Three months into my stay, a name shows up on my visitor list: Helen Peters. I don’t recognize the name, but I approve it anyway. Maybe it’s someone I knew in school. Maybe it’s the new tenant, onto Margo and Graham’s game. I don’t care who it is. I am so bored in prison. I have a roommate, so it’s kind of like college but the girls are meaner. They play games where no one wins. I will be out soon. I’m looking forward to it but I’m also afraid. A life is such a dangerous thing to have. I’m surprised everyone gets one. Most people don’t know what to do with it.
I take my spot at one of the tables. It’s my first time having a visitor. My parents are happy with their wedding present. Post–prison sentence, they probably feel only more justified in choosing money over me. Posey sent me a postcard from St. Barts: I can’t believe you’re in jail! Graham is such an asshole! I pinned it to my wall. Who would have thought that Posey would be my only real friend?
This is a low-security prison. It’s like a country club without champagne. Visiting hours seem like a chance for prisoners to ream out their loved ones. One woman is mad that her husband doesn’t visit enough. Another is pissed at her son for getting a tattoo. Another one is crying because her family couldn’t bring their dog in.
I am watching the door when Demi walks in. My stomach drops. She is dressed all in white. What a bitch; that’s Margo’s color. It makes me like her. No, it makes me love her.
A genuine smile spreads across my face as she takes the seat across from me. “Helen Peters?” She shrugs. “You look good.” Who wears white to prison? Rich people. People so out of touch they don’t realize how bad it looks.
“Thank you,” she says, shifting in her seat. Her eyes narrow as she takes in our surroundings, always analyzing. Always looking for a way out. “I wanted to thank you for . . . for what you did.”
“It’s nothing.” I toss my hand. Nine months in prison? Easy. I do it all the time. “I’ve done a lot of bad things. I deserve to be punished for something, even if it’s something I didn’t do.”
“I appreciate it.”
I don’t say anything. It’s a power move. Pathetic but it’s all I have.
“Do you have anything you want to ask?” she finally says.
“You came to me.” She shifts, uncomfortable in her white linen. “I’m guessing you’re starting to see what I was dealing with. The games these people play. I could have warned you.”
“Why didn’t you?”
“Would you have believed me?”
“Yes.”
“I’ll be out soon. For good behavior.”
“Graham wants to have you committed.”
“You won’t let that happen, will you?” I stand to leave, rap the table once with my knuckle. It’s the only card I have left to play.
DEMI
I am living in the glass house. I’m not happy. I’m not sad. I’m rich.
Graham works all the time, and when he’s not working, he goes on his golf trips. I am almost always alone. It is perfect. I sit on a chair next to the door so I can see the whole house, the way the floor stretches on and on, stops just short of forever.
The castle above us is being renovated. Margo is on vacation, a pilgrimage through Spain in Bean’s honor. She still doesn’t know who I am. She doesn’t even know she’s met me. I skipped her farewell party. I convinced Graham it was better that way. The fewer people who know the truth, the more secure my position. Graham is a problem, I will admit. He’s obsessed with me now, but I have a feeling he’ll get bored.
One Friday night, he comes home early, finds me in my spot, drinking Mo?t and watching the sky fall.
He kisses my temple. “Hey, I had an idea.” He perches on the arm of my sofa. He is dressed in one of his ridiculous three-piece suits, like he might be asked to stand in on a period piece at any minute. “I wanted you to come on one of my golfing trips.”
I wrinkle my nose. “I don’t like golf.”
“Neither do I.” He smiles without teeth.
We pack nothing but a set of clubs, one fresh set of clothes. “You’re going to love it,” he promises. And then he drives me in his Rolls-Royce Phantom to a bad neighborhood. It’s not the neighborhood I grew up in, but it could be. The streetlights are out and have probably been out for a long time. The glass windows are broken. Someone somewhere is screaming. Someone somewhere is crying. They are both far away and right beside us.
The Phantom rolls to a stop in front of a cracked red curb. Graham puts it in park. He shuts off the engine.
My heart itches. “What are we doing?” I can see a broken window above us covered with a bedsheet. We used to cover our windows with bedsheets.
Graham puts his finger to his lips. “Just wait.” His teeth are so white, it’s sinister.
“For what?”
“Someone always comes out. To see the car.” He indicates the Phantom’s slick gray surface. It looks like a spaceship. Like a silver dress—the silver dress that woman wore in a different life, the night I realized I was poor.
“Then what?”
He grunts, frustrated by my lack of enthusiasm. “They see what we have, and they try to get it.”
“Then what?” My voice is steel.
“Oh, look!”
A little girl stumbles out of a front door onto a concrete stoop. She is dressed in too-small pajamas. Her eyes are wild, not with fun but with exhaustion. She doesn’t look like me but I see myself—the way she stoops, ducks her head, embarrassed.
Graham presses his back against the seat, reaches toward the clubs.
“Stop!” I put my hand on his shoulder. “Are you fucking insane?”
He frowns. “It’s just a game. God, don’t be boring!”
The girl has stopped at the last step, is watching us. Her eyes are wide, taking everything in. The silver car, the man in the blue suit, the woman in white.
Her lips part. “Can I see your car?” she asks like she’s not already seeing it.
“We’re just leaving!” I say to her as Graham says, “Of course you can, darling.”
“What are you going to do?” I whisper in his ear.
He elbows me, calls to her, “You can touch it if you want.”
I run through all the weapons at my disposal. I want to kill him. I want to take one of his clubs and split his skull open as she takes a step toward the car.
I lunge across his lap, turn on the engine and throw the car into drive. Hike up my leg, slam my foot over the center console and step on the gas. Graham gasps in surprise and grabs the steering wheel, keeps us from crashing as we stream off into the night.
“Don’t ever do that again!” I say as the girl and the neighborhood disappear from view. “Don’t ever do that again!”
He just makes a face. “I didn’t do anything.” He takes a gold cigarette case from his pocket. “What did you think I was going to do? Murder some kid? God.” He lights a cigarette. “It’s just a game. We’re not playing for your fucking soul.”
“Don’t do that,” I say again. I sound unhinged. He slouches moodily and keeps driving. And he will. I know he will. I am beginning to realize that I can’t even fathom all the things that he’s done, all the terrible things, all his life. All the terrible things he’s gotten away with, will keep getting away with. Unless somebody stops him.
All I ever wanted was for things to be easy. I wanted to stop suffering. I never considered that it was a trade. That it was me or them.
I thought I wasn’t rich because I didn’t deserve it. I never considered that it didn’t deserve me. Michael was right. Money is immoral. I don’t want to be rich. It’s not enough. I want more. I want what I deserve.
Some people deserve to die. And I deserve to kill them.
DEMI
I visit Lyla in jail to thank her for what she did. I want to tell her about Graham, about the golf trips. But when I see her, scrubbed of makeup but glowing with life, I realize I don’t need her permission. She saved my life. It’s my turn to save hers.
When I get home, I make him dinner. I was never a good cook but he likes my simple, plain food. It’s exotic to him. He comes home from work and he asks where his kiss is. I kiss his dry cheek. My nose crinkles at his animal scent.
The floor stretches all the way to the glass so it seems to go beyond that, way out into the sky, where we live. I hear the scratch of the new tenant downstairs.
“Should we celebrate?” I hold up a freshly opened bottle of Mo?t.
He’s been edgy ever since that night, unsure about me. “Celebrate what?”
“Nothing,” I say. “Isn’t that what we celebrate?”
“Pour me a glass.” I do. Mine is already filled and on the counter. He lifts his glass. “To the new tenant.”