Page 40 of The Tenant
“Trust me, Krista.”
She gives me a skeptical look. It’s frustrating. How does she not smell that chemical odor? Is shehard of smelling?
“We need to get rid of Whitney,” I say more forcefully. “We’ll find someone else.”
“Everyone else was horrible,” she reminds me. “I like Whitney. She’s been nothing but sweet the entire time she’s lived here.”
“Yeah, toyou.”
She gives me the same look she did when that Quillizabeth woman claimed she had a vision of me stabbing her to death. “Blake, is there any chance that you’re…”
“That I’m what?”
And now she averts her eyes. “That you’reimaginingsome of the things that you say Whitney is doing?”
“That’s ridiculous.” Although I don’t admit that her accusation leaves me with an uneasy feeling. “I’m not imagining anything. Whitney despises me.”
“She never said anything about not liking you when we had lunch together.”
I feel like I just got socked in the gut. “You hadlunchtogether?”
“Why not?” Krista puts her hands on her hips. “She’s not the enemy, Blake. She lives with us.”
“Sheisthe enemy,” I shoot back, although when I hear the words leave my lips, I notice I do sound a little hysterical. The water sloshes in Goldy’s bowl. I clear my throat. “And she probably did this to get back at me.”
“Why would she want to get back at you? Back at you for what?”
“For what I did to her bed.”
Krista inhales sharply. “What did you do to her bed?”
Crap. I shouldn’t have said that. I wasn’t thinking.
“What did you do, Blake?” She narrows her eyes at me. “Tell me the truth.”
I squirm. When I threw that mess into Whitney’s bed, I was extremely pissed off. In retrospect, I’m embarrassed that I did it. But it’sherfault. She’s the one who hid rotting fruit in our kitchen.She’sthe evil one.
“You remember how we had all those fruit flies?” I begin. “Well, it turns out Whitney stuck a couple of pieces of fruit on the top shelf in the cabinets, and they’d been rotting there the whole time she’s lived here. It was growing maggots.” I cringe at the memory. “So…I just gave it back to her.”
“Gave it back to her? What does that mean?”
“I left the fruit in her bed.”
“Oh my God.” Krista starts pacing across the living room. “You seriously put fruit that was growing maggots in Whitney’s bed? What on earth is wrong with you? Have you lost yourmind?”
“She’s the one who left it in the kitchen—”
“How do you know that?” she bursts out. “You’re the one who is always eating apples. Maybeyouleft it up there!”
“I think I would remember putting a bunch of apples in a paper bag and stuffing it on the top shelf where I can’t even reach it without a stool!”
Krista shakes her head. “Were you using that awful stool that’s in the hall closet that you won’t get rid of? You’re going to really hurt yourself one day when it breaks.”
“You’re missing the point,” I snap at her. “Look, I know it was Whitney who left the fruit there. And now she’s getting back at me by pouring bleach in the fishbowl.”
“How would that get back atyou?” she shoots back. “I’mthe one who loved Goldy! You don’t even care about her at all! You were about to flush her down the toilet!”
IlikedGoldy—loveis a strong word for a fish. But yes, if she gave me the option now, I would definitely flush the fish down the toilet and avoid this ridiculous funeral. But I have to play the part of the sensitive fiancé right now. Because it’s becoming increasingly obvious that I am in danger of losing Krista if I don’t try to fix things. She’s acting like I’ve become unhinged lately, and that’s not true. Given that I lost my job and I’ve been sleeping like shit (in no small part thanks to yet another thumping episode), I think I’m holding up pretty damn well.
