“No one said anything iswrongwith you. That’s not what she’s there for.”
“I don’t even know if Iwantto go back, Timothy. Okay? Forget if I can. I don’t know if I want to.”
The blood had drained from Timothy’s face. Which was precisely how Zeke knew they weren’tbuddies.
“Zeke, come on—”
The conversation came to an abrupt end when Betty rounded the corner and screeched at seeing them sitting there.
“Shoot, sorry,” she said once she had settled herself. “I thought I was here alone. Not that I—I mean, it’s your place, of course.” She squinted at Timothy, sizing him up, then made her way to the Nespresso machine.
Timothy bugged his eyes at Zeke like he hadn’t realized he was interrupting a next-morning tryst. It dawned on him justhow little Timothy knew about his life. Not his game life. Hislifelife. Once Timothy was out the door, Zeke apologized to Betty, in case she intuited what Timothy had been implying.
But she had just shrugged and said, “We’re all just projections of what we want to show other people and what they decide to think of us, so it doesn’t really matter.” Which, Zeke realized later, was just a very fancy way of saying they were all liars. He didn’t know what Betty was lying about, and he didn’t want to consider what Sybil could be lying about. He knew he was a liar, but he hadn’t pinned down about just what yet either.
“You’re okay?” he had said to her. He’d noticed she was jumpier, a little more fragile, but he didn’t want to pry. Didn’t actually know how to pry. Zeke had gotten used to everyone asking questions ofhimbut was terribly out of practice in doing it for others.
“Tired,” she had replied. “Just tired.”
But she’d been tired since the day they met, and Zeke was beginning to suspect that maybe Sybil was right about Betty; maybe there was more to her story. Which he didn’t mind. Didn’t even find all that odd. But the question that circled around him was: What was so important to Betty that she had to keep up the ruse aroundhim? He wanted her to trust him. He didn’t want to be to her what Timothy was to him.
Tonight, with Betty at work and Julian having disconnected the FaceTime, he felt an urgent need to convey this to Sybil. She was already so many steps ahead of him on just about everything, and he wanted to let her know that maybe he couldn’t keep up at her speed, but also, he was trying to keep pace. That he was a partner, an ally, ready to stand shoulder to shoulder with her in her pursuit of solving and helping Betty.
He tugged his cell phone out of his back pocket with his left hand and texted his car service. Sybil was in the suburbs for the night, so he would just have to go to her.
24
Night Nine
Sybil
The Night Before Thanksgiving
Somehow, Zeke endedup staying for four days. When he first showed up on her doorstep last Friday, no small part of her felt like she was finally the heroine in her very own rom-com. She’d been watchingUnsolved Mysteriesand had just put on an anti-aging seaweed mask, which she knew, medically-speaking, did nothing to stop the onset of aging. And there was Zeke, looking too striking for his own good, with an overnight bag and a five-o’clock shadow, and yes, Sybil felt a stir of lust that she thought had disappeared from her repertoire entirely.
He said, “Hey, Syb, I need some company, can I stay the night?”
She’d raced to the bathroom to wash off her face, then dabbed on some mascara and blush because, let’s be real here, and then they watched the rest ofUnsolved Mysterieswhile Sybil offered her theories—“It’s always the boyfriend or the husband, Zeke, always” or “The DNA match wasn’t reliable back then, why haven’t they rerun it, that makes no sense, maybe it’s an inside job.” It really never turned out to be an inside job andtruly was almost always the boyfriend or husband, but Sybil liked to narrate along all the same.
“By the way,” he said, “I am starting to think you’re right about Betty.”
She tucked her knees into her chest and turned toward him on the couch.
“That she is too alone? That she doesn’t have support from her family?”
Zeke shrugged. “I can’t…I don’t know what it is. But I wanted to tell you that you looking out for her, well, I think that’s a good thing.” He paused. “You’re better at this stuff than I am. But you’re definitely right about something.”
Sybil didn’t think he was issuing a warning. She thought instead that he was encouraging her hands-on approach. This was a girl who needed a mother. And she was a mother who could help this girl. Still, though, you don’t binge-watch four days of true crime without darker elements wedging their way into your mind. But maybe Sybil needed some fictionalized drama in her life so she could forget the real drama—her lousy husband, the empty-nesting, the extremely horny feelings she was having for the man on her couch sitting close beside her—in her life.
Indeed, there was a moment on the second night when fatigue had turned to absurdity, when Zeke said he didn’t mean to stay, to take up her time if she had other things to do, and she replied, “Zeke, you’re the only thing I want to do,” then thought she might die—actuallydie—from her idiotic candor, but he had laughed, and said, “Don’t worry, I know what you meant.” Which he obviously didnot, or else he would have either peeled off her clothes right there or made a run for the front door, depending on his own feelings. Then later, the following day, they took a walk with Pluto through the neighborhood, Pluto trouncingthrough fallen red and yellow leaves, the air scented with fireplaces and pinecones, and Zeke looked at her and said, “Honestly, Sybil, if I never had to go home, I’m not sure I would.” Sybil had disposed of the medical bootie and was in thick-soled sneakers she thought were for retirees in Florida, but Zeke didn’t seem to mind, so she laced her elbow into his good arm, and Pluto zigzagged all over the road like he was dancing and that made them both laugh, and she thought:Maybe? Possibly? Is this something?But he never tried to kiss her, never made a move, even that night when she was dizzy from two glasses of wine and in an apron, and he, sober because of his rehab, said, “I think I could watch you cooking a Thanksgiving meal every year for the rest of my life.” She froze and found herself unable to look in his direction, and then Pluto barked at a squirrel in the backyard, and Zeke pushed back his stool at the island to investigate. They spent the next half an hour playing fetch (Zeke was a naturally good pitcher, even with his left arm), and by the time they returned, Sybil was elbow-deep in stuffing prep, and the moment had well passed. But she thought again:Maybe? Possibly?And tucked it away to revisit.
As the first night of his stay turned into four, Sybil made a point to check in with Betty in his absence, but she wasfine, she kept saying over text; she wasbusy, she promised; she had adate with a boy, she admitted, at which Sybil immediately FaceTimed her, but Betty didn’t pick up.
Zeke had shuffled out the door yesterday morning, a car service idling at the edges of her front walk, because his own family was descending for Thanksgiving. He’d said they should all come to his apartment for the holiday, but in her attempt to say no because Thanksgiving was Sybil’s favorite family holiday, she unintentionally invited Zeke, and therefore Betty, and then they couldn’t exclude Julian, to join them.
Tonight, just before Thanksgiving, Mark had met the twins at Penn Station, and the trio was on their way home. Sybil had reluctantly taken three Benadryls last night to finally just get a little rest so she could be composed, the mother the kids needed, for the weekend. Now she busied herself in the kitchen while she waited for them, feeling less weary but not at all rested. While she was chopping the ends off green beans with a new knife she’d ordered after the old one sliced her toe in half, the front door swung open. Pluto yelped and skittered out to the foyer. Sybil set the knife down, more careful now, and flattened her palms against her marble counter as if to ground herself, and reminded herself that honestly, she could get through anything. She was Sybil Bowman Foster, though she was thinking of dropping the Foster. She’d raised her two siblings. She was the top student at Harvard Medical School. She could make nice with Mark for a few nights while her children were home so their worlds weren’t obliterated on their very first college break.
She squeezed her eyes shut, then opened them again.
