“Do you know, are there AA meetings here?”
“Not next week, there aren’t.” Deftly, he throws the door open, bends down for the box, then stands, catching the door with his foot before it closes. I could help him, but I don’t offer and he doesn’t ask.
The week before her meeting at Lollygag Studio, she had one listed at someplace called Love Self-Tape. It’s located in a warehouse in Marina del Rey not far from here, so I head there next. The complex is divided into tiny self-taping studios, which I learn from the receptionist are where actors record auditions for parts.
“There’s one rehearsal space,” she tells me, glancing at the photo of Regina on my phone. “I’ve been here four years, never seen an AA meeting. If your daughter was here, she was probably auditioning. She’s pretty enough to be an actress.”
An actress? So these weren’t AA meetings? While that doesn’t mean she relapsed, it feels like a blow, a growing fissure in my story. She’d always been a writer. Wouldn’t she have told me if she was auditioning? She must have known that I would try to talk her out of it. Acting is even more of a crapshoot than writing. We would have fought. It would have strained our fragile symbiosis. She was right not to tell me, which is hardly a comfort. It’s one more notch on the long belt of ways I’ve failed her.
Of course this is when Isaac calls, as the doubt is creeping in, threatening my resolve. I hesitate on the sidewalk outside the self-taping studio, then pick up.
He asks a few benign questions about how I’m doing, never once inquiring if my trip has been fruitful. To him, this is a futile quest of misplaced grief.
“The l’vayah’s tomorrow,” he says. I hate that he calls it a l’vayah instead of a burial, that religion makes his grief profound.
“I’m aware.”
“I know you feel like you need to be in LA. I just don’t want you to regret—I’d hate for you to look back and wish you’d been here.” His voice is so laden with concern it makes me want to lash out at him for thinking he knows what I need more than I do. It comes from a good place. Isaac was never a bad man. He just never understood me. He certainly doesn’t understand me now.
“I appreciate that, but I need to stay and—”
“You’ll be back for some of the shiva, though, right?” Now he’s begging, like it might break him not to have me there. It breaks me, too, a cracking through my breastbone. Even if this burial and shiva aren’t what Regina would have wanted, it’s the only funeral she’ll have. And I’m going to miss it.
“I won’t be able to live with myself if I don’t find out what happened to her,” I explain.
“Let me know when you’re back,” he says gently. I stop myself before I ask why. Isaac and I aren’t friends. We won’t grow closer now that our child, our sole connection, is gone.
“Isaac?” I ask before he hangs up. “Did Regina tell you she was getting into acting?”
“She was a writer.”
“She was auditioning,” I tell him.
“Whatever you say.” There’s an edge to his voice, the first sign that he’s losing his patience, that his sympathy for me is finite. “Take care of yourself, Barb,” he says, like I haven’t been doing that for years.
As I drive back to my hotel, I call Linda.
“Should I come home?” I ask her.
“Are you ready to come home?” she asks me.
“I should be at her burial.”
“What will you regret more, missing her funeral or leaving too soon?”
We both know the answer.
“I’m going to find out what happened to her,” I promise Linda, and Regina, and this impossible, shapeless city.
Chapter Sixteen
Barb
On Monday morning, the canals are muddy basins again, with stagnant water collected in their bowels. This is the third morning I’m watching Tessa’s husband. He leaves the house earlier today for his surf, I assume because he has to work. He rides the waves for an hour without any disruptions to his routine. When we return, Tessa is downstairs, playing on the floor with Jasper. My heart swells at the sight. I’m growing attached to them, more attached than I should.
Tessa’s husband, clad in that sandy wet suit, bends down to kiss her. She wraps her arms around his neck, allowing him to pull her up and deeper into their kiss. They seem so bonded, the picture of a happy family. My resolve starts to weaken. It’s a classic amateur-sleuth mistake, grasping for the first suspect, assuming the murder can be solved that swiftly. There’s no evidence to suggest Tessa’s husband is anything but the doting father and partner he presents himself to be, someone with only a weakness for the Pacific Ocean. I have zero reason to suspect him of cheating, until I remember that everything along these canals is an illusion, even the waterways themselves.
When he disappears upstairs, presumably to shower, I rush over to Pacific Avenue, where I’ve parked my car, hoping he isn’t so fast I’ll miss him. Tessa mentioned that he leaves for work around this time of day,so I take my chances that he’s headed there by car. LA is a driving city. It’s a calculated bet. I wait at the end of the alley, conspicuous, but all the action takes place on the other side of these homes. A few minutes later, Tessa’s garage door swings open, and a black Lexus SUV pulls out. His face grows clear in my rearview as he passes me. I put my rental into drive, instinctively checking my mirrors again, not expecting to spot anyone. Instead, what I see makes my arm hairs stand on end. It’s that woman from next door, leaning against her doorjamb, scowling at me. We lock eyes through the reflection as I drive away.
