“She didn’t hate swimming. Like I told that other detective, we’d been swimming before.”
“Okay,” the detective said. “Thank you, Alice, for clearing up the issue of the bite.” Something in the detective’s voice and body language told Alice that she’d just decided that there was nothing mysterious about Gina’s death. Alice had passed, somehow. But then Detective Metivier turned to Jake and said, “Do you mind walking me out to my car? I have a couple of questions just for you.”
“Oh,” Jake said, then nodded. “Sure.”
Alice was able to watch them talking in the parking lot from the window in Jake’s office. They stood side by side near what was probably the detective’s tan car, something American, maybe a Chevy Celebrity. It was a grey evening, the air filled with fine mist, and Jake, wearing only a sweater, stood with his arms across his body. The detective had put on a white trench coat with a big, floppy collar. She seemed to be mostly listening as Jake spoke. She nodded several times, then began patting at her pockets as though she was getting ready to leave. Jake unfolded his arms and held out a hand for her to shake. Then she was pulling out a pack of cigarettes, offering one to Jake. To Alice’s surprise—he’d quit a couple of years ago—he took the cigarette. The detective lit her own with a lighter then handed the lighter to Jake. After she drove off, Alice watched him stand, greedily smoking the cigarette, and looking out across the road toward the ocean, lined with whitecaps.
When he came back in, his skin was damp with the mist from outside, and he smelled sharply of the cigarette.
“Why’d you smoke one of her cigarettes?” Alice asked.
“You were watching us?”
“I saw you through the window, but you smell like cigarettes.”
He sniffed, and rubbed at his nose. “I was just being polite. She offered.”
“What did she ask you?”
“Let me get a drink, and I’ll tell you. Why didn’t you tell me about Gina and her mother? Jesus, Alice.”
She followed him into the kitchen. “I didn’t tell you because who cares what they think.”
“Maybe I would’ve cared. You have to tell me these things, Alice. I need to be prepared.”
“What did that detective ask you?”
He poured whiskey into a tumbler, then added some ice and soda water. It was what he drank when he was drinking a lot, what he drank all day on Sunday when there were football games on.
“She wanted to know what our relationship was.”
“What did you tell her?”
“I told her that it was none of her business.”
“Why didn’t you tell—”
“She said that Vivienne Bergeron told the police she has proof that we’re involved, that one of her friends saw us together at a restaurant in Portland.”
“That doesn’t mean anything. Besides, who cares, and what does it have to do with what happened with Gina?”
“Nothing. Nothing at all. That’s what I told the detective and she agreed. She says that Vivienne Bergeron is kicking up a fuss, convinced that because they had accused you that night, somehow you got revenge on Gina. She’s been talking about the bite, and how she knows for a fact that Gina would never have gone swimming by herself.”
“That’s stupid.”
“I’m just telling you what the detective told me that Vivienne has been saying.”
“So what does she think I did? Does she think I killed Gina and threw her in the ocean?”
Jake shrugged. “She just lost a child. I don’t think she’s thinking straight. Can I get you a drink?”
They watched TV. Jake let Alice pick what to watch. Mystic Pizza was on USA and they watched that, Alice occasionally flipping over to MTV during commercials. Jake went back and forth several times to the kitchen to get a new drink. When the movie was over, Alice turned the television off and said that she was going to bed.
“Wait a moment, Ali, okay?”
Her body was instantly cold. “Sure,” she said.
“I’d like to talk with you about something.”
Alice’s heart fluttered, and she stood up, and said, “How about tomorrow, okay? I’m too tired to talk.” She knew what he wanted to talk about. She knew that the police detective bitch had said something to him, and now he wouldn’t want to live with her anymore.
“Hey, stop that,” he said, his voice too loud, like it sometimes got when he drank a lot. “Come here, okay?”
She came over and stood in front of him. She realized she was still in the robe she’d worn all day, and her hair was probably flat and greasy. No wonder he was kicking her out. “You want me to leave?” she said, and jutted out her lower lip.
“Alice, no. That is definitely not what I want. Sit down here.”
He patted his lap, and she slid on top of him as he carefully placed his drink on the glass-topped side table. “What I want,” he said, “is for you and me to have a conversation about how we need to be extra-careful from now on.”
“I didn’t say anything to Gina and her mother. They were trying to get me to say something about you, but I swear I didn’t.”
“I know you didn’t. I’m not talking about just you, I’m talking about us. We have to be careful about what restaurants we go to, and how we act, and eventually—not right away—you should get your own place. No, no, don’t worry. You should get your own place even though you can keep staying here most nights.”
“Maybe we should just let people know about us. It’s not illegal.”
“I know it’s not illegal but it’s frowned on. And I wouldn’t care except that I have a position at a bank that’s important. I advise people in this town on what to do with their money, and they’re going to lose faith in me if they think that you and I are together. They won’t understand.”
“What if we got married?”
“Alice,” he said, then took a long sip of his drink, placing the glass back down with a loud clink. “It wouldn’t make any difference. In fact, it would probably make things worse. It’s not just that you’re the daughter of my wife, it’s that I’m thirty years older than you.”
“I don’t care.”
“I don’t care, either, but other people will.”
“Fine. We’ll be extra-careful.”
“That’s all that I’m saying. We have to be very, very careful from here on out. People hate to see other people happy. Remember that.”
Alice went to bed first. She was exhausted, brushing her teeth for less than thirty seconds, then slipping out of her robe and under the covers. She wondered if she was exhausted because of the stress of being interviewed by the frizzy-haired detective, or if she was tired because she’d barely done anything all day. She hadn’t gone swimming since Friday night, the night that Gina couldn’t make it back. Tomorrow she’d swim again. There were only so many days left before it would be too cold, and then she’d have to swim at the Y with the overchlorinated water and the old ladies.
She lay awake thinking about swimming, then listened as Jake got ready for bed, standing for a long time in the bathroom applying his face lotion, as he always did. He climbed in beside her, naked, smelling of vanilla and sandalwood.
He kissed her, the type of kiss that meant he was tired, then said, “I was going to bring it up earlier, but I couldn’t find the right time.”
“What?” she said, her limbs tingling.
“I woke up on Friday night to get a glass of water. You weren’t in bed so I went downstairs to look for you, and I couldn’t find you anywhere. I was nervous, so I looked out the window. I saw you coming back from the beach. Your hair was wet.”
She didn’t respond.
“Alice?” Jake eventually said.
“Why didn’t you say something?”
“When? That night?”
“Yes.”
“I guessed that it was something between you and Gina, and I didn’t want to bother you about it. I went back to bed. You came in and showered.”
“I didn’t—”
“Shh,” Jake said, his face pressed close up to her ear. “I don’t want you to say anything, but I wanted you to know that I knew. Don’t say anything, okay? We’re better off—much better off—without Gina in our lives. Just like we are better off without your mother.”