The message couldn’t be clearer. I do have a habit of taking over these missions—but only because Mr. X pairs me with the green ones. God, Waylen was so sweet and clueless when we did ours together. But he proved himself to be more than meets the eye. There’s an edge underneath the surface that only I can see. He tries to pretend it isn’t there, but I know. It’s part of why I said “I do.”
Still, Elodie did prove herself by handling that interview with Erin. It’s only fair that I give her a chance. “You’ve heard of ‘good cop, bad cop,’ right?” I ask her.
She snaps to attention. “Huh? Yeah, sure. Of course.” She’s still reeling from the chance that our mark is a murderer.
“We’ll need to go in there with a strategy when we interview him,” I say.
“So, good reporter, bad reporter?” Elodie asks.
“Not exactly. More like super confident, cocky reporter, and bumbling, nervous assistant reporter.”
Something about this makes her smile. “Sounds like the script for a Meryl Streep movie.”
Over the remainder of our drive, we work out that she—of course—will be my confident supervisor. I’ll bumble my way through the interview, and as I do, I’ll get asense of what our dear Bertram Casimir responds to. If he’s irritated, I’ll dial it back. If he likes the attention, I’ll show interest in whatever he has to say. Improv is where I really shine, but I can tell that Elodie does best with structure. As soon as the car is parked, she’s whipping out her phone to punch in some notes in her memo app.
“Wait,” she says as I open the door to get out. I turn to face her, surprised that she’s extended a manicured hand out to me. She gives me a firm handshake. “I have to say, Margaux, it’s a pleasure doing business with you.”
—
The house is dark when I tiptoe through the front door. From the foyer I can see into the kitchen, where Waylen has left a plate of food for me, wrapped up in foil. His way of reminding me that I missed dinner.
He’s still awake. I hear him tapping away at his computer, the floorboards groaning as he rolls his desk chair across them.
In the kitchen, I make as little noise as possible and heat up the plate of seared tuna and stir-fried vegetables. The clock on the microwave reads 11:59. At least I kept my promise to be home before midnight.
Waylen is still mad at me. I can feel it lingering in the air like a thick and pungent perfume. When he’s upset, he makes himself practically invisible. The kitchen is spotless—all the dishes washed and put away, the sink empty, the counters wiped clean. He’s purged any trace of his presence while I was away.
He’s been pushing me to retire ever since he got out of the game. I suppose he thought that Collette would beenough to change me. He views my job as a torrid affair, like it’s a lover that I can’t seem to leave. He despises Mr. X for the role he plays in this as well.
It doesn’t matter how much time I give him or that I spend my days fully dedicated to our daughter’s student career—even tonight with Elodie, I secured a plan to keep her in good social standing by offering her up as a tutor. It wouldn’t matter even if I only snuck out of the house long after he was asleep and returned before he woke up. He won’t be satisfied until I give it up; we’ve had enough fights on the topic. But he’s run out of ideas to try to wear me down. Maybe that scares him.
I look up when I hear footsteps coming down the stairs. That will be him, with a disappointed, weary expression and greeting me with a sigh. Maybe he’ll apologize for being upset with me earlier, or maybe he’ll just ask for my opinion on how well he seasoned the fish.
But the figure that emerges from the darkness of the hallway is Collette, her hair tousled with sleep. “Mom?” she says softly. “Did you just get home?” She climbs into a chair across from me.
“I was working on some PTA things and it ran a little late,” I lie. I have worked hard not to shatter the perfect image that Collette has of her life. She doesn’t even know that Waylen and I argue. She’s smart, though, and she’s getting older. She’s bound to pick up on it eventually—and when that day comes, she’ll want to know just what we’re fighting about. “Actually, I spent the evening with Mrs. Blevins—you know, Finnegan’s mom. She’s not so bad when she’s not wearing a whistle around her neck and directing traffic.”
Collette wrinkles her nose, but whatever she’s thinking, she’s too tactful to say. My daughter isn’t the sort to make waves. She’s quiet, polite, and so reserved that she intrigues her classmates. Rather than a shy little girl who’s easy to bully, they see a pretty, well-dressed, well-groomed peer whose social fate depends on what she chooses to say—only she never says anything at all. Nobody knows what to make of her, and there’s power in that. Even I don’t know what to make of her half the time.
But she is observant. I know that much.
“We thought it would be nice if you girls got to know each other a little better,” I say, cautiously broaching the subject. “So, you’re going to tutor her in math after school one day next week. She’s struggling, and it’s your best subject.”
Collette raises her head. “I can’t stand Finnegan.” There’s only the barest whine to her words. “She’s the worst.”
“How is she ‘the worst’?”
“Mom, you don’t know what it’s like at school,” Collette says. “It’s like a vat of boiling lobsters meetsThe Hunger Games.”
“You know,” I say, “sometimes when people are mean, they’re just criticizing the things they don’t like about themselves.”
Collette huffs. “She mustreallyhate herself, then,” she mumbles.
“Try to make the best of it,” I say.
Collette crosses her arms and leans back in her seat. I wish that she’d say whatever she’s thinking. I wish that she’d argue, that she’d insult me—anything.
“I’m doing this for you,” I tell her. “Mrs. Blevins has a lot of pull with the PTA. She’s going to handle a lot of casting for the upcoming Christmas play. Maybe she can help you get a good role as a way of saying thank-you.”
