Seriously?
The man had spent two weeks in England and suddenly he was talking like one of the Beatles.
“We bought the place furnished a couple of years ago,” John went on. “Built in 1922. Thought we’d fix it up, but one thing led to another. I don’t think we’ve gone up there but twice. Probably should sell it. Muriel never liked the place.”
“It’s in New Hampshire, for Chrissake,” moaned Muriel, lighting another cigarette. “The mosquitoes! My god! The mosquitoes!”
Between her chain-smoking and her perfume, Jaimie didn’t believe a mosquito could get within ten feet of her.
“And those ducks!” Muriel said.
She took a long pull on her cigarette.
“Loons,” her husband corrected.
“Honestly, it’s like the criminally insane are out there paddling around in the dark. No thanks.” She turned to Jaimie. “I understand why you might want to spend a week or two up there in Godforsaken, New Hampshire. After everything you’ve gone through, I mean. But between you and me, Jaimie, I’ve squashed my last mosquito and heard the gibbering of my last duck.”
“Loon,” John said again.
Muriel stood up and walked into the kitchen. A stainless steel nightmare. Like the inside of a UFO, Jaimie thought. For a second he imagined a spaceship filled with Muriel clones. Terrifying.
She mixed herself another drink as John gave Jaimie instructions for the cottage, detailing its many quirks.
“I’ll tell Moses Eldred to put a key under the mat,” John said. “He’s the local who looks after the place for us. And don’t try to open the back door. You’ll never get it shut.”
Jaimie stood up to go.
“Oh, I almost forgot,” John added. He steadied himself on an end table. “The water in all the faucets will run brown the first day or so.”
“Like blood,” Muriel yelled from the kitchen.
two
After everything you’ve gone through.
The words stayed with Jaimie. They were with him now as he headed out of Boston, driving north to New Hampshire. He could hear Muriel’s smoke-ravaged voice. Could see her downturned lips.
Muriel was clueless. Like everybody else. His parents. Barry Pryce. His friends. Why couldn’t they see it? He hadn’t gone through anything. That was the point. There was no going through. Jannie was dead. There was no going anywhere.
His lips twisted into a half smile. He was thinking of the way he’d tricked Barry Pryce. Barry Pryce. PhD. The so-called grief counselor his parents made him see after the accident.
The man was a dick. Him and his five stages of grief. As if what Jaimie was feeling was nothing more than a recipe in one of the glossy magazines his mother fanned so precisely on the coffee table.
Want a surefire fix when the love of your life kicks the bucket? Follow these five easy steps and you’ll be twerking on her grave in no time.
Start with a healthy dollop of denial.
Now shake in a little anger.
“I’m feeling better,” Jaimie had lied in his last session with Pryce. He was good at lying now. And why not? With Jannie gone, it was all a lie. Getting up in the morning. Brushing his teeth. Please. Thank you. Yes. No. All of it. “My appetite is coming back, too.”
Pryce smiled and bobbed his head. He reminded Jaimie of a weird toy ostrich. The legless kind that dunks its head in water.
“Right on schedule,” he had said to Jaimie. “You’ve moved through the first four stages. Now, you’re entering the final one: Acceptance. Right on schedule.”
Jaimie tried to assume the posture of someone dumb enough to swallow this BS.
“Thank you for your help,” he said. “It’s . . . it’s been rough.”
Pryce continued to nod and smile. Jaimie had him right where he wanted him. His parents would never let him spend a week at the cottage alone unless Pryce approved it.
He’d thrown out the bait. Now it was time to hook the bastard.
“I . . . I really feel like I could use some time to myself. You know . . . to get my head back together and everything.”
“That’s only natural,” the doctor said. “You deserve it.”
And that was that.
Jaimie pulled into the left lane to pass a white, late-model Ford puttering along at forty-five miles an hour. He accelerated as he turned his head to check out the driver. His breath stopped so suddenly that, for a moment, he thought he might pass out.
An old woman sat hunched in the driver’s seat. Her upper body leaning toward the windshield. Her fingers curling around the steering wheel. Her fingers, with their gross, swollen knuckles. Like leeches, he thought.
He lowered his speed so that his Volvo ran parallel to the Ford.
One mile.
Two.
With each click of the odometer, his rage burned hotter. She had to be in her eighties. Older even than the old man who had run the stop sign. The man who had killed Jannie.
What was that old bag doing behind the wheel of a car? She had no right. Any fool could see that. She was too old. Too old to live even. Why was she alive and Jannie gone? Hadn’t he and Jannie sworn they would never be apart? Hadn’t his classmates voted them The Couple Most Likely to Stay Together? Jannie and Jaimie. Jaimie and Jannie. That’s the way it was supposed to be. Forever. Forever and ever.
What would it feel like to run the old woman off the road just the way the old man had run Jannie off the road? See her go through the windshield just the way the police said that Jannie had? Watch her choke on her own blood?
It would be easy. The slightest downward pull of his right arm. That’s all it would take. Easy! Easy-peasy! Easier, when he thought about it, than not doing it. He tightened his grip. The Volvo inched closer to the center line.
If she so much as glances at me I’ll do it, he thought. Swear to God! I will!
He brought the Volvo so close to the old woman’s car that if the windows had been open, he could have flicked her on the temple.
Look at me! Look at me!
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