Henry cups my chin in his hand and brings his face close to mine. “The thing is, Faye? You can’t get away from me.” Then, almost apologetically, “No matter where you go and what else you accomplish, I will always know you like this.” I gasp in his face, a disastrous admission. Beneath all the other hollow and painted versions of myself, Henry has found the innermost doll in the nesting set, the smallest, most solid me.
On the bed, the timer counts down the final few seconds. We notify Henry that we are done at the same time. I stand there, in the shrill blare of the alarm, straddling Henry’s leg, spots swimming in front of my eyes, trying to find my footing again. I am a bad, bad person, I have to be, for being able to do that, for doing what I do next.
I go over to the bed and stab the alarm silent. Then I lift Henry’s screwdriver to my lips to take a sip. The glass is slippery with condensation, and it falls from my fingers just as easily as it shatters on the floor. “Shit,” I say. “Sorry. I’ll get a towel.”
“Don’t move,” Henry says, as I hoped he would. He turns and disappears into the bathroom, and I grab the toolbox—there are hammers in there, things he could use to break down the door—and I take wide, leaping steps to freedom, slam the door behind me quick, lock it with numb, shaking hands. From the other side, Henry calls out my name in confusion. I take a step back from the door in disbelief, and when I realize I did it, I locked Henry inside, I lunge forward furiously.
“You’re a fucking liar!” The words come roaring out of me. Something small and fast goes tearing through the woods.
“Liar?” Henry repeats, bewildered. “What the hell are you talking about?”
“Why is PT’s heart medication in your safe?”
For a moment, only silence. Then the doorknob begins to rattle menacingly. “Open the door, Faye. I mean it. You should not have found that. You should not be out there alone. Please. Just open up and I’ll explain.”
“Explain to me now.”
Henry hits the door with the flat of his hand in frustration. “Campbell took it.”
I shake my head. Try to think straight. “When?”
“The night PT had us over. He went upstairs to use the bathroom, and Campbell pocketed it then. He had no way of knowing for sure that PT might need it, but he had a pretty good idea. A man with a heart condition who overexerted himself and found out his wife was murdered? Campbell took his shot.”
“Why? Why would he do that?” I am close to crying, thinking how little PT mattered to Campbell in the end, how little any of us did.
“Because PT was talking about going to the police and outing us. Why else?”
“Then why do you have it?”
Another pause. “Corrine found it.”
I take one big step back from the door, my shock necessitating a physical response. “Corrine?”
“Yes, Corrine.”
“But… what did she say? How did Campbell explain himself to her?”
“He didn’t have to, just. Open the fucking door, Faye.”
“No. Answer my question. Why wouldn’t he have to explain himself to her?”
In the silence that stretches, I’m sure Henry is about to tell me. But then there is a vicious crack from the inside. I hug myself in horror, realizing Henry is throwing himself at the door, that we did this once already the night he chased me down at the clubhouse and he managed to blow the hinges off the door then too. I turn. I run.
Chapter 25
I rip the boat keys from their hook and stumble back outside. Henry is still crashing into the door and shouting my name at a terrifying tenor. I break into a sprint and vault myself onto the deck of the boat.
Key in the ignition. Key right-sideupin the ignition. Wait for the engine warning lights to turn off. A minute that feels like an hour, and then finally, I shift into reverse. I clench the steering wheel with all my might, try to make my hands forget to shake. Is it terror or grief? I am leaving.
The sun glares at the water, punch-bright and sinister. My hair flaps around, tickling the back of my neck like ghost children playing a malevolent game. I keep whipping around, eyeing my wake made wavy and mirage-like by the boat’s motor, every cell in my body tweaking with the sensation of being followed, though that would be impossible. I took Henry’s only mode of transportation, and there is no one else on the island but us.
I push through the inlet at a higher speed, my hands sweating and my teeth chattering. I have no idea why they call it “driving” a boat.A car and a boat have steering wheels, and that’s about where the similarities end. Boats do not always go where you steer them. Boats are not easier to handle at lower speeds. Boats do not havebrakes. The only way to slow down is to reverse, and I do that now because as I emerge from the inlet, I come upon another boat, bobbing listlessly like a car on the shoulder of a highway. Inside, someone waves their arms frantically for help. It’s Corrine. Fuck. It’s Corrine.
Chapter 26
My heart is going berserk as I choke up on the throttle, maneuver jerkily alongside the shipwrecked vessel. Corrine watches me over the rims of her small gold sunglasses, her face intermittently betraying her surprise and disgust at the implications inherent to my presence on the island, all between repeated declarations of gratitude, that she is such an idiot for not checking to make sure she had enough gas before she left the lot, that she was this close to abandoning the boat and swimming to shore, that Campbell would have killed her if she’d left the boat. A stilted laugh, at the mention of Campbell’s name. My tongue tastes sour.
Corrine coaches me through dropping my fenders and untying and retying lines so that we can raft up without dinging the paint, because Campbell will also kill her if she dings the paint. Another tinny and unconvincing laugh I wouldn’t believe Corrine capable of producing if I had not heard it for myself. She must know he’s cheating. She must have come here to catch him out. I recognize the hallmark forces of humiliation tugging down the corners of her mouth. I’ve seen gravity take premature hold of my beautiful Hollywood friends who have been scammed by men who wear lifts in their loafers. It is anatomy-changing, to know that others know you have been cast aside.