V turned around. “What? You find something?” she asked.
Nic got up and managed a warm smile.
“No. I just realized I’m late to meet someone.”
V stepped away from the sink, a look of doubt on her face.
“What did you find in there?” She took a step closer. Nic put the book back in the box.
“Nothing. I should go.”
Nic walked quickly to the door. V didn’t follow.
“Thanks,” Nic said, pulling it open, stepping outside.
She didn’t look back as she closed the door behind her. Then she walked to the car, quickly, sucking in the cool air, turning around, then driving through the woods, back to the main roads.
And thinking about the face she’d just seen in that book.
The face of Jared Reyes.
43
Day seventeen
It took most of the night to grind the seeds. The amygdalin is beneath the hard shell. Alice made soup for dinner. I slid the spoon under my leg when she went to the kitchen to get more crackers. When she returned, I drank the soup from the bowl, slurping it loudly.That’s bad manners!she scolded me, but it made her forget about the spoon when she cleared our dishes.
I still had the knife from when we made the sandwiches. Now I had one spoon, which I bent at the top. One spoon and over two hundred seeds. I lay them in the sink, ten or so at a time. I pressed both thumbs into the head of the spoon, twisting and pressing at once, into the seeds. Grinding them between the metal and the porcelain. I collected the mash in a cup, sifting out as many of the hard shells which broke into larger pieces but would not grind.
Thumbs aching, cramping. Arms begging for rest. I did not stop grinding those seeds, making the mash, until I had a small cupful.
I pray now, in the morning light, that it will be enough to make him sick. The amount of amygdalin, and then cyanide, dependson the type of apple and how much evaporates before it can be ingested. It depends on his weight and how quickly he consumes it. There are so many factors. It is not likely he will die. Not at all. But I don’t need him to die.
I hear the car on the gravel outside. I look at Alice and she looks at me. Maybe I am misreading her. We are soldiers about to enter a field of combat.
Alice and I have been very busy this morning. First, we cleaned up the pillow beds where we slept on the floor together, the bars between us.
Then, Alice brought the flour and sugar, the baking soda, butter, milk, and eggs. She brought, too, a metal bowl, measuring cup, and mixing spoon. She brought all of it, and with Dolly watching us, I was the best mommy—showing her how to make muffins.
The apples were tricky. There was not much of them that wasn’t rotten. I salvaged what I could and left it in the bath tub. I flushed the rest down the toilet—a little at a time.
I knew the recipe by heart. Muffins are muffins when it comes down to it. Alice measured and mixed. We laughed and pretended to be having fun. She spilled the flour. I went to the bathroom to get a towel. And in the towel were the bits of apple I was able to save. I slid them into the bowl with my back to the camera, to Dolly and her watching eyes. Then I wiped the flour from the floor.
I sent her to the kitchen to get a wet sponge. And when she was gone, I filled the muffin tins.
When they were baked, we put frosting we made from powdered sugar just on one special muffin—the one in the middle on the edge of the tin with a brown stain. I told her it would make Mick feel special. Like we cared about him.
And then we sat and did Alice’s homework. We sat and played with the dolls. We sat and waited.
When the front door finally opened, it closed again with a loud bang. His footsteps were heavy, pounding the floor. He walked past us without saying a word. Not to Alice. Not to me. He went to his room in the back of the house and slammed that door as well.
We said nothing, Alice and I. We pretended not to notice him, though my heart was heavy and light all at once.
Heavy because he needed to be happy and calm and eat his muffin like a good boy.
Light because he was angry. And that meant something had gone wrong with Nicole.
Good Lord, is it terrible? Is it twisted that I feel a laugh rise inside my chest as I picture my strong-willed, tortured daughter sending him away after an unfortunate night? I am filled with joy where there had once been despair that my daughter uses men to fill the hollow spaces she spoke of in therapy.
