Page 54 of The New Couple in 5B

I stare at Abi, his kind face, his bottomless eyes. When he returns my gaze, something goes cold inside me.

We all ride up to the apartment in silence and I fume about how I’ll be using the service elevator from now on, and will find my way into that back office and get a look at that surveillance equipment.

I expect Charles or Ella to come out, to say they’ve heard the news, but there’s only silence from their place and I’m glad as we push inside to our apartment.

“He heard it on the news?” I say when the door closes. “How can that be?”

Chad shakes his head, mystified. “I don’t know. Maybe someone called in a tip?”

I shed my coat, my bag, look at my ragged reflection in the foyer mirror. My auburn hair is wild, big circles under my brown eyes, makeup smudged. A striking contrast to Abi’s cool, put-together exterior, I look a wreck—flustered, just as Abi said.

I keep seeing her, hanging there. Her eyes bulging, mouth open in an eternal scream, her throat black-and-blue. Will I ever be able to unsee it? That session with Dr. Black tomorrow can’t come soon enough.

I flip on New York One News and I’m shocked to see a reporter broadcasting from in front of Dana’s studio. I turn up the volume.

“Renowned photographer Dana Lowan was found dead in her studio today, cause of death not yet determined.”

How is that even possible?

“Rosie.”

Chad calls from the second bedroom, and I move away from the screen to follow his voice. He’s standing by my desk, looking down. Sitting there on the floor near his feet is the box with Dana’s name scrawled across the side.

What? No. It can’t be. I know I brought that box downstairs.

I move over to it quickly, open the lid.

The letter that sat on top of the items inside, the one from Ivan to Dana, is gone.

sixteen

Dr. Black’s office feels like a cozy living room with plush furniture and towering bookshelves, a fireplace that he lights in winter, tall windows that look out onto Central Park. I sink into my usual place on his couch, my phone off.

He’s long and lean in his Eames chair, black wool pants pressed, a dove-gray sweater hanging elegantly off his thin frame. He adjusts his thick black glasses, runs thin fingers through his floppy, glossy dark hair.

“That’s a lot,” he says easily. His notebook sits in his lap, but he hasn’t written in it. “For anyone, that would be a lot. Death of a loved one, large inheritance, moving, new book contract, which is a boon and a big responsibility. We can also add the strain of trying for a baby. The traumatic discovery of Dana’s body. Honestly, I’d be surprised if youweren’texperiencing anxiety.”

Very faintly outside I can hear the street noise. Beside him on a small pedestal table, there’s a picture of a young girl with long, dark hair cascading past her shoulders. His daughter as a little girl. She’s a teenager now, getting ready for college.

“Anxiety,” I say, twisting at my wedding ring. “I could handle some anxiety. It’s the other things that rattle me.”

I won’t sayvisions. I will not use that word.

“Trauma manifests differently for every person. Nightmares. Insomnia. You’ve experienced both of those. Panic attacks can feel very real—some people experience them physically, even mistaking them for heart events. For you, I think we’ve determined, it’s these waking daymares. Your subconscious fears rise to your conscious mind, and you experience these episodes. Sometimes that includes visual or auditory hallucinations.”

It sounds so logical when he puts it like that. Like it could happen to anyone. But it doesn’t, does it? Most people know the difference between what’s happening in their minds and what’s happening in the space around them.

This space, ensconcing and warm, is one of the first places I felt most safe and understood. I started seeing Dr. Black when I was still in college, when he took me on for nearly nothing, knowing that I was barely making ends meet.

“And what about the box?” I ask him.

He raises his eyebrows, shifts in his seat. “To be honest, that sounds a little off to me.”

I was expecting him to have a theory.

“No matter what challenges you face from your past, Rosie,” he goes on when I stay silent, “you’re a smart, present person. If you say you brought that box down to the street, I believe you.”

A sense of relief floods my system. Max, Abi, even Chad seemed to think that I’d been mistaken, or that I had misremembered. Even I was starting to wonder.

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