In the bedroom, nothing looked as it once did. The bed he shared with his wife was neatly made and would stay that way. He’d sleep on the couch. It was almost midnight, too late to call Nat’s parents. He’d do that in the morning. Maybe by then Natalie would come to her senses, but that felt like a dim prospect. In his gut, he knew: this wasn’t his life anymore, and all these things they’d acquired over the years were illusions, too. It wasn’t the possessions but the people residing within that made a house feel like a home.
Michael settled his gaze on the dresser. His clothes took up the bottom two drawers. Natalie had the other three. Something made him go there, a whisper of intuition perhaps. If she wanted to keep a secret from him, those drawers might be a good hiding place, somewhere he wouldn’t accidentally stumble upon it. He riffled through piles of underwear he’d seen on Natalie’s body, and thought that he might never see them grace her curves again.
Inside the other drawers, he found her socks and belts and a jewelry box filled with costume jewelry that had belonged to Natalie’s grandmother, but no clues, nothing to point him in any direction.
He went to the closet, not to search, but to get out of the clothes he’d had on in New York, purge himself of the reminders. He noticed a stack of shoeboxes, the ones Natalie left behind. A thought occurred to him that if she’d left the house knowing she was going to run, she knew what shoes she’d want to bring with her on her journey, and none of these made the cut.
The box with the red-soled shoes stood out to him. They were her most expensive pair—he should know, he had bought them for her as a gift. Well, she told him exactly which ones and what size to buy. She wore those shoes, often paired with a black spaghetti strap dress, whenever she got dressed up for a night on the town. The dress went with her to New York because Michael had insisted on it. It was so damn sexy on her, but the shoes had stayed behind, and he hadn’t made the connection. That should have been a clue that Natalie had no intention of ever putting that dress on.
Michael opened the box and removed one of the insanely expensive shoes, which looked to him like a form of medieval torture. With one shoe out, he could see a flash of white at the bottom of the shoebox, contrasting with the beige interior—because fancy shoes evidently came in colored boxes. He soon realized the white was a folded-up piece of paper. A receipt, perhaps? Maybe he’d return the shoes. Vindictive? Sure. But maybe he’d do it anyway.
After unfolding the paper, Michael knew this was no receipt. It was a handwritten note. It was unsigned, but he knew who wrote it. He read the words with his heart in his throat.
There’s something you need to know. I feel deeply ashamed and I don’t think I’m capable of having this conversation in person. I’ve been having an affair with your husband. I didn’t realize he was married when we first started talking. We were just friends and it progressed. As we got closer, I learned the truth, but I let my emotions take over, so I’m at fault as well. It’s over now, but I think you should know that the man you’re married to has been unfaithful. I’m sorry for the pain that I have caused you.
Oh shit, he thought. This is bad. But does she know the rest?
CHAPTER 12
NATALIE
BEFORE SHE DISAPPEARED
The morning after her lunch with Audrey, Natalie awoke utterly exhausted. She made her way to the bathroom on achy legs, thinking she should make yoga a priority again. A splash of cold water felt rejuvenating, but the circles under her eyes suggested that to stay awake at work, she would have to forgo the Xanax she so desperately wanted to take for her anxiety.
After getting dressed, Natalie headed to the kitchen, where she prepped what would be the first of many cups of coffee that day. She looked around, seeing all the familiar sights of home. She had sought meaning and purpose within the kernels of the stories each of those items told: the couch where they lounged during family movie nights; an original oil painting that was supposed to be the start of an art collection but was still the only one they’d ever purchased. Every item, from the expensive to the mundane, told part of the same story: my husband loves me, we have a beautiful home together, a perfect life. It all rang hollow. Her possessions appeared as they did yesterday, as they always had, but now Natalie saw them as tainted, as if a coating of ash had settled over her life’s accumulations.
Not only was Natalie convinced her husband was being unfaithful, but had she accidently stumbled upon the woman with whom he was having his affair? She didn’t think to tell Audrey her last name. Perhaps Audrey didn’t realize that she’s Michael’s wife, or could it be she was well aware and harbored some twisted curiosity about her lover’s spouse? Tina’s prescient words of warning came back to her with a sting. The bait had turned out to be the catch.
Natalie made waffles for the kids. More aptly, she put four quasi-edible frozen ovals in the toaster oven and heated them up. She had no qualms this morning about letting the children overindulge in the fake syrup Addie and Bryce liked so much. Natalie far preferred the Vermont variety, but little mattered to her at that moment.
Michael strode into the kitchen, knotting up his tie like he was stepping into a TV commercial: Morning dear! Coffee dear? No time, hon, got to run. There’s always time for [insert favorite brand of coffee here].
But no, this wasn’t a commercial. This was Michael’s usual morning routine. He had his gym bag with him. That was different. Normally he kept his workout gear in a rented locker at the club, but Michael had lost his key and didn’t want to pay the fifteen-dollar replacement fee.
“It’ll turn up somewhere,” he told Nat with his usual air of Michael confidence that everything was going to work out just fine.
Natalie eschewed the job of doting wife from that fictitious commercial to let Michael pour his own damn cup of coffee. He fixed it the way he wanted—milk with extra sugar, overly sweet, just like the kids and their syrup. Natalie drank her coffee black, the more bitter the better. Was that a sign of their incompatibility, one that she’d overlooked? Perhaps it was one of many. She wondered how many signs she may have missed along the way.
“Want me to pick up fish for dinner?” Michael asked all honey-voiced, face glued to his phone. Everything was on that blasted device, including, as Natalie now speculated, pictures of precious little Audrey Adler. Maybe there were some naughty shots, or sexts all hot and steamy. There certainly wouldn’t be any pictures of that sort from their own bedroom, which had frozen over like an ice storm had passed through.
Michael wanted to blame her insomnia for what he called a “woefully lacking” (aka nonexistent) sex life, which Natalie now saw as a clever bit of misdirection. Sure, Natalie was the first to lose interest in sex, but it was a temporary hiatus she believed, work pressures and nothing more. The note about Michael’s flirting habit was bad enough to send her into full-blown insomnia, but Audrey risked pushing her over the edge.