by JB Malory
My heart was still racing as I tiptoed into the house.
Marianne was on the sofa, she wiped her eyes as I entered the room. Emotions twisted her face into something I hardly recognized.
Desperate as I was for the safety of my office, I could not leave her in her present state.
I sat in a chair in the corner of the room where I could watch her face in silhouette against the fading light.
“Paul, we need to talk,” she said, at last. “We can’t go on like this.”
My mouth was dry, my hands numb. Looking around the living room, I realized I had hardly spent any time there since we had moved into the house. The place was foreign to me. Where had this furniture come from, these books and records, this rug?
I had little idea of what all these rooms were for, or how Marianne kept herself occupied. What happened in this place while I was locked away in my office?
“I can’t be in this house alone, Paul. You’re here, but you aren’t here. If you really can’t stand being around me, then what is the point of all this? I hoped you would be happy, with your writing, but…”
In the street, a car passed, and I heard the whine of its worn brake pads as it slowed and stopped.
“Hang on,” I said, raising my hand for silence.
I crept to the window.
Across the street, Tom’s car was gone, probably still at the real estate agent’s house.
“Paul, what are you doing? I’m trying to talk to you,” Marianne said, her voice strained.
I sensed that there was something she did not want me to see. I imagined her carefully staging the living room for this scene in the moments before I arrived, arranging the sofa just so, even mussing her hair for dramatic effect.
She could playact behind her smokescreens all she wanted, I was determined to confront this newest threat head on. Her sudden excitement said enough. The true and final test was finally at hand.
I opened the door and scanned the street.
“You seem anxious, Marianne. Calm down, everything will be fine,” I heard myself say. A new kind of certainty filled me as I breathed in the night air.
The neighborhood was dark, and the streetlights had not yet come on. At the end of the driveway, behind a row of hedges, a black shape sat in the shadows.
“Brian,” I shouted. “Is that you?”
Nothing moved. Even the crickets were silent.
I took a few tentative steps down the driveway, but I still could not make out the shape clearly.
Behind me, Marianne stood in the open door.
“Paul, come back. We have to talk. Where are you going?”
“Don’t worry, honey. I’m taking care of it.”
I was no longer afraid of the town, there was nothing it could do to harm me now.
“Paul, you’re frightening me. Please.”
“What a mess this all is,” I called out over my shoulder as I made my way slowly toward the street. If only Marianne knew how close I was to uncovering the truth, she might call the whole thing off then and there and save herself the embarrassment.
“If this were a movie, I might expect a hitman to come bump me off,” I said, laughing to show my confidence. “Or maybe a hidden camera crew somewhere to film the prank?”
My throat was constricting again, fear threatened to overwhelm me. I wanted to run, but there was nowhere to go, no one to go running to.
I had warned Marianne again and again to be cautious, not to be so trusting. It was no coincidence that people guarded their privacy here, no coincidence that doors had locks.
But she hadn’t listened.
“It’s this place,” I shouted, responding to her unspoken objections. “This town. Let’s go back to the city. It’ll be different this time. I know it will.”
I reached the end of the driveway and hesitated.
“I’m going to look now, Marianne. Don’t be frightened.”
Somewhere at my back, I heard the front door close, but I did not break focus. The dark shape hadn’t moved, but I was sure it was there, right behind the hedges.
Suddenly, I understood everything.
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