It made perfect sense if you came from a place like Cooley Ridge.
If the entirety of Corinne’s official investigation existed inside that single box I pictured at the police station, I’d imagine this was all the evidence you would see: one pregnancy test, stuffed into a box of candy and hidden at the bottom of the trash can; one ring with remnants of blood pulled from the caverns; cassette tapes with hours of interview reports to sort through—facts and lies and half-truths, wound up in a spool; Corinne’s phone records; and names. Names scrawled on ripped-up pieces of paper, enough pieces to pad the entire box, like stuffing.
Until recently, I imagined that this box was taped up and hidden in a corner, behind other, newer boxes. But now there’s the feeling that all it would take is a simple nudge for it to topple over, and the lid to fall free, and the names to scatter across the dusty floor. The box is exactly like it is in Cooley Ridge. The past, boxed up and stacked out of sight. But never too far away.
Open the top because Annaleise mentioned Corinne’s name and disappeared. Close your eyes and reach your hand inside. Pull out a name.
That’s how it works here.
That’s what’s happening.
Yes, I had called Everett for advice. For my dad. He could’ve told me what to do about the cops who were ambushing my senile father at his nursing home, but he hopped a plane three days ago and paid a ridiculous amount of cab fare and set up his own base of operations in the dining room. He showed up at this house and stood on the front porch because he said I’d scared him, and I loved him for it. I loved that he came. But I couldn’t dig through our history with him here. Couldn’t figure out what the hell had happened to Annaleise without dragging him into it.
My advice to him: Leave. Leave before we pull you down with us.
“It’s my family,” I said.
“I don’t want you staying here,” he whispered, pointing to the backyard that stretched as far as we could see, disappearing into the trees. “A girl went missing from right there.”
“I’ll take that prescription, and I’ll try to sleep more, I promise. But I have to stay.”
He kissed my forehead and mumbled into my hair, “I don’t know why you’re doing this.”
Wasn’t it obvious? She was everywhere I looked. On every telephone pole. In every store window. The same places I’d hung posters of Corinne, stapling them with a knot in my stomach, handing them out faster and faster, as if my speed could somehow change the outcome.
Annaleise on those posters now, with her huge, open eyes, telling me to open mine. Everywhere I looked, there she was. Look. Look. Keep your eyes open.
* * *
THE TAXI COMPANY SAID a car would arrive in twenty minutes, but I guessed it would be more like forty. Everett was leaning against the laundry room doorjamb, watching me dump his clothes from the dryer into the warped plastic bin with half a smile on his face. “You don’t have to do that, Nicolette.”
I cleared my throat and balanced the laundry basket on my hip. “I want to,” I said. I wanted to fold his clothes and pack them up and kiss him goodbye. I wanted him to get home and open his suitcase and think of me. But I also just wanted him to go.
He watched me fold his clothes into perfect squares on the dining room table. And then he watched me stack them in his suitcase, as if performing a delicate surgery. “See if you can break your lease,” he said, striding toward me, wrapping his arms around my waist as I folded his last shirt. He brushed my ponytail to the side and put his lips against my neck. “I want you living with me as soon as you’re back.”
I nodded and kept my arms moving. It should be easy for me to say, Yes, of course, yes. It should be easy for me to envision: me, with my clothes taking up half his closet; us, cooking together in his kitchen, curled up on his couch with the red throw blanket over my legs because he kept the temperature about five degrees cooler than I liked it. Him, talking about court. And me, talking about my students as I poured two glasses of wine.
“What’s the matter?” Everett asked.
“Nothing. Just thinking of everything I need to do here first.”
“Do you need anything?” he asked, stepping back. He cleared his throat, tried to make his voice seem natural. “Money?”
I flinched. He’d never offered me money. We’d never even talked about money. He had it and I didn’t, which meant we circled the topic like a fire that could quickly burn out of control and consume us both. It was why I never brought up the wedding, because then he’d have to mention the prenup that I knew his dad would demand I sign, and I would, but there it would be, out in the open, ready to burn. “No, I don’t need your money,” I said.
“That’s not what I— Nicolette, I just meant I can help. Please let me help.”
He’d told me, back when we first met, that I was the embodiment of everything he wished he could be. Setting out in a car by myself, working my way through school, self-made.
But as I’d told him back then, you have to come from nothing to have that chance. You have to pay your debts.
“Yeah, well, I have ten years’ worth of loans,” I’d said.
Sometimes I wondered if, when we got married, he would pay them off. If that would make me a different person. If he’d like me quite as much.
“Everett, thank you, but money isn’t going to help.” I zipped up his suitcase and leaned it against the wall.
I heard a car turn off the road in the distance. “Your cab’s here,” I whispered, bringing my arms around his waist and resting my head against his chest again.
“Think about it?” he asked, pulling back. I wasn’t sure which he was referring to—moving in with him or taking his money—and I hated that he was bringing both up right now. That it took this—seeing me here, hovering near some indefinable edge—that made him seem to want me more.
“Okay,” I said, and from the look on his face, I wondered if I had just unintentionally agreed to something.
“I wish I could stay longer,” he said, pulling me into a kiss. “But I’m glad I got to meet your family.”
I laughed. “Yeah, good thing.”
“I’m serious,” he said. Then, lower, “They’re good people.”
“Yeah,” I whispered, and I let him pull me in so tight I’d probably have indentations from the lines of his collar on my cheek. “So are you,” I said as he released me.
He dragged his hands down my arms as he backed away and lifted my left hand to his face. “I’ll file a claim tomorrow.”
“It might still turn up.” I cringed. “It’s probably in one of those half-packed boxes. I’ll look again.”
“Let me know if you find it,” he said, pulling his suitcase behind him toward the front door. “And Nicolette?” My heart stopped, from the way he was looking at me. “If you’re not home by next weekend, I’m coming back for you.”
* * *
AFTER WATCHING HIS CAB drive off, I shut the door behind me, turned the lock, and twisted the knob to double-check. I circled the house, checking them all, closing the windows that Everett had insisted on opening, and wedging the kitchen chair under the handle of the back door with the broken lock. Everything felt slow and labored, even my breathing. It was this heat. The damn air-conditioning unit that still wasn’t fixed. I dragged myself to the kitchen—I needed a drink. Something cold. Caffeinated. I bent over and stuck my head in the fridge, debating my choices.
Water. Gatorade. Cans of soda. I sank to my knees in front of the open door, breathing in the cold air—wake up, Nic—as the electricity hummed in my ear and the fridge light illuminated the space around me.