I just look at it myself? Why haven’t I thought about this before? Probably because when it was a suicide and he was just depressed, it wasn’t something I thought would be meaningful. And since learning of the affair, I’ve been in a tailspin. But holy shit, is there any reason I can’t look at his records? We’re on the same damn phone plan. Of course I can.

I pull a pitcher of lemonade out of the fridge and try to guzzle a couple of glasses to hydrate and sober up, gather my wits about me, and to cool off from Callum’s inferno of an apartment. Then I sit at the kitchen table. I think this will probably be an ordeal and take a while, but all I do is log in and click on the statements from the months leading up to his death, and it’s all there. That easy. Unbelievable.

I start to scan through all of the numbers. They don’t show up as names on a phone record, of course, so I cross-check them in my own phone. Once I start to plug one of the numbers into my phone, if the person is in my contacts, it will pop up. If not, I google the number.

I start with the few weeks right before Henry died. Mostly it’s the phone numbers of a few art studios, a couple clients I know. The pharmacy, a couple of guy friends, way more Pizza Palace deliveries than I would have imagined, and then one number that makes me stop cold.

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