I suppose it was removed at some point. Maybe Graham felt it wasn’t safe for me to be locked in the bathroom, given my situation. But I hate the idea that anybody could burst into this room at any moment.
I force myself to look at my reflection in the vanity mirror. It’s so strange. It’s me, but not me. But also definitely me. The short hair is the most jarring part of all, but my face looks different in subtle ways. Ways that maybe only I would notice. A few creases around my eyes. My cheeks aren’t quite as full.
And there are dark purple circles under my eyes.
I pull off my night shirt and drop it on our shiny new toilet. I run my fingers over the bare skin of my chest. It’s not that different from what I remember. But if I continue to have these memory problems over years and decades, that will change. Someday, I’m going to walk over to the mirror and see an old lady staring back at me.
The thought of it brings on a wave of nausea. I double over, clutching my stomach. I need to calm down. It’s like that letter I wrote said—if I relax and accept it, I’ll be fine.
And then I notice something on my thigh. Black ink.
Somebody scrawled a sentence on my thigh, above where my nightshirt ends. It looks like my own handwriting, but it’s hard to tell. I squint at the words, and a chill goes through me when I realize what they say.
Graham is drugging you.
Oh my God.
I’m shaking so badly that I barely make it to the toilet before my legs give out beneath me. I sit there, staring at the message scribbled on my leg. I’m obviously the one who wrote it there. It’s upside down, the way it would be if I were writing it. Nobody else could have written that. And I wrote it in a place where I didn’t think Graham would see.
My husband is drugging me. I don’t know whether I have a head injury, but either way, something is going on. He’s doing this to me.
I’ve got to get out of here. I’ve got to call the police.
I peek outside the bathroom—Graham has gone downstairs. I forget about showering and slip outside the bathroom. I fumble through the drawers, looking for something to wear. I find piles of women’s clothing, but none of it looks familiar to me. All my old stuff is gone. My Weezer T-shirt. My fuzzy green sweater I always wore on St. Patrick’s Day. My favorite pair of blue jeans with the giant hole in the right knee that Harry used to joke made me look like I was in a grunge band. Everything is gone.
But I don’t have time to care about any of that. I select a sweater and a pair of jeans, then slide my feet into a pair of blindingly white sneakers, so new that they still feel stiff. I look around for a wallet or any kind of money—I usually keep my wallet on the clothing dresser.
But there’s nothing. And my phone is MIA as well.
It doesn’t matter. I’ll leave here with no money and I’ll find the nearest police station. I’ll tell them what I know about Graham. I’m sure they can do some blood or urine tests to find out if he’s been drugging me or not.
I try to be as quiet as possible as I walk down the stairs. I don’t know Graham, and I don’t know what he’s capable of. Well, I know he’s capable of poisoning me. But I don’t know if he’s the sort of person who would attack me if I tried to leave. Better not to find out.
The living room is quiet. It looks so different from the way it used to look when Harry and I lived here. It looks like the living room out of a magazine about the lifestyles of the rich and famous. Where did the money come from to buy all this stuff?
I smell bread toasting in the kitchen. The sizzle of a frying pan. Graham is occupied at the stove. Now is the perfect time to slip away.
I reach the front door, my legs wobbling underneath me. I feel so lost. I don’t even know how I’m going to get to the police station. I wish Harry were here. I need to find him. Wherever he is, I’m sure he’ll help me. I don’t believe what that letter said about him having done bad things.
As soon as I get out of here, I’m going straight to the police and I’m going to find Harry.
I reach for the lock on the front door. But then my hand stops, inches short. There’s a lock, but not one that you turn from the inside. Instead, there’s a keyhole.
Oh God, this door is locked from the inside. I can’t get out.
I turn the knob, hoping this is some sort of mistake. It’s not. I can’t get out of this house without the key to the lock on the door.
I’m trapped here.
“Tess?”
I whirl around. Graham is standing there, holding a spatula in his right hand. He raises his eyebrows at me. “What are you doing, Tess?”
I wipe my sweaty hands on my jeans. “I… I need some fresh air. Could I go out?”
“Maybe after breakfast.” He nods in the direction of the kitchen. “Come on. Let’s eat.”
I could scream. I could try to attack him. But what good would that do? I saw him without his shirt on—he’s a muscular guy and he would have absolutely no problem fending off any attacks from the likes of me. And even if I momentarily disabled him, I can’t leave this house without a key.
Maybe it’s better for him to think I trust him. For now.
“Okay,” I say.
When I get into the kitchen, I have to blink a few times. Like the living room, the old skeletal kitchen that used to be falling apart at the seams has now been replaced with… well, my dream kitchen. Not that I’m the sort of person who has a dream kitchen, but God, this kitchen is gorgeous. I sit down at the kitchen island on one of the barstools. There’s a flat rectangular device on the table.
“What’s that?” I ask.
Graham’s lips twitch. “It’s your phone.”
A phone! And not just a phone—it’s one of those iPhones. I always wanted one of those, but it was so far out of our budget. But now, not only do I have my dream kitchen, but I have my dream phone.
But none of that matters. All that matters is that I can call 911 with this phone. I can let the police know that this crazy man is holding me hostage and drugging me and making me live in this house that is… well, gorgeous, but that’s beside the point. I’m trapped here.