“Regina was sober. She hadn’t touched a drop of alcohol in seven years,” I tell Tessa. “She’d never jeopardize that.”
“So you think someone ... that she was ...” Tessa hesitates, unable to vocalize the word.Murdered.
“There’s no way she got drunk and drowned. I can’t go home until I find out what happened to her.”
Suddenly, something cold and wet dribbles down my leg. I see Jasper giggling, his hand flapping as he splatters smoothie across thetable. I jump up, my kneecap burning in protest. It’s too late. A line of pink trickles down my white pant leg.
“Jasper, no!” Tessa pulls her son away more forcefully than she intended. It surprises him, and he starts to cry. Tessa hugs him, kissing his forehead. “It’s okay, sweetie. It was an accident. No one’s mad at you.”
She scans the café to see if anyone is watching. Besides the two bored workers, there’s no one here. I’d forgotten this part of early motherhood, how you constantly feel judged, how society tells you you’re going to screw them up—and you will, but not because you lost your temper at a coffee shop. It’s internalized, this maternal guilt, and it never goes away.
I inhale deeply. I’m doing it again. Taking on her injustice as my own. I do the breathing exercises my therapist taught me, the mantras that remind me I don’t have to fix the world. I’ve never fixed anything. I got fired for trying. Excommunicated by my daughter.
“I’m sorry,” Tessa says to me, rocking her boy. She holds out a container of wet wipes, and I take one to be polite, even though dabbing will further set the stain.
“You like to make a mess, don’t you?” I tickle Jasper’s belly, then remember that you aren’t supposed to touch children anymore without first asking permission. To our surprise, Jasper laughs. He pokes me back, roughly, and I pretend it tickles, causing him to cackle in delight. Tessa still seems worried, so I tell her, “Really, there will always be more pants.” This sounds like a motto.
“You were saying that you can’t go home yet?” Tessa asks, still rocking Jasper.
I’d forgotten what I was saying before the smoothie incident. This is how conversations unfold for her. You have to be able to hold the thread through distractions.
“I live in New Jersey. As soon as I heard, I took the first flight out.”
“I would have done the same thing.” Of course she would. Any mother would.
“The police mentioned a girlfriend. Do you think ... Would it be intrusive if I tried to talk to her?”
“She would know, right? If someone was after Regina, her girlfriend would know.”
Every muscle in my body unclenches. She believes me.
“Do you know this place? The Brig?”
Tessa nods. “It’s a bar on Abbot Kinney. Is that where she’d been drinking? Allegedly, I mean. The police said ... Was she at the Brig?”
“I know how it sounds. I get why they’d think she relapsed.” That’s all they see in my daughter. An alcoholic, and addict, who slipped. That’s all they can see because they don’t know her, the stubborn, determined woman who never would have welcomed me back into her life if she hadn’t been steadfast in her sobriety, bulletproof against me, her greatest trigger. “The bartender must have gotten it wrong.”
“Would it help if I—” And there she goes again with the fidgeting, passing her son from hip to hip. “You shouldn’t have to do that yourself. I can go see the bartender?”
I hear what Tessa is really asking, the question she can’t articulate for fear of rejection. In a mystery, this is the moment where Tessa becomes my spunky sidekick, only I’m not sure she’s ever anyone’s supporting character.
“That would be a big help,” I tell her.
Outside, we trade numbers and plan to meet here, at this awful, now ominous, coffee shop, tomorrow afternoon. Tessa and Jasper disappear around the corner. She isn’t doing this only to help me. She needs to know what happened to Regina as badly as I do. This doesn’t just involve my child anymore. It’s about her son too.
Chapter Eleven
Tessa
Jasper and I swing by Abbot Kinney on our way home. In the car, I watch him through the rearview mirror, monitoring for signs of an imminent meltdown. The short drive to the police station hardly counted as his second nap. He babbles to himself, clearly giddy. He liked Barb. Children, like dogs, have instincts for people. If Jasper trusts her, I do. If she says her daughter didn’t accidentally drown, I believe her.
The Brig has just opened for the day. As I push Jasper inside, I realize I’ve never stepped foot in here before, only passed by so many times it seems familiar. The false memory of the space casts a swell of doubt, especially because Gabe wouldn’t like this. It’s become another mantra, companion toTrust your instincts.Gabe wouldn’t like this.They go hand in hand, my intuition and my deceit.
Two old Venice types with scraggly white beards and faded leg tattoos are seated at the otherwise empty bar. It smells of stale beer, made all the more pronounced by the bleach trying to cover it up.
The woman wiping down the bar surveys us, unamused. “No one under twenty-one allowed in here.”
“Oh, he’s only having a nonalcoholic beer,” I joke, thankful that Jasper’s attention is on my phone as he navigates it with a deftness that makes me feel like a neglectful parent.
