What You See (12 page)

“Too bad you can’t see the stabber’s face,” Jake had said to D.

“True,” DeLuca said. “Thing is, we don’t need to see it.” He pointed to the stabber’s forearm. The arm with the knife. “Look closer.”

Jake looked. “Tattoo.”

“Yup.”

Jake had examined it again, close up, and then from farther away, holding it up to the light, as if that would reveal something. “Some fancy defense attorney’ll probably try to argue the stabber was being a good Samaritan, trying to pull the knife
out.
”

“Love to be there when he tries that,” DeLuca said. “We’d hear the jury laughing all the way to the Cape.”

“Yup,” Jake said.

“So, my man. If our John Doe 2 at MGH has a tattoo? What you see is what you get. Another life drama successfully solved,” DeLuca had said. “And in less than six hours. A new record, Harvard, even for us.”

Jake put the photo back into his jacket pocket. Reaching past the stroller, he pushed the button for 6.

*   *   *

So that was cool. The afternoon had raced by, even though it usually seemed like time went by slower if you wanted the day to go fast, not today. Brileen had asked her if she wanted to get coffee after work, since lunch got too rushed.

Tenley had gone back to her desk, and time had completely flown.

She logged off, watched the screen dip to black, waved at the second shifters arriving to take the day team’s place, and even smiled at the slobby red-haired guy who always took her spot. He looked kind of, like, surprised, so she guessed she’d never smiled at him before. Dahlstrom was nowhere to be seen, even better, as Tenley punched the ticking metal time clock. She usually hated that—who still had a punch clock?—but this time the little good-bye
ding
made her happy. She’d realized she’d seen Bri on the T in the mornings, must have, they just hadn’t connected. And turned out Bri went to the same college. Now she was meeting a college friend for coffee. Cool.

Tenley made a quick pit stop, assessed herself in the ladies’ room mirror as she rolled up her skirt’s waistband. Once, twice, patted it into place. Wonder if Brileen knew Lanna? Brileen seemed a little older—but old enough to know Lanna?

Anyway. Dr. Maddux would be happy she was “getting out in the world,” right? Should she text her mom, saying she was meeting a friend for coffee—wouldn’t
that
be a surprise?—and not to worry, she’d be home? She
could
just go tell her in person.

Tenley stuck her earrings back in, felt the golden curves slip through the pierces in her ears. She felt like her old self, a feeling she hadn’t had in however long she could remember. There was a Tenley she used to know, the one who laughed and read vampire books, who kind of liked math and computers and puzzles, who listened to music and secretly read movie star blogs. It had all soured, turned worthless, and gross and shallow, after Lanna. Died.

“
After Lanna died,
” she whispered. She had to face it. And live with it.

She was only eighteen. And she was, she had to admit, kind of tired of feeling sad. Was it being unfaithful to be happy? She would never understand what happened to Lanna. She could never imagine forgiving herself for it. And she would always miss Lanna. Always, always, always.

But that didn’t mean she had to give up her whole life. Lanna would want her to be happy.

She hardly remembered waiting for the elevator, hardly remembered waving to the snoozing security guard at the Congress Street side exit, hardly remembered poking the flat metal button to get the Walk sign. She’d started crossing before it even changed, because how could she wait? Because there was her friend Brileen Finnerty, across the street, sitting on the green bench. Exactly as she’d promised.

It was almost as if Lanna had given her a gift.

17

“My
fault
?
My
fault?” Catherine Siskel said it out loud to her empty kitchen, knew if she threw the framed photo of Lanna across the room it would serve only to shatter the glass, thereby destroying another part of their lives. Early this morning, her husband called to inform her that he’d “again” “unexpectedly” been “called” to meet with a client. And he “might be” “very delayed” coming home. So her photo-throwing drama would be wasted. What’s more, she’d have to clean up all that broken glass.

Seemed she was always cleaning up something. The most internecine messes at City Hall were easier to manage than her own life.

It wasn’t just Greg, she had to admit. Often she herself stayed late at the office, an explainable side effect of her job, but recently more an excuse to keep from having to go home to their daughter Lanna’s forever-empty bedroom and her husband’s empty eyes. What was he caring about these last months? Not her.

Now she was by herself, in their empty house. Tenley wasn’t home yet, and if Greg found out, somehow he’d make even that her fault. In this morning’s call, he’d insisted, as always, she make sure their daughter was home that night. Because of Lanna, he always said.

What else was new?

She was always concerned about Tenley. Greg hardly had to remind her of that. But Tenley had to live in the real world. She and her husband could not protect her from imaginary dangers. She’d be home soon.

“The girl is eighteen,” she’d reminded Greg, unnecessarily, this morning. Now she shoved a bottle of sauvignon blanc into the fridge. At least it could be cold, even though she’d have to open it alone. She slammed the stainless steel door.
Taking her hostilities out on the fridge. Helpful.

“She has a job at City Hall, a job
I
managed to finagle for her,” Catherine had said. “Why is it my responsibility to make sure she’s home at some random time you happen to select? No. Just, no. We need to let her have a life.”

Catherine steadied herself against the countertop. Using the toe of her left black patent pump, she pried off the heel of her right shoe, then, with bare toes, slipped off the other. She left both shoes toppled over in the middle of the kitchen floor and paced by them, fuming. Taking off her heels was always such a relief, and the cool tile felt soothing under her feet. But this was no time to relax, she couldn’t relax any part of her.

She replayed more of the morning’s conversation—if you could call it “conversation”—in her head.

“I resent this, Greg,” she’d said. “You go away, you call me from where the hell ever, you expect the world to work just the way you want and demand, and when it doesn’t, it’s everyone’s fault but yours.”

She leaned against the counter, the empty house deafening. She’d tried to be patient with her husband. He was still in mourning, still upset, relentlessly, viciously upset. Catherine knew the most effective way to handle an unhappy constituent was to listen, evaluate, and then design a solution. She did that every day at City Hall.

But finally she couldn’t listen to one more word. “
You
lost a daughter?” Her scorn had pinged off the shiny windows of her City Hall office, and then against the framed photos on her office wall. “
I’ve
lost a daughter, too, Greg. We’ve both—I mean—not a day goes by that I—”

The kitchen floor tile no longer felt cool under her tired feet. She dropped her head back and closed her eyes, remembering, searching for new meaning in this impossibly recycled and reprocessed conversation. How many times could they talk about the exact same thing in different ways? How long would the loop of sorrow and guilt continue before it destroyed them both?
All three of them,
she amended.

How her husband’s brain worked she could no longer fathom. Twenty-seven years ago, was it now? when she was still Kate O’Connor, they’d met and married when they both attended the Kennedy School’s public policy program. They’d cuddled in the common TV room watching the presidential elections and told each other “don’t worry, be happy” every time they had a big paper due. She rebranded herself Catherine, took her husband’s name in a fit of neofeminism, and went into local politics. He went into political consulting. They’d been the happy activist couple, making a difference in people’s lives every day. Now they lived in a nice, but fringey, part of town, the mayor insisting it would prove that every part of the City of Boston welcomed everyone. The mayor lived in the welcome of Beacon Hill. But the woods nearby had been lovely. Until Lanna.

“How about this, Greg,” she’d said, trying to use her calm-the-constituent voice though she knew he’d recognize that and be further annoyed. “How about if you come home tonight? For once?”

“I’ll try,” he’d said. “I will.”

Catherine replayed those words, “I’ll try,” as clear as if her husband—
where was he?—
had just said them. She’d open that wine now and pretend nothing bad had happened, nothing bad had touched them, and nothing bad would ever touch them again.

She took a step toward the fridge and tripped over one of her shoes, stubbing a toe and almost falling against the drain board.
All
she needed. All! She paused, feeling her tears. Why did she always have to be the conciliatory one? She was hurting, too, and trying her best to cope. Huh. Maybe she’d even be better off without Greg. Let go of the past. Let go of
him.
Start over.

“Greg?” She’d finally interrupted whatever he’d been saying. “Forgive me here for the outrageous notion—but if you cannot manage to come home, how about if you pick up your phone and call Tenley yourself? Remind her you exist?”

A hang-up moment if Catherine had ever heard one, and it took every bit of her willpower not to do it.

“Tell Tenley I love her,” Greg had said. And then he was gone.

*   *   *

“Never?
Never?
”

Jane tried to remember the last time she’d seen her sister like this. Over many years, Melissa had perfected annoyed-petulant and demonstrated it whenever she didn’t get her way.

“You’re saying this has never happened before?” Melissa stood next to a striped wing chair in Robyn and Lewis Wilhoite’s living room, one hand on her navy silk hip and the other gesturing, underlining every time she said “never.” Jane could picture the identical stance in a courtroom, Melissa as prosecutor, grilling some poor defendant on the witness stand.

Melissa’s target now was suburban housewife Robyn Wilhoite, perched on the center cushion of her almost-gaudy chintz couch, alone, hands in her lap, fingers intertwined.

“Never happened that I don’t know where they are?” Robyn pouted, fussed with the black cardigan draped around her shoulders. “Well, not really. I mean, lately Lewis is trying to be, well, he calls it
spontaneous.
He thinks Gracie should be more … flexible. Live for today, all that. They go on adventures.”

Jane, standing by a multiwindowed mahogany breakfront, waited for her cue, not certain of her role. Melissa had asked her to come, her pleading voice on the phone making Jane’s presence seem urgent, but after a brief two-cheek air kiss, Melissa’d essentially ignored her. Still, the best way to understand a story was to listen. Any good reporter knew that.

“Flexible?” Melissa was saying. “They go on ‘
adventures
’? My question was: Has it ever happened before? A fairly binary question. Yes or no?”

Robyn flattened herself against the couch, pressing into the flowered cushions as if she were trying to get farther away from her new—what was she about to become? Jane tried to parse the relationships. Robyn was little Gracie’s mother, and Melissa would soon be Gracie’s stepmother. So Robyn and Melissa were … there was no word for that, Jane realized.

“Gracie left her cell phone at home.” Robyn’s voice was a mix of whine and whisper. “Lewis isn’t answering his, and I’ve left message after message. But he thinks the phone is silly. He says it’s a ‘technological noose.’ Strangling real life.”

Lewis sounded like quite the piece of work.

Jane tried to catch Melissa’s eye, but her sister focused on Robyn.

“I see. I suppose. Still.” Melissa slapped the back of one hand into the palm of the other, like a politician making a point. “Daniel arrives from Geneva tomorrow now, if all goes as planned, and we’re all supposed to fly back to Chicago. What if they’re not back in time for that? It’s the wedding!”

“Why is
she
here?” Robyn pointed to Jane.

Jane saw Melissa shake her head, quickly, as if to clear it, change the tone. She stopped her rapid-fire interrogation and lowered herself onto the wing chair, tucked her silk skirt under her, then reached out a conciliatory hand. Not quite touching Robyn but coming close.

“I’m
so
sorry, Robyn,” Melissa said. “I tend to accelerate right into lawyer mode. It’s the wedding. I’m a little on edge. Jane’s here simply in case we need to call someone. We’re family, right? She’s family. But the easiest solution is most often the correct one. That’s why I’m asking—before we make any major decisions—if it’s possible your husband just forgot to call to update you? That his cell battery is dead? That he and Gracie are, I don’t know, getting pizza?”

A tiny jagged streak of black mascara blotched one of Robyn’s cheeks, and she yanked her pale hair behind her ears, twisted it up on the back, let it fall. “Pizza?”

“Robyn?” Jane took a few steps closer. “You’re saying Lewis and Gracie have never been off your radar? He picks her up at school for lunch?”

“Well, not totally. Of course I don’t
always
know where they are,” Robyn said. “Why would I?”

Well,
Jane thought, I
would know where
my
daughter was.
So any suspicious mind—and Jane was proud of hers, a necessary quality in a reporter—would wonder if the reportedly manipulative and clingy Robyn was truly upset over Gracie’s whereabouts, or simply trying to screw with the woman about to keep her daughter from her for three months a year. A suspicious mind would also speculate whether obviously skeptical Melissa was upset over Gracie, or over Robyn’s center-ring disruption of her own prenuptial plans.