Sleepwalker (16 page)

“I’m coming, I’m coming.” Harried, she bends to strap J.J. into his stroller again. “Thanks, Phyllis.”

“I know it can be crazy, Allison, chasing around after little ones, but time is going to fly by. Those three will be away at college before you know it, just like mine.”

Phyllis’s son, Ryan, is at Brown; her daughter, Laurel, is at Cornell. Scholastic, athletic, and extracurricular overachievers, both—par for the course in Glenhaven Park.

“Enjoy every minute of this, Allison,” her neighbor calls after her as she wheels the stroller down the path. “Trust me—you’re going to miss it when it’s over.”

Mothers of older kids are always talking about how quickly children grow up. It bothers Allison that they all seem so wistful for the good old days, as though it’s all downhill from here on in.

She glances back over her shoulder to see Phyllis still silhouetted in the doorway, looking out into the night. Jet black Marnie has appeared beside her, poised in profile with her feline back humped and her front paws extended toward her mistress.

It’s a sight Allison quickly forgets as she catches up to her children . . . but one she will forever remember, with a shudder, whenever she thinks of what happened to Phyllis and Marnie later on this Halloween night.

M
ack expects Allison to be a bit frosty toward him when he gets home too late to even see the kids in their costumes, having just missed the 6:51 train after all. When he walks in the door, she’s upstairs wrangling the kids into bed. The house is cold and lit only by a few flickering candles that cast weird shadows on the walls. He goes right up, of course, and is immediately regaled with a recap of the evening’s activities by his sugar-fueled daughters.

Allison can’t get a word in edgewise if she wants to—and he can’t tell whether she wants to. The baby is overtired and cranky and she has her hands full.

“I left you some macaroni and cheese,” she calls from J.J.’s room after Mack has kissed everyone good night, changed into a double layer of sweats to keep warm, and is about to head back downstairs.

That’s a good sign.

He thanks her and goes down to look for it in the candlelit kitchen, hoping it’s the homemade kind she sometimes bakes in her big blue-and-white Corningware dish.

But it isn’t—of course not. It’s Kraft, from a box, sitting on the countertop in a Saran-wrapped plastic bowl. He forgot that the oven is useless without its electronic control panel. Only the gas stove burners are working.

He eats the mac and cheese cold with ketchup, standing at the counter. Then he finds a slightly wizened apple in a bowl on the counter, slices it, buries it in cinnamon and sugar, and carries it to the living room. An orange jar candle is burning on the coffee table, throwing off a tiny bit of light and a powerful pumpkin smell.

He crunches through a slice or two, caught up in his BlackBerry, which was fully charged when he left work but is already down a bar. In trying to tie up a few loose ends he left at the office, he succeeds only in complicating matters even further, and now he’s worried he’s going to run out of battery before anything is resolved.

This power outage is getting to him.

No, this
job
is getting to him.

Understatement. This job is killing me.

The fall programming schedule is under-delivering, not achieving the ratings estimates. The clients, furious and frustrated, are looking for make-goods, but there’s no inventory for that; the ad sales team has been scrambling for ways to avoid having to return cash to them in what has become a no-win situation . . .

Hearing footsteps on the stairs, he looks up from the e-mail he’s in the midst of painstakingly typing with his thumbs.

Through the archway, he can see Allison descending into the votive-lit hallway in her pajamas and a thick fleece robe. She looks like one of the girls, with her long hair hanging loose and her feet in fuzzy slippers—particularly when she stops to peruse the big candy bowl sitting on a table near the front door. After picking through it, she picks up the whole thing and pads into the kitchen with it.

A minute later, she’s back, still carrying the candy, along with a glass of diet iced tea.

“Trick or treat.” She offers the bowl to Mack.

“No, thanks. I’ve got an apple.”

She looks at the plate parked next to the candle on the coffee table. Even in this light, it’s obvious that the fruit slices are all but obscured by drifts of cinnamon sugar.

“There’s probably more sugar there than there is in this entire bowl,” she comments.

“Probably,” he agrees with a shrug. “And by the way . . . we’re out of apples.”

“We’re out of everything except candy. I have to go through the fridge and freezer and toss all the perishables even if the power comes back tomorrow.”

“Well, before you go to bed, make sure you hide that bowl someplace where I can’t get to it, okay? Just in case.”

“What—? Oh.” She gets it. The sleep-eating thing. “Right. I will. But there’s no chocolate—I didn’t buy any because I didn’t want you to be tempted.”

“I don’t think that really matters. I hate sweet pickles and you’re telling me I ate a whole jar last week in my sleep.”

She sighs. “I just hope you don’t eat anything from the fridge that’s spoiled and make yourself sick.”

“I’ll try to warn my subconscious mind.”

“I don’t think that’s going to work.”

“I was kidding, Allison.”

“Oh. I can’t see your face.” She sets the glass and candy bowl on the coffee table—beyond his reach—then sits beside him on the couch, tucking her slippered feet under her and unwrapping a lollipop.

He goes back to typing on his BlackBerry, wishing he could turn on the television. He doesn’t really feel like watching it, but he doesn’t feel like talking to Allison right now, either.

Okay, so maybe he’s the one in a frosty mood, thanks to the earlier tension between them. He’s under enough pressure at work. He doesn’t need her cranking it up at home.

She shivers. “It’s freezing in here.”

“Do you want me to build a fire in the fireplace?” he asks, hitting send and looking up from his BlackBerry at last.

“Not really,” she says around a yawn and a lollipop stick. “I’m going up to bed in a minute. It’ll be warmer under the blankets.”

“Isn’t it going to take you longer than a minute to finish that sucker?”

“I only want a few licks. I’m still on my diet. I have three more pounds to lose. I guess we probably should give all this candy away, like the school said.”

“Killjoy.”

She smirks. “Hey, anything for charity. So . . . stressful day at work?”

“I really don’t want to talk about it.”

She nods and licks her lollipop and sips her iced tea in silence as he checks to see if there’s a response yet to his last e-mail.

There isn’t.

“Mack?”

“Yeah?”

“Are you happy?”

Startled, he looks up to find her watching him intently. Even in this light, he can see that her blue eyes are troubled.

“You mean right now?” he asks. “Or generally speaking?”

“Both.”

He shrugs. “Things are beyond crazy at work, but . . .”

“Things are crazy at home, too. Maybe we should . . . I don’t know.”

His heart does a nervous little flip-flop.

“What?” he asks, reminding himself that this is Allison, not Carrie. This is a successful, solid marriage. She’s not going to end it—and this time, neither is he.

“Maybe we should do something about it. Make some changes. I feel like we never get to see each other anymore, you’re always working, I’m always exhausted. . . . Is this how it’s supposed to be?”

“This is the life we chose, Al. The house, the kids, each other . . . what is it that you want to change?”

“Not
us
,” she says hastily, and rubs her forehead, hard. “I don’t know. Maybe not anything. I just feel like . . .”

He waits for her to finish.

She doesn’t.

She stands, leans over, and kisses him on the head.

“Where are you going?”

“Bed. Maybe all I need is a good night’s sleep.”

He used to think that was all anyone needed.

Not anymore.

Watching her go, he realizes she left the bowl of candy behind. He stands, picks it up, looks around the dark room, and walks toward the desk in the corner. The bowl is too big to stash in a drawer, but he pulls out the leather chair, puts the bowl on the seat, and pushes it back into the kneehole. No one would ever know it’s there.

Not even me.

Pretty bizarre that he’s hiding something from himself.

How is it possible that he wanders around the house at night and wakes up with absolutely no recollection?

How is it possible? You’ve been doing it all your life.

Well, when he was a little boy he did, anyway. For all he knows, he’s been doing it ever since, though the sleep-eating is a new twist.

He’s fairly certain it hasn’t happened lately, though. Every night, after he takes the medicine, before he falls asleep, he does his best to will his subconscious mind into submission.

You will stay in bed.

You will stay in bed.

He hasn’t gained any more weight, and Allison hasn’t mentioned any missing food.

Wearily, he blows out all the candles, climbs the stairs, and looks in on the kids again, one by one. They’re all buried beneath layers of blankets, sound asleep despite the pervasive cold.

Are you happy, Mack?

When he reaches the bedroom, Allison is either already asleep or pretending to be. You’d think the caffeine in her nightly iced tea would keep her awake, but it never seems to.

It isn’t fair, Mack thinks, not for the first time, having long ago given up coffee in the afternoons on Dr. Cuthbert’s advice.

She left a votive candle burning on the bathroom sink. He shakes a familiar white capsule out of the orange plastic bottle and washes it down with water. Then he blows out the candle.

Are you happy, Mack?

The question echoes through his head as, shivering, he climbs into bed. The answer manages to elude him, but sleep, blessedly, does not.

Chapter Eight

L
ast night, long after Mack fell asleep, Allison lay shivering on her side of the bed, having a good cry into her pillow.

It wasn’t that she thought her marriage was in serious trouble.

Of course not.

She loves Mack, and he loves her. It’s just . . .

They’re going through a rough patch, that’s all, between his job and the kids and never having time for each other. She sees that, even if he’s not willing to acknowledge it, or do anything to change it.

But everything seemed more positive in the bright sunlight of Tuesday morning. Luckily, NYSEG kept its promise and restored power to the area by dawn. Allison woke up to find that the house was warm and appliances and electronics had hummed back to life.

Mack was playful with the kids and he kissed Allison on the cheek before he left for the train.

Around noon, he even texted her to say he’d be home before seven tonight, so she decided to cook one of his favorite meals: spicy pepper steak over rice. White rice, not brown. Brown may be healthier, but it just doesn’t taste as good as sticky white in this dish, and Allison is getting tired of feeling obligated to ride the health food train all day, every day. A little simple white starch once in a while isn’t going to kill anyone, right?

You’d think so, listening to those super-nutritionist, super-vigilant, super-organized supermoms on the playground, at book club, at the bus stop.

She’s got to stop hanging on their every bit of advice—solicited or, more often, not; putting constant pressure on herself to do every little thing perfectly. It sucks the fun right out of life.

So Allison loaded the kids into the car and went out to buy the white rice. She visited two different supermarkets in search of just the right cut of meat, loading up on fresh dairy and produce, too, with three different varieties of apples for Mack.

She’d also stopped at Target and replaced the missing chef’s knife, along with a new set of cereal bowls that hopefully won’t disappear into the garbage this time.

Back home, she threw away every perishable item in the fridge and freezer, and now that it’s all restocked . . .

I know exactly what we have, and how much.

As always, the prospect of Mack’s sleep-eating looms in the back of her mind, along with the nagging question about whether she should set up the nanny cam to catch him at it.

When the phone rings late Tuesday afternoon, she’s crying.

This time, it’s only because she’s chopping onions.

She tosses the knife aside, quickly rinses her hands, and picks up the phone, glancing at the caller ID panel. She just hopes this phone call isn’t going to be Mack reporting that he won’t be home for dinner after all.

Private caller.

She answers with an expectant, “Mack?”

There’s a crackling sound, and then a male voice—not her husband’s—comes on the line. “Is this Allison?”

“Yes?”

“Bob Lewis. From next door.”

“Hi, Bob. I thought you were in London.”

“I am, but— Have you seen Phyllis around lately?”

Something in his voice ignites a spark of apprehension. “Yes, just last night. The kids trick-or-treated at your house. Halloween was canceled, but—”

Bob cuts her off, which isn’t like him. He’s usually exceedingly polite.

“Have you seen her today?”

“No, but . . . why? Is everything all right?”

“I’ve been trying to get ahold of her all day, and she’s not answering the house phone or her cell, or her e-mail or texts. That’s not like her.”

Bob says something else, but she can’t hear it thanks to J.J., babbling and banging a wooden spoon on the tray of his high chair. She steps away, into the doorway of the darkened sunroom, standing where she can still keep an eye on her son.

“I’m sorry, Bob, I couldn’t hear you. What was that?”

“I said I’m just worried because she always calls me first thing in the morning—that would be afternoon for me—and she didn’t this morning. I know the power was out, but she has the generator . . .”

“She does,” Allison agrees, “and anyway, the power is back on again. It has been since early this morning.”

“You’re not having any trouble with the phone lines, are you? There’s not another storm, or . . . ?”

“No, the sun was actually out all day. It’s melting all this snow.” Allison automatically glances at the wall of glass—still uncovered, because they haven’t yet gotten around to window treatments.

In the gathering dusk, now that a couple of big branches have fallen from the trees on the property line, she has a partial view of the Lewises’ big Colonial next door.

“I see a couple of lights on,” she tells Bob. “Maybe Phyllis went out and didn’t want to come home to a dark house.”

“Maybe. But she should be answering her cell. Listen, I need to get to bed—it’s getting late here and I have an early meeting—and I won’t be able to sleep unless I know she’s all right. Would you mind going over to check on her?”

“Not at all. I can’t leave the kids, but Mack should be home in about half an hour, so—”

“Is there any way you could just run over quickly now, Allison? I’m sorry. It’s just that the generator could be dangerous if she doesn’t remember to keep the garage door open while it’s running. I keep thinking maybe something happened . . .”

“You mean carbon monoxide?” Allison is alarmed.

“I—I don’t know. You have the keys to our place, right?”

“I do.” Something flashes through her brain—something she never lets herself think about if she can help it.

She had the keys to her neighbor Kristina Haines’s apartment, too, ten years ago. Worried after not hearing from Kristina in the wake of the World Trade Center collapse just blocks away, she let herself into the apartment to check on her . . . and found her murdered corpse.

But this, of course, is completely different. Another place, another time, another friend . . .

Phyllis could be in trouble, though—overcome by carbon monoxide fumes. Her life might be hanging in the balance, and every second counts. Allison can’t tell her worried husband, who is helpless and an ocean away, that she isn’t willing to go over there and check on her because of something horrible—and completely unrelated—that happened ten years ago.

No, and that’s not who I am. I’m not weak. I don’t shy away from my responsibilities, not like my mother did.

“If she doesn’t answer the door,” Bob is saying, “just let yourself in and make sure she’s not in there and . . . unconscious or something.”

“I’m on my way right now. I’ll call you right back in a few minutes . . . or actually, I’ll just have Phyllis call you.”

With those reassuring words ringing in her own head, she hangs up the phone and returns to the kitchen.

“Girls?” she calls, trying to un-pry J.J.’s fingers from around the handle of the wooden spoon. Naturally, he screams in protest.

“Shh, J.J. . . . Girls!” she calls again.

From the living room, she hears only the murmur of televised voices and jaunty kid-show music. With no school yet again today—on the heels of seventy-two hours without electronics—she’s allowed them to watch TV most of the afternoon.

“
Girls!
Come here right this minute!”

Now there are footsteps hurrying toward her the way they do whenever she sounds like she means business.

Maddy appears in the doorway, takes one look at her face, and immediately asks, “What’s wrong, Mommy?”

Beside her, Hudson, markedly less concerned, wrinkles her freckled nose. “I smell onions.”

“I need help,” she tells them above J.J.’s wailing as she wrestles him out of the high chair.

“Chopping onions? Because I don’t like—”

“Not chopping onions! I need you two to babysit your brother for a few minutes. Do you think you can do that?”

Hudson nods vigorously, but Maddy looks even more worried now. “Where are you going?”

“Just outside. I have to run next door, but I’ll be back right away. Like, in two seconds.”

“Two seconds? That’s impossible. No one can—”

“Two
minutes
,” she interrupts Hudson. “Not seconds. Minutes. Okay? You can time me. Come on.”

She leads the way back to the living room with the girls obediently at her heels. “I’m going to put your brother into his swing—no, his ExerSaucer.” Yes, that’s stationary and low to the ground, so he can’t fall out of it. “Stay right here with him while I’m gone, okay?”

The girls kneel on the floor beside the ExerSaucer as she straps their squirming brother into the molded yellow plastic seat. It’s completely encircled by a round red tray to which all sorts of gizmos are attached—bells, mirrors, rattles, the works.

J.J. immediately cheers up, reaching with a chubby, drool-and-tears-wet hand to spin a bright blue spindle.

“There. That’ll keep him busy while I’m gone.” She hurriedly opens the desk drawer where she keeps the Lewises’ keys, expecting to have to dig for them, but the manila envelope labeled “KEYS” is right on top. She sorts through several sets, all labeled with circular cardboard rings: “Our House (spares)” . . . “Beach House” . . . “Lewis House.” Okay, so far, so good.

“Two minutes,” she promises the girls again, and pats her pocket. “I have my cell phone if you need anything. The number is taped by the phone.”

“Or we can just scream out the front door,” Hudson points out.

“Or that,” she agrees with a faint smile, and then she turns her back and is on her way, the smile gone.

I
t’s too good to be true: Allison on her way over to check on her neighbor.

I couldn’t have planned it this way if I tried.

It just goes to show that things have a way of falling into place, if one has patience and truly believes that justice will prevail. The poetic brand of justice, anyway.

Jamie’s only regret is that the surveillance cameras and microphones can’t follow Allison now that she’s out the door and on her way to the Lewises’ house.

All that’s visible now on the computer screen is an image of her kids.

The girls are doing just what she told them to do: sitting and playing with the baby. He’s a spoiled brat, though, that kid. He keeps throwing toys on the floor. He could use a good, hard smack—that would teach him how to behave.

Jamie’s hand clenches into a fist just thinking about it.

But I’ll get my chance for that. All in good time . . .

For now, it’s enough just to think about what a lovely surprise Allison is about to find next door.

C
oming up the Lewises’ driveway, Allison can see that the garage door is open and Phyllis’s Saab is parked inside. The generator is beside it, but it’s fallen silent since last night.

That means Phyllis must have turned it off when the power came back, right?

But wouldn’t she have closed the garage door? She never leaves it open.

Maybe the generator ran out of fuel, and Phyllis didn’t realize it because the power is back.

But surely she’d have noticed the absence of that rumbling motor.

At least the open door is a good sign—it means the house probably isn’t full of carbon monoxide fumes.

And the fact that the car is here doesn’t necessarily mean Phyllis didn’t go out. A friend could have picked her up, right? And she could have forgotten her cell phone, or lost it somewhere in the house . . .

No, she doesn’t have a sticky-fingered, phone-crazy baby to contend with, but people lose their phones all the time, right?

Allison makes her way to the front door and rings the bell. She promised Bob she’d check on her, and she’s going to keep that promise.

After about twenty seconds, she rings it again. Waits.

Rings it again.

Worried, she fits her key into the lock.

Maybe there are fumes even though the garage is open. Maybe that wasn’t enough ventilation.

Hurriedly, she unlocks the door and pushes it open.

“Phyllis?”

The house is completely still. She sniffs the air, smelling nothing, but carbon monoxide is odorless, right? That’s what makes it so dangerous.

“Phyllis!” she calls again.

Silence.

Now what?

Allison props the door open, steps inside, and opens the nearest window, letting more cold, fresh air into the house. Then she pulls her cell phone from her pocket and quickly dials Phyllis’s number.

Immediately, she hears a faint ringing sound from someplace upstairs.

Okay, so the cell phone is here.

What if Phyllis is, too, and is somehow incapacitated?

“Hi, this is Phyllis. Leave me a message, and I’ll—”

Allison disconnects the call and quickly dials her home number. Hudson answers on the first ring, with the efficiency—if not the accent—of a British butler.

“MacKenna residence.”

“Huddy, it’s Mom. Is everything okay there?”

“Everything’s fine and you better hurry. You have less than thirty seconds left,” she reports, and Allison can just picture her looking at her watch.

“I’m going to be another couple of minutes. I just wanted to make sure you guys were all right.”

“We are. Are you going to be one more minute, or two?”

“Two. At the most.”
I hope.

“Okay. Bye, Mommy. Don’t worry about us. I have everything under control.”

“I’m sure you do.”

Hanging up, she flips on a light by the door. The overhead fixture floods the foyer with bright, harsh light.

“Phyllis?” she calls again, poking her head into the living room, dining room, kitchen, study, opening every window as she goes.

The house, a center hall Colonial, is laid out the same way as Allison’s own, but on a much grander scale. She’s been here plenty of times be—

Wait a minute.

The reason she’s been here is to feed the Lewises’ cat.

Every time she opens the door when they’re away, Marnie comes running, purring and rubbing against her legs. She’s an indoor cat—so where is she now?

And where is Phyllis?

“Phyllis!”

Silence.

“Marnie!”

Heart pounding, hand clammy on the polished wooden banister, Allison starts up the steps, calling for the cat, calling for Phyllis, trying not to think of Kristina Haines.