Page 8 of I Know She Was There

I pressed my lips together.Spying on people like you. Couldn’t say that.

“Don’t tell me you don’t have one?”

“I do, but it’s...” I let my voice trail off as my mind searched for appropriate possibilities.

“Look, you don’t have to share if you’re not comfortable.” Muzzy shifted Brandon from one knee to the other. “I got Emmy to sleep while you were inside. She looks darling in her carriage?—”

“No, I want to share. It’s embarrassing, is all. So few people do it these days.”

Muzzy stilled the toddler on her lap.

“I’m terribly addicted to cigarettes. Foolish, I know. The health hazards...” I paused when Muzzy’s features scrunched into a confused expression. “What’s wrong?”

“Both my parents smoked. You could smell them approaching five minutes before they arrived, but you don’t carry even the slightest hint of cigarette odor.” Her expression shifted slightly, looking guarded. Her narrowed eyes told me more than her words.

“That’s the most embarrassing part,” I jumped in, my mind working overtime to compensate for my blunder. “It got so bad, I switched to vaping.” I hung my head, a blush spread from my chest to neck, a tell that I was lying, but Muzzy didn’t know that. Looking at her through the fringe of my lashes, I glimpsed her rounded eyes and slightly parted lips. “Honestly, how can I cling to such a bad habit? I mean, I only vape outdoors, away from Emmy, but still.” Muzzy’s eyes softened.

My heartfelt revelation had worked. Our friendship notched up and clicked into place.

Fortunately, Muzzy had no desire to visit me at my house, which I’d described vaguely as being on the outskirts of Deer Crossing. She was happy to spend free time with me in her yard, and eventually, we set up a specific time for playdates: 3:00 p.m. on Mondays and Wednesdays. It was a perfect arrangement.

Until the past reared up and ruined everything.

The unfairness of it filled me with sudden, overwhelming fury. It radiated painfully through my chest, like heartburn or a muscle tear. My head shook back and forth in tiny little movements, my limbic system trying to cast off memories. I wouldn’t—couldn’t—think of that day. What was done was done. Suddenly fatigued, I felt like an old woman. The effort I had to expend to get air into my lungs was enormous.

The rumble of a car engine in the distance pierced the evening, getting closer, but I couldn’t stop looking at the custom Cape in front of me, a multitude of images swirling in my brain: Matt’s handsome face hovering over the metal hedge clippers; Melanie’s shadow in the upstairs window, her sultry voice calling out; Melanie embracing a dark-haired man in the doorway of her home.

The thud of a car door closing pulled me away from my preoccupation with the couple at 21 Pine Hill Road. I glanced over my shoulder to see a dark sedan parked halfway between the pond and Muzzy’s house, but it was too dim to see anything else. Beyond the car, Muzzy’s living-room light popped on.

I wheeled Emmy’s carriage around until I was facing away from Matt and Melanie’s and began walking toward the Owen house. Unease niggled at the back of my mind. I blinked at the shadows swooping around me, darkened silhouettes popping into my peripheral vision but vaporizing when I snapped my head in their direction for a better look. Sweat broke out along my hairline and on my upper lip as I approached the car. A black Impala, just like Tim’s. I studied the dented driver’s-side corner of the back bumper, which I’d dinged in the supermarket lot a few months back. Of course it was still there. Tim was too cheap to fix it.

Why would my husband be here? Recalling how he and Muzzy had connected after the incident, I stared at the car as if my intense gaze could pry an answer from it; I reached into my pocket and pulled out the mini flashlight I always carried when I walked Emmy after dark. I flicked it on, directed the powerful beam inside. As usual, Tim’s neatness prevailed. Not so much as a speck of dust marred its Simonized vinyl surfaces. The only other person I’d ever known to take such precise care of belongings was...Muzzy.

I looked at her house, cozy and inviting with the glowing light diffused in the veiled windows. Was Tim inside right now? Surely, he wouldn’t have been attracted to Muzzy in the aftermath of the incident, discovered kinship in mutual obsessive cleaning habits and their shared disdain for me. It was ridiculous.

But why is he here?I recalled how often her husband, Johnny, was away, and my heart twisted in my chest, making breathing difficult. It was well after 7:30 p.m., the time Muzzy put her kids to bed. She had hours alone to fill. Something told me if the two of them were holed up in her house, they weren’t cleaning. I glanced up the street, hoping to see Tim’s familiar form loping through the shadows—from the other direction. The area was quiet, empty. I looked back at Muzzy’s. Her yard had an air of disuse I couldn’t put my finger on, but I sensed my former friend wasn’t spending much time outdoors anymore. Was she hiding from me? I angled my head, ears alert for sound, and squinted at the pond, searching for any movement in the shadows. The patter of the distant fountain mocked me.

I stumbled backward, pulling the carriage with me. What was going on in this neighborhood? Jane cheating on her older husband was bad enough, but the others... perfect Melanie stepping out on Matt, and Tim... with Muzzy? No, it just wasn’t possible.

I had to get out of Deer Crossing. I turned Emmy’s carriage around and rushed across Primrose, but my hammering heart and the thick, sludgy air made proper breathing impossible. Halting again in front of Matt and Melanie’s place, I gulped like a doomed fish caught on a line. The lack of oxygen made me dizzy, so I sat down on the curb beside the carriage, concentrating on breathing instead of the image of the neighborhood lovers hugging, kissing, dancing. I pressed my palms tightly against my temples to block out my building rage, focusing on the vital task of getting air into my lungs. How long I sat there, I didn’t know.

When I eventually tilted my chin up to elongate my neck and unblock my passageways, I was once again standing, facing the house. Surprised, I scanned the façade of 21 Pine Hill, wondering when I’d risen, and how long I’d been standing there.

That’s when I saw her.

The ghostly lines of a woman materializing in the upstairs bedroom window, pressing her forehead up against the pane with such force I feared it would crack. My body jumped, as though given a jolt from a live wire. Her absurdly open eyes were dark and searching as if scanning the street for something she desperately needed to find. When they locked onto me, her mouth popped open into what could have been a call, or even a scream, but I couldn’t hear anything through the closed window. The only sound filling my ears was the pounding of my own heart, battering my ribs and attempting to beat its way out of my chest.

It was then that I noticed her hands, wrapped like a scarf around her own neck, a neon-orange thumbnail—its strangely festive hue at odds with her expression—visible just below her chin, as she beseeched me with an unflinching stare.Whatdoessheneedfromme?The hands slid away from her neck as a gush of dark liquid covered the light column of skin.

I gasped.Blood. I stood frozen, watching her neck turn a different hue, thinking absurdly of a child’s crayon coloring the white space between black lines. But this was no children’s activity. I looked at the empty driveway, my heart sliding into my stomach. It didn’t appear that anyone else was there.

My legs moved as if of their own accord. And then I was running toward the house, pulling thebabyzenbehind me and hoping I didn’t trip and lose control of the carriage, toppling Emmy. But I couldn’t slow down. Melanie needed my help. I looked frantically around the yard, seeing a blur of grass and trees that became nothing but obstacles blocking a clear path to the front door.

Leaving Emmy on the brick path in front of the porch, I stumbled up the steps and pounded on the door.

“Jesus, Caroline, now’s not the time for manners,” I muttered, turning the knob, which gave way surprisingly easily, shooting me off balance. I nearly fell into a heap on the foyer floor. Instinctively, I regained my balance and looked around the gray murk, my gaze connecting with a wooden staircase a few yards in front of me. An overwhelming smell of metal and mugginess assaulted my nose. Sticky fingers clawed at my chest and throat as I ran toward the stairs.

You’vekilledhim,screamed a voice. My mother’s. I halted abruptly, and looked up the staircase, even though I knew I wouldn’t see her there.

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