Here She Lies (27 page)

A few miles outside of town, the Weathervane Inn was the only establishment that would have us, as none of the others took children under twelve, especially noise-making smell-issuing babies. It was perfect—

big enough to have some privacy, small enough to feel comfortable. They served a full, filling breakfast and, for lunch and dinner, pointed you in the direction of the many excellent local restaurants, which I had never really noticed, as we’d done our eating mainly at Julie’s house. The innkeepers, Mr. and Mrs. Boardman—

a long-married couple who had raised a family in this very inn—allowed guests use of the two living rooms, one of which was kind of a family-den-cum-kids’-

game-room, which made it a perfect place for us to hang out. All the weekenders had fled the night before or early this morning and when I returned from the police station I found Bobby alone in the den with Lexy on her play mat on the floor.

On a side table next to the couch was a bouquet of lilacs. The fragrant and vaguely purple clusters relaxed over the lip of a glass cocktail shaker filled with water and I couldn’t resist leaning over and taking a deep whiff of the tiny blossoms. The lush smell filled me,
warmed
me, replacing the chill of the police station, and I took another breath of it. Then I kissed Bobby and snuggled next to him on the couch. Together we watched Lexy.

Even after two days, it still felt like a miracle to have her back. I didn’t know if I’d ever trust anyone with her again—except Bobby, of course. Maybe I would be one of those mothers who never used a babysitter and never let her kids out of her sight.

Bobby and I had already decided to return to Kentucky together when Detective Lazare was through with me here and when Liz had sorted out the embezzlement charge and we could buy back the bail bond. Kent, amazingly, had softened up and had stopped hassling Bobby about all the time off (wisely, since the Family Leave Act allowed Bobby ample time to care for his family without loss of his job, and if Kent had persisted in his harassment it would only have meant a lawsuit). So we would go home. But I would not return to work at the prison—I would
never
set foot in any prison again. I would stay home and be with Lexy full-time until I figured out my next move. In a year, once Bobby had earned his pension, we would relocate somewhere that we both agreed on. That was our new plan.

“Liz called,” Bobby said after a minute.

“And?”

“She’s asking around for recommendations for a criminal defense lawyer, either from around here or the Boston area.”

“Do I really need another lawyer? And why Boston?

It’s so far.”

“It’s not really that far—and yes, Liz says you should have a lawyer who knows Massachusetts criminal law.”

“But I’m not a criminal!”

“I know that.” He kissed my forehead. “And Liz knows that, and Thomas Soiffer probably knows that, and, let’s face it,
Julie
knows that. But still, Liz said that because they’re putting you through all these paces, you need representation. Just in case.”

“In case of what?”

“I don’t know, Annie. Just
in case
.” “What about Julie? She’s probably already got the best lawyer there is.”

“Probably.”

Bored with her toys on the floor, Lexy started to fuss. I bent down and brought her to my lap, running my hands along her soft, soft arms and kissing her sweet-smelling peach-fuzz head.

“Listen, Annie.” Bobby raised his eyebrows and set his mouth in preparation for this: “Liz told me something else. She said she spoke with the police in Lexington, and they told her they’d confiscated our computer, from home.”

I stared at him, speechless.

“They sent our computer to the FBI in Boston.”

“
Why?
Do they actually think
I
started all this?

Like I’m some kind of madwoman hell-bent on self-destruction—”

“Annie.” Bobby’s tone was firm. “Liz said not to waste time getting upset about it. I think she’s right.

Rusty Smith’s probably checking to see how Julie’s viruses and stuff got into our files, something like that.

The important thing is that Liz thinks she should be able to have the embezzlement charge dropped in the next couple of days, and as soon as that happens, buying back the bail bond won’t take long.”

“Two whole days?”

“She said Thursday at the latest.”

“But Thursday’s
three
days away.”

“
Annie
, it’s really in our best interest to cooperate.

Once the blood results come in, the criminal stuff will work itself out. And remember, Lazare’s dealing with Julie, too. He may need to talk to us some more. It’s important we stick around for that. Three days isn’t that long if you look at the larger picture.”

“Fine,” I said. “We’ll stay and talk to him, and I’ll meet my new lawyer, but I want to go home by the end of this week. If anyone has any more questions, can’t they talk to us on the phone?”

Bobby’s smile showed hints of mischief. It really was tempting, even for someone as disciplined as he was, to slough off our fast-multiplying shackles just by deciding to go. He could get what he’d wanted all along: I would go home with him. “Well,” he said,

“we’ll try to leave by Friday—or sooner, if we can.” Lexy grabbed at my shirt and I got her latched on for her midmorning feed, then settled my head on Bobby’s shoulder. With one extended finger, he stroked his daughter’s supple cheek while she sucked away at me. When she was finished, I handed her to him and he paced the room, patting her back in hope of a burp. I leaned across the couch and sank my nose into the lilacs to drink some more from their glorious scent. The lilacs had bloomed weeks ago in Kentucky, where it was warmer. So you see, in some ways I was lucky: this year, I got lilacs twice.

A blue-green vein fattened in reaction to the tight rubber tourniquet, the needle pierced the skin of my inner arm and I could feel my blood pulsing out. I watched as the technician, a tiny Korean woman, capped one vial and attached a second to the needle.

All my life, I had never looked away when blood was drawn, and, in fact, today it strengthened me to watch my blood fill the glass vials. That was a difference be-tween Julie and me: during any medical procedure, she blanched and looked away. Not I. Nearly every drop of blood that had ever left my body had been observed by me. All our adult lives Julie and I had donated blood as a matter of conscience, and every time it was the same: I would focus on my blood’s journey from vein to tube to vial; she would focus anywhere else. When Lexy was born, I had screamed and fought and even watched, at moments, through a mirror I had insisted Bobby hold up at the end of the hospital bed. I remember him cringing a little at the suggestion of the mirror—

he thought it was “gruesome”—and I had to explain my strange relationship with blood, as a twin. It was a matter of my own body and where it ended; blood that came from my body belonged only to
me
. Julie had her own blood and her own reaction to it.

This fascination had started when I was a child, when a teacher had explained that during gestation some twins shared a sac, while others had their own individual sacs; likewise, some twins shared a placenta, while others did not. And to further complicate the possible variables, twins sharing a placenta and a sac sometimes also shared circulation: that is,
blood
. One’s blood would circulate through the other and back again, to the extent that some fraternal boy/girl twin pairs soaked up each other’s hormones, blurring gender-based behaviors later on. So the question of whether or not I had my very own blood, or some combination of mine and Julie’s, felt significant to me.

Because we were identical twins, I was attuned to any differences. For instance, growing up, I’d thought I was served a greater dollop of bravery (what my mother called “impulsiveness” or, in frustration, “foolishness”) than my sister, but I now realized that my curiosity about my own blood was about an
urge
to see evidence of my
self
. Because we were so much alike, it was impossible to know exactly how much we shared—where she ended and I began. Did the blood that came from my body also flow through hers? Were we
really
identical twins or did we only
look
identical?

It was something I’d always secretly wondered about—secretly because our parents had never allowed us to broach the possibility that we weren’t actually, verifiably, genetically
identical
. We’d looked so cute in matching dresses and played so nicely together and
everyone
mistook one for the other. What other proof did you need? And what did it really matter? Before we got old enough to insist that our parents tell us (if in fact they knew), they both died.

My blood left my body, entered the tube.

I looked at the technician. “My twin sister and I never had the blood test, to find out if we’re really identical.”

“You want it?”

“Yes.”

“I’ll take some extra, then.”

She twisted off one filled tube, plugged it, and attached another. In the end she had four tubes of my blood upright in her tray. I felt a little dizzy, so she gave me some orange juice and a cookie and told me to sit for a couple of minutes before getting up. I drank the juice and ate the cookie, but I didn’t want to stay.

I was still a little dizzy on the way home, so I drove slowly, but mile by mile, I felt better. It was a magnif-icent spring afternoon, greenery and flowers bursting in every view, and the road back was quiet. The sense of peacefulness I had abandoned on my way to the clinic began to return to me. By the time I pulled into the small gravel parking lot of the Weathervane Inn, I felt practically happy—done with the lineup, done with the blood test—like a child who hated camp X-ing days off a calendar. By the end of the week we’d be
home
.

Before I was out of the car, my cell phone rang. I saw it was Bobby.

“Where are you?” he asked.

“I just pulled up. I’m right outside the inn.” I got out of the car, slammed the door and there he was, slipping his cell phone into his jeans pocket.

“Lexy still asleep?” I asked.

“Listen, Annie. Bad news.”

I froze. I didn’t know if I could take any more. “Better just tell me.”

“Gabe Lazare called,” he said. “It turns out Julie
did
rent a vacation house in Maine. It agrees with everything she said before.”

“But she never said anything to me about that! She says I
knew
she was taking Lexy there, but I
didn’t
.”

“Shh. Calm down.” He reached out to stroke my arm, but I yanked it away.

“I can’t calm down. She’s lying, Bobby! Does this mean they’re not going to arrest her for trying to steal Lexy?”

“I think that’s what it means. I really don’t know.

Lazare won’t tell me much. But he said we had to stay until he gets the DNA analysis from the blood tests. He said it could take up to two weeks, but he would get this one expedited.”

“Why can’t we go home while he waits for the tests?”

“I don’t know.”

I steeled myself. “How long?”

“A week. He
promised
.”

Another week in this town, staying at an inn like tourists, while my sister lived, a free woman, in her luxurious house. What if we saw her in town? Would we have to travel to distant counties for our meals just to avoid Julie?

“Forget it, Bobby. We’re going home
now
.”

“Annie—”

I left him standing on the path, went upstairs to our room and packed up all our stuff. When Lexy woke up I changed her diaper and nursed her. By then, Bobby had gathered up the last of his personal toiletries. He checked us out and drove the car to the airport in Albany. On the way, he confessed that he’d made two calls before joining me in our room while I was packing.

“Lazare said that if you leave the state, you’ll be jumping bail. That simple. Liz agreed with him; she said she’d try to reach the judge and see what she could do, but she couldn’t guarantee anything.”

“This is nonsense, Bobby,” I said. “They can’t keep me here.”

“Actually, Annie, they probably can.” That was all he said. Clearly he had made up his mind not to try to stop me. But didn’t he also want to go? I knew that if he was really dead-set against it, he would have said so. As for the potential consequences of flight, I was so upset I couldn’t think about them right now.

We drove in silence the rest of the way. Even Lexy was fairly calm in her car seat in the back. I looked out the window at the highway connecting Massachusetts and upstate New York, the ribbon of road pulling us in, bringing us closer to the airport and our home in Kentucky. It probably
was
a stupid idea to run home, but how could I resist? I was frantic for all this to end. I wanted to breathe my own air, walk my own floors, sleep in my own bed. I was as desperate to be home now as I had been to leave home two weeks ago. I couldn’t wait a week or more.

We arrived at the airport and returned the rental car.

Bobby carried our luggage into the terminal while I pushed Lexy in her stroller. There was a flight in three hours and we booked it—using our very own credit cards, which had finally started to reach us at the inn.

We were standing on line to check our baggage—and I felt so close to normal, to
home
—when I turned and saw Detective Lazare come in through a revolving glass door. When he saw that we’d spotted him, he attempted a smile. He
had
to be kidding.

“Fancy meeting you here,” he tried to joke, but no one laughed. Then he just tossed out his lasso. “Can’t leave, folks.”

“You really don’t need me here,” I said. But Bobby looked nervous, and that shook my confidence, so I added, “Do you?”

“I spoke to your lawyer,” Lazare said. “Her motion to modify your bond is still in effect, but your permis-sion to leave New York State extends only to Massachusetts.”

“I went to Vermont and nothing happened.”