I point down the paved path that lines the beach. “There’s a playground at the end of the pier. Or you can take him to the skate park. It’s a bit of a walk. Or Café—”
“Tessa, I’ve got this. Go.” I bow my head in thanks and bend down to kiss Jasper’s curls. As I walk away, I wait for Jasper to cry for me, but I hear only the waves crashing against the beach, the bustle of tourists deciding where to eat, what to ride. When I peer back at them, Jasperis laughing, reaching for Barb’s nose as she leans toward him, then away. I hurry off before Barb can see me, before she can think I’m nervous, when really I’m overwhelmed with a gratitude that scares me. It’s not just Jasper who’s become attached to her.
Ten minutes later, I’m rushing down the sidewalk toward Gabe’s clinic. The police have blocked off the parking lot outside Longevity Fertility and are conferencing around Aram’s red Mercedes. Despite the flurry of people, there’s a tranquility to the scene, similar to the one along the canal a week ago.
I survey the area, searching for Gabe, freezing when I see a familiar face. Dan Huntsman angles to see around the crowd. What’s he doing here? And is that Erin beside him? Farther over, the man with the bike who snakes up and down the canals stands beside my always-shorts neighbor and his Yorkies. My heart pounds, the baby kicking as she feels my fear, making it her own. I need to calm down, for her if not for me, but I see too many familiar faces. Too many people here who were also along our canal.
I scan the crowd for Officer Gonzales. Surely he will see how troubling this is. The patch on one of the police officer’s arms catches my eye. It says Santa Monica Police Department. Not Los Angeles. This is a separate city. A different jurisdiction. When I notice the always-shorts guy again, he tugs the leash of a golden retriever three times the size of my neighbor’s Yorkies. And that isn’t Erin. It’s another brunette with poutier lips. Although the man with the bike has the same bright-orange children’s seat mounted to the front, I don’t remember the father along the canals sporting a beard like the one cloaking this man’s face. These are different neighbors, witnesses to a separate tragedy so close to their lives. When Dan turns my way, he’s paler, doughier, less angry. The only people who were at both death scenes are me and my husband.
“T.” Gabe encloses me in his familiar arms. I go slack as he holds me and explains how he found Aram unresponsive behind the steering wheel with pill bottles all around. He called 9-1-1, but they were hours too late.
Gabe buries his head in my hair. “Oh, T.” His breath is hot and ragged against my neck. I don’t sense any fear in him, just profound loss. He isn’t thinking about Regina, how recently we’ve been this close to another tragedy. He isn’t even considering how his patients might interpret a death where they’re hoping to create life. His thoughts are only on his friend and colleague, inexplicably gone.
I pull my husband closer, trying to exude a calm I don’t feel. At some point our tiny world is pierced by a wail. Across the parking lot, Lara, Aram’s wife, is being held back by an officer as she tries to get to the open car door, where her husband is still inside. She’s wearing a floral pajama set, flip-flops, her hair oily, her face splotchy. Gabe lets go of me and rushes over to her. I start to follow him when a spasm hammers my tailbone, forcing me to slow down. Gabe hugs Lara while one of the nurses rushes into the clinic, returning moments later with a glass of water. Lara holds it in her hand, uncertain what she’s supposed to do with it.
“This makes no sense,” Lara keeps saying to Gabe. “Did you tell them this makes no sense? Aram didn’t do drugs. You know him. He would never.”
With Lara, I hear the same bewilderment I’ve witnessed in Barb. Not willful ignorance or wishful thinking, but certainty. This wasn’t an accident. Regina’s death wasn’t either.
There are no benches in the parking lot, so Gabe escorts Lara into the office lobby, where it’s eerily empty. Gabe’s office is never empty.
As soon as Gabe and Lara have vanished inside, my brain starts racing. Overdoses and drunken accidents happen all the time, but two in a row? In two people who seemed clean? Outside our home and my husband’s clinic? Even if I was wrong about Dan, my instincts are right. Something’s going on, something I don’t understand. One thing I know for certain. The only person connected to these two deaths is Gabe.
A few minutes later, Gabe files out and finds me.
“How’s Lara?” I ask.
“She’s with an officer, answering some questions.” He scans the crowd. I can’t tell who he’s looking for, if he’s looking for anyone at all.
“It is suspicious,” I tentatively begin.
Gabe’s gaze returns to me. “What?”
“You said it yourself, he’s been on edge lately.”
Gabe clenches his jaw. “So you think, what, Aram’s been actingweirdlately? He must be on drugs?” He shakes his head, disappointed.
“I just mean, first Regina outside our house, and now at your office? To a man you’ve never known to have a drug problem?” Her name rolls off my tongue too smoothly. I recognize my slip-up immediately.
“Regina?” Except his tone is more confused than surprised. He doesn’t remember her name. She’s omnipresent in my thoughts, my days, but my husband doesn’t even know the name of the woman who died outside our house.
“The woman who drowned. You don’t think it’s strange? First our home, now here?”
Suddenly, Gabe’s furious. He’s never furious. Particularly not at me. “My colleague was just found dead outside our place of work. His wife is inside—” He points to his clinic, where two police officers are stationed by the door. “This isn’t about you. Don’t make it about you.”
This hits me so hard it’s practically physical. My stomach jolts as my daughter kicks. Gabe notices, places his hand on my stomach. I’ll always be between him and my children. Even after they are part of the outside world, they remain inside my DNA, reordered. He’ll never know our children like I do. Nothing is about me. It’s always about them.
“I just thought maybe we should mention it to the police,” I say sullenly.
“Sorry.” He pulls me toward him. I let him hold me, but I don’t hug him back. “That was a shitty thing to say. You’re right. I’ll mention the other accident to the police, okay?”
I nod, not entirely trusting that he’ll say anything to the cops. Gabe searches the crowd, suddenly worried. The Dan look-alike is still there.The man with the bike and the child’s seat. A woman in spandex—not Erin, not the woman I saw moments ago either.
“Where’s Jasp?”
“What?” This question shouldn’t startle me as much as it does. Gabe is a good father. Like me, he never stops thinking about our son. “With Marisol,” I blurt before I catch myself.
“Claire was okay with that?”
