“Yes, I am. I am sure. I am not delusional.”
Silence. I listen to him breathe.
“You don’t think you’re being paranoid?”
And before he’s finished, I’m on top of him: “It isn’t paranoia if it’s really happening.”
Silence. This time he doesn’t follow up.
When I speak again, my voice jangles. “It’s very frustrating to be questioned like this. It’s very, very frustrating to be stuck here.” I gulp. “In this house, and in this . . .” I want to say loop, but by the time I’ve found the word, he’s talking.
“I know.”
“You don’t know.”
“I imagine, then. Look, Anna,” he continues before I can jump in. “You’ve been going at warp speed for two straight days. All weekend. Now you’re saying David might have something to do with . . . whatever.” He coughs. “You’re winding yourself up. Maybe tonight you can just watch a movie or read or something. Go to bed early.” Cough. “Are you taking your meds properly?”
No. “Yes.”
“And you’re keeping off the booze?”
Of course not. “Of course.”
A pause. I can’t tell if he believes me.
“Got anything to say to Livvy?”
I exhale in relief. “I do.” I listen to the rain drumming its fingers against the glass. And a moment later I hear her voice, soft and breathy.
“Mommy?”
I beam. “Hi, pumpkin.”
“Hi.”
“You doing well?”
“Yes.”
“I miss you.”
“Mm.”
“What’s that?”
“I said ‘mm.’”
“Does that mean ‘I miss you too, Mommy’?”
“Yes. What’s happening there?”
“Where?”
“In New York City.” That’s how she’s always referred to it. So formal.
“You mean at home?” My heart swells: home.
“Yes, at home.”
“Just something with the new neighbors. Our new neighbors.”
“What is it?”
“It’s nothing really, pumpkin. Just a misunderstanding.”
Then I hear Ed again. “Look, Anna—sorry to interrupt, kiddo: If you’re worried about David, you ought to get in touch with the police. Not because he’s, you know . . . necessarily involved in whatever’s going on, but—he’s got a record, and you shouldn’t be afraid of your own tenant.”
I nod. “Yes.”
“Okay?”
I nod again.
“You’ve got that cop’s number?”
“Little. I’ve got it.”
I peek through the blinds. There’s a flicker of movement across the park. The Russells’ front door has swung open, a bright flap of white in the gray drizzle.
“Okay,” says Ed, but I’m not listening anymore.
When the door closes, the woman has appeared on the stoop. She’s in a knee-length red coat, like the flame of a torch, and above her head bobs a translucent half-moon umbrella. I reach for my camera on the desk, lift it to my eye.
“What was that?” I ask Ed.
“I said I want you to take care of yourself.”
I’m peering through the viewfinder. Streaks of rainwater like varicose veins slide down the umbrella. I lower the lens, zoom in on her face: the tip-tilt nose, the milky skin. Dark clouds brew under her eyes. She hasn’t been sleeping.
By the time I say goodbye to Ed, she’s slowly descending the front steps in her high boots. She stops, withdraws her phone from her pocket, studies it; then she tucks it away and turns east, toward me. Her face is blurry behind the bowl of the umbrella.
I’ve got to speak to her.
61
Now, while she’s alone. Now, while Alistair can’t interfere. Now, while the blood is roaring in my temples.
Now.
I fly into the hall, whirl down the stairs. If I don’t think, I can do it. If I don’t think. Don’t think. Thinking hasn’t gotten me anywhere so far. “The definition of insanity, Fox,” Wesley used to remind me, paraphrasing Einstein, “is doing the same thing again and again and expecting a different result.” So stop thinking and start acting.
Of course, it was only three days ago that I acted—acted in this very same way—and I wound up in a hospital bed. To try that again is insane.
Either way, I’m crazy. Fine. I need to know. And I’m no longer sure my house is safe.
My slippers skid on the kitchen floor as I rush across it, swerve around the sofa. That tube of Ativan on the coffee table. I upend it, shake three into my palm, clap my hand to my mouth. Down the hatch. I feel like Alice swigging the drink me potion.
Run to the door. Kneel to retrieve the umbrella. Stand, twist the lock, yank the door open. Now I’m in the hall, watery light leaking through the leaded glass. I breathe—one, two—and thumb the umbrella spring. With a sound like a sudden breath, the canopy spreads in the gloom. I bring it to eye level, fumble for the lock with my other hand. The trick is to keep breathing. The trick is to not stop.
I don’t stop.
The lock turns in my hand. The knob turns next. I crush my eyelids shut and pull. A gasp of cool air. The door dents the umbrella; I maneuver myself through the doorway.
Now the cold encloses me, hugs me. I scurry down the steps. One, two, three, four. The umbrella pushes against the air, plows through it, like the prow of a ship; with my eyes buttoned tight, I feel it flowing in sharp currents on either side of me.
My shins brake. Metal. The gate. I wave my hand until I’ve grasped it and draw it open, step through. The soles of my slippers slap concrete. I’m on the sidewalk. I feel needles of rain pricking my hair, my skin.
It’s strange: In all the months we’ve been experimenting with this ludicrous umbrella technique, it never occurred to me or (I assume) to Dr. Fielding that I might simply close my eyes. No sense in wandering around sightless, I suppose. I can feel the shift in barometric pressure, and my senses prickle; I know the skies are vast and deep, an upside-down ocean . . . but I screw my eyelids tighter still and think of my house: my study, my kitchen, my sofa. My cat. My computer. My pictures.
I pivot left. East.
I’m walking blind down a sidewalk. I need to orient myself. I need to look. Slowly I unshutter one eye. Light dribbles in through the thicket of my lashes.
For an instant I slow, almost stop. I’m squinting at the crosshatched innards of the umbrella. Four blocks of black, four lines of white. I imagine those lines surging with energy, bulging like a heartbeat monitor, spiking and sinking with the rhythm of my blood. Focus. One, two, three, four.
I tilt the umbrella up a few degrees, then a few more. There she is, bright as a spotlight, red as a stoplight: that scarlet coat, those dark boots, the clear plastic half-moon nodding above her. Between us stretches a tunnel of rain and pavement.
What will I do if she turns around?
But she doesn’t. I drop the umbrella and cram my eyelid shut once more. Step forward.
A second step. A third. A fourth. By the time I’ve stumbled over a crack in the sidewalk, my slippers sopping, my body shaking, sweat sliding down my back, I’ve decided to hazard a second look. This time I open the other eye, lift the umbrella until she flares within my view again, a streaking flame. I flick a glance left—St. Dymphna’s, and now the fire-red house, its window boxes throbbing with mums. I flick a glance right: the beady eyes of a pickup staring down the street, headlights livid in the gloom. I freeze. The car swims past. I squeeze my eyes shut.
When I open them again, it’s gone. And when I look down the sidewalk, I see that she is, too.
Gone. The sidewalk is empty. In the distance, through the haze, I can make out a knot of traffic at the intersection.
The haze thickens, and I realize it’s my vision thickening, quickening.
My knees buck, then buckle. I start to sink to the ground. And as I do, even with my eyes reeling in my skull, I picture myself from overhead, shivering in my sodden robe, my hair pasted against my back, an umbrella dipped uselessly in front of me. A lone figure on a lonely sidewalk.
I sink further, melting into the concrete.
But—