“Actually, I’m not hungry,” she said, planting her feet.
David shot a glance at Kate, then let his hand slide off Zoe’s shoulder. “Oh. You sure? There’s other stuff too, if you don’t like nachos.…”
“Why don’t I show you the guest room, Zoe?” Kate said. David nodded slowly and Zoe could see that he’d just recalled that Zoe’s mother was sick. He was probably attributing her strange behavior to that. It was nice, to have an excuse for once.
“Thanks though,” Zoe said to him, then followed Kate up the stairs.
It was a little surreal to find that the guest room had its own bathroom. A full bathroom, made of stone that twinkled like it was ingrained with diamonds. It had a bath and separate shower and two sinks! The bath was deep, with jets. It looked impossibly inviting.
“Feel free to have a shower, or a soak in the tub,” Kate said. “Some of my toiletries are in the cupboard under the sink. Help yourself to anything.”
Once Kate left, Zoe sank onto the bed. She had longed to be alone for the past twenty-four hours, but now that she was, she wasn’t sure she wanted it anymore. As she sat all alone, the pain of her mother’s illness finally pierced her. Was this her future? Living in strangers’ homes—kind strangers who quickly realized the truth about her, and were disappointed?
Zoe thought about her mom for a moment, lying in her hospital bed. She’d be freaking out. Zoe fished her phone out of her bag and sent her a quick cheerful text. Even if she had lied to her about her cancer, Zoe didn’t want her worrying while she was in the hospital. When she was finished Zoe went to the bathroom cupboard. There was a wicker basket inside with shampoo, conditioner, body wash, some nail-polish remover, and expensive-looking moisturizer. Zoe dug into it. A few bobby pins were scattered across the bottom of the basket, and a new disposable razor.
She sat on the edge of the tub. Her mother wasn’t fooling anyone with her talk about everything going back to normal. Zoe knew ovarian cancer wasn’t one of the “good” cancers. One of the side effects of being a worrier was that she spent a lot of time researching things. Her grandmother had died of ovarian cancer just before Zoe was born. It was the silent killer, she recalled now. The one that didn’t show symptoms until it was too late. And if there was one thing Zoe knew, it was that she wouldn’t survive in this world without her mother.
Zoe took off her clothes and slid into the empty bath, turned the taps on. Then she reached for the razor. She stared at it, turning it over, observing the glint of the light on the blade. If she were a different kind of person, she’d take the blade, press it against her wrist. But she wasn’t a different kind of person. Was she?
*
When Zoe was nine, her mom took her to the zoo. Zoe, of course, hadn’t wanted to go. “Zoos are crowded,” she said. “I might get lost.”
“I won’t let go of your hand,” her mom said.
“But I don’t like zoos.”
“You love animals.”
“I love seeing them on TV.”
The funny thing was, Zoe wasn’t agoraphobic. She liked the outdoors. Sometimes early in the morning or late at night she would ask her mom if they could “go get some fresh air.” No, it wasn’t the outdoors she was afraid of, or the animals. It was the people.
They got to the zoo an hour before it opened so they could get in first (Zoe couldn’t handle standing in lines) and spent a few minutes in the gift shop trying on giant animal heads. Zoe actually cracked a smile when Alice put on the lion’s head. “You are so silly, Mom,” she’d said, giggling. Her mom was so pleased that she went to buy it, but when she checked the price tag—sixty bucks for a novelty lion’s head!—she changed her mind.
Half an hour later, when a line formed behind them, Zoe had forgotten the lion’s head and was starting to freak out. Some girls her age approached with their mothers. Zoe felt their eyes on her, staring. Judging. After a while it became unbearable.
“Mom, everyone is looking at me.”
Her mom glanced around. “No they’re not, hon.”
“They are. I want to go home.”
“We can’t go home,” her mom said. “I’ve already bought the tickets.”
“Mom, please.”
Zoe’s face was hot, and sweat poured from her underarms. Her mom looked bewildered. Zoe hated herself for asking—she knew the tickets had cost a lot of money—but she had to get out of there.
“Fine,” her mom said finally, stalking out of the line. Zoe was right on her heels. But she was walking in the wrong direction.
“Are we going home?” Zoe called after her uncertainly.
“Nope.”
“Mom!”
Her mom marched into the gift shop and grabbed the lion’s head off the stand. She winced as she handed over her credit card and, a minute or two later, she slipped it over her head and returned to the line.
“Mom, what are you doing?” Zoe asked, astonished.
“No one is looking at you now,” she said, winking at Zoe through the eye slits. “They’re looking at me.”
29
That evening, as she lay in her hospital bed, Alice was worried. Had she done the right thing, letting Zoe go back to Kate’s? After all, she didn’t know the faintest thing about Kate, other than that she was a nurse with a soothing bedside manner. Her husband could be a pedophile, an abuser! Sure, Kate said she had been background-checked. (Briefly Alice wondered why she had been, but manners had stopped her from asking. Manners! Who cared about manners—this was her daughter!) Then again, there were plenty of criminals with clean records. Weren’t there?
She took a deep breath. Get it together, Alice.
Alice was not a conspiracy theorist. Growing up, she had been schooled in the idea that people were, by and large, good. If something went missing, it probably hadn’t been stolen, you’d most likely lost it. The government was not in cahoots with pharmaceutical companies to make you ill so they could make money. The world these days was much the same as it had always been—with good people and bad people. She had always felt strongly about this. She still did. But fifteen years ago, she’d been exposed to the bad. Worse, she’d invited in the bad. She thought now of that strange, horrible night. The glass of red wine she’d gulped down. “I insist,” she’d said.
She dragged her phone from her bedside table and saw that Zoe had already sent her a text.
Hey Mom everything is fine. I have a room with its own bathroom! Hope you’re okay. Zoe.
Alice put down her phone. Everything is fine. Why did Alice not believe that? After all, things always seemed like they were fine—until they weren’t.
30