Page 75 of Do Not Disturb
I can help you get into bed tonight.
I grit my teeth. I don’t want his pity. Granted, it’s something he helps me with every night, so I can see why he feels bad about abandoning me. But I’ll manage on my own. I’ve practiced it a few times since that night I went crashing to the floor.
Don’t worry about it.
Fine. But I’ll bring you dinner. Don’t say no.
I want to tell him not to bother, but that would be stupid. I have become horribly dependent on him over the last five years. If I’d let him turn the dining room into a bedroom like he wanted, I wouldn’t have this problem. But I’ve been stubborn.
Well, he’ll be rid of me soon anyway.
I look out the window again. The dark-haired woman in room 203 is gone, although she left the light on in her room. I scan the parking lot and see only one car, which must belong to that woman. But then I notice the parking lot around the building that used to be Rosalie’s.
The blond woman’s car is still there.
Well, that’s strange. I assumed when I saw somebody else in her room, she must’ve checked out. And Nick himself said that she was very eager to leave. Now that the plow has done its job, why hasn’t she taken off?
Again, I get that uneasy feeling. But really, it’s none of my business. Nothing here is any of my concern anymore. Including Nick. If he wants to make out with all the guests, that’s his business.
I wish I could stop missing him.
I reach for my phone and start scanning through the photos. I haven’t taken any pictures in the longest time. I go back in time to seven years ago. Nick got the idea to do a theme night at the diner, and that particular night, we were doing eighties night. I had on a headband and legwarmers, and I had crimped my hair. Nick was wearing double denim—denim jeans with a denim jacket—and he slicked back his hair. We snapped pictures of each other, both of us in the middle of laughing at how stupid we looked. Then I snapped a selfie, but Nick ruined it by kissing me in the middle.
We looked so happy. Wewerehappy. I can’t even remember what it felt like to be so happy.
After I’m gone, Nick will meet someone else. I’m sure he’ll be sad about me for a while, but he’ll move on. He’ll find some other woman to have this kind of happiness with—I’ll just be a distant memory by then. And he can start a family with her. He deserves to be happy. He’s a good guy. I’m not sure if I believe he killed that woman two years ago. He’s not capable of it. We’ll probably never know what really happened to her.
I look up from my phone as some movement from outside the window catches my eye. It’s coming from all the way across the parking lot, at my old restaurant. There’s somebody in front of the blond woman’s car.
At first I think it’s the blond woman, but she’s wearing a different coat. I grab my binoculars again to get a better look.
It’s the dark-haired woman staying in room 203. What on earth is she doing?
Then she looks up, straight at our house. Her eyes point directly at me. I drop the binoculars, my heart pounding. She doesn’t look away.
What is going on?
She’s rifling around in her purse, looking for something. She pulls something out of her purse, but it’s much too far away to see without the binoculars. Cautiously, I bring them back up to my eyes just as she pulls the object from her purse.
I can’t see what the object is, but it glints in the moonlight. Could that be...
A knife?
Oh my God, does she have a knife? Why would this woman have a knife? And what does she plan to do with it?
And then she moves in the direction of our house.
My heart is pounding painfully. What is she doing? Why is she coming here with a knife? Is she angry that I was watching her?
I throw the binoculars onto the bed, like they’re made of fire. She couldn’t have seen that I had them. And even if she did, she wouldn’t kill me over it, would she? It’s not like I saw anything terrible. I just saw her sitting in her room. That’s all.
She’s definitely moving toward the house. There’s no doubt about it. And she’s still got that knife gripped in her hand.
Oh god oh god oh god oh god…
And now she’s at our front door. I hear her knock, but I stay perfectly still. But then a horrible thought occurs to me.
Nick may not have locked the front door.
