Page 96 of The New Couple in 5B

“No way.”

“Max.”

“Seriously? Offer again and I’m leaving. This is us. Some people share hobbies, maybe films, food, tennis. This is what we do, right? You and me. This is our thing.”

Gratefully, I follow him into my office, sit on the floor and start sifting through my notes. We talk about Marc LeClerc. I tell him about my scheduled interview with Arthur Alpern, the man who writes about a haunted New York. Max comes up with some good questions—about the building, about energy and ghosts, the psychology of haunting.

But the past seems so far away, and the present so chaotic and strange. I can’t stop thinking about Xavier, seeing him lying broken on the sidewalk. I imagine him now as one of the Windermere’s ghosts.

What did you want to talk about?

But there are no answers from the spirit world. Maybe I need a Ouija board.

While Max is sifting through the Windermere detritus on my floor, I sit at my desk and log on to my computer to open Xavier’s Instagram page.

The most recent image is of a white lily, the text obviously a message from his family.We lay our beloved son Xavier to rest on Wednesday at 4. Join us at The Church of the Ascension to say goodbye and to celebrate his life.

I scroll through the rest of his feed—a selfie with friends at a party, a colorful salad he was proud of making and having for his dinner, though the next picture is a decadent pile of brunch waffles covered in cream and syrupy fruit.

Two cocktail glasses clink against a sunset view that I recognize as a few floors up from my own—#paradisefound. I scroll and scroll at the snapshots of his life—which looked to be a happy one full of friends, and fine meals, travel—most recently a jaunt to Majorca in images of glittering blue water and tiny winding cobblestone streets lined with pink buildings; Xavier looking fit in tight black bathing suit briefs on a sunny beach.

I feel like we would have been friends. He was funny and smart, observant, kind to me. I would have liked to get to know him better. Detective Crowe must be doing the same thing, sifting through this record all of us keep of our lives, this curated and filtered diary that we post for everyone we know. I bet Crowe is looking for connections, suspects, theories. That’s what I’m doing, I guess. But there’s nothing really—just a handsome, urbane, forty-something man living his best life in Manhattan.

I keep scrolling until I come to an image that stops me.

Xavier is dressed in a tailored charcoal suit, behind him, large photographs. It looks like he’s in a gallery, other chic, striking people around him, cocktails in hands, standing in small groups. He poses with a stunning redhead, her face pressed against his for the selfie, both smiling wildly.

It’s Dana, looking joyful in a way she never was in our encounters.

Didn’t he say they’d never met?

Clicking on the image and zooming in, around Xavier’s neck there’s a leather strap, and just the edge of the now familiar charm—the hand with a blue eye in its palm.

My breath quickens. Beneath the jolt of fear, there’s a flash of that journalistic hunger.Keep digging, it demands.

Dana’s Instagram feed is spare and grayscale, mostly just images of her work, many of the same striking photos from her gallery, those layered interesting faces, some cityscapes, some black-and-white shots of the woods. Scrolling down to the date of Xavier’s post with her, I find one from the same event.

Opening night at the Great Jones Gallery! Dreams do come true!

The post has multiple images. Dana dressed in a dramatic black sleeveless shift with a plunging neckline, exposing her flawless décolletage and toned arms, obviously giving a speech, glass in hand, all eyes on her. Dana standing with two older men, who look at her adoringly. Group pictures with people I don’t recognize. I scan the backgrounds, searching for familiar faces. I almost skip the final image, but then scroll again.

This one is taken from a distance. Dana stands in front of one of her portraits; she points at it. A young couple stands before her—he, tall and dark skinned, she, petite but full bodied, fair—clearly rapt by whatever it is Dana is saying.

I’m struck, as I often am looking at old photos, how life is captured, frozen in a single frame. Dana is gone, all her passion and joy, evident in these images, her talent, all gone with her. The couple listening—who are they? Where are they now?

I scan the rest of the people in the crowd around them. It takes a second, but I spot Lilian, Charles and Ella’s daughter, her elegantly skeletal frame, big bangles on knobby wrists; a skintight, red, off-the-shoulder dress is painted on her body, her jet hair a striking contrast to her pale skin.

Of course I recognize the man she’s with immediately, but it takes a second for the pain to travel to my heart. Those sandy curls, broad shoulders, the way other women in the room surreptitiously steal glances. It’s not just his beauty that mesmerizes; it’s his aura, his charm, his radiating kindness.

My husband.

Leaning into Lilian, a smile on his face.

Lilian looking up at him, with a gaze I know too well. Besotted.

Just six months ago or so. I recognize the shirt, one I bought him at Barneys, though we could ill-afford it. It was a soft blue oxford that I knew would make the blue flecks in his hazel eyes pop for his audition.

Where wasIthe night of this glitzy opening?

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