Whispers of the Bayou (6 page)

After two hours I finally gave up and signed onto an Internet computer to check flights to New Orleans. There was nothing left for today, so I bought a ticket for the first flight out in the morning, pressing the final “Buy Now” button with a surge of defiance—defiance against AJ, against
the various forces that were at work here, against helplessness. Using the e-mail address from the printouts AJ had given me, I sent a copy of my itinerary to Charles Benochet, the lawyer who handled my inheritance, along with a quick note that said to please tell Mr. Pedreaux that I was coming. After arranging for a car rental, I went onto an Internet mapping site and pulled up directions from the airport in New Orleans to my destination about an hour west of there, to the estate known as Twin Oaks.

With my plans made and my work here done, I gathered up my things and made my way downstairs to the majestic front entrance of the library. On the way I passed a bank of pay phones and stopped to make a call, as the battery on my overused cell phone had run out.

Dropping coins in the slot, I waited for the tone and then dialed my daughter’s nanny, Rosita, who always brought Tess over to her house on Fridays to stay until bedtime, so that Nathan and I could each work late and get caught up for the weekend. Actually, Nathan had started the tradition a year before so that he and I could have a weekly date night. That had lasted only a few months, however, until we began once again to drift apart and let our busy schedules get in the way. Eventually our child-free Fridays had turned into an anything-
except
-a-date nights.

When Rosita answered the phone I could hear laughter and voices in the background, and with a surge of jealousy I could picture her big extended family all gathered around the kitchen, rolling tamales and slicing vegetables as they basked in the glow of their love and connection. I’d never had anything like that at all in my life, though I was glad at least that my daughter was able to experience it on a weekly basis.

I told Rosita that I needed her to bring Tess home a half hour earlier tonight than planned because I was leaving on a trip tomorrow and I wanted to spend a little time together before she went to bed. After hanging up I thought about calling Nathan, but I decided I’d rather talk face-to-face once he got home. He had a huge work-related event coming up on Sunday, so I knew he’d be putting in extra time tonight in preparation. That meant that Tess and I could have our nightly half hour of quality time, and then I could put her to bed and get packed for my trip in the peace and quiet of an empty bedroom. Nathan would probably show up just about
the time I was ready to turn in. We would have to discuss the logistics of what I needed to do and how we could make this work then.

It was getting dark by the time I came out of the library, so again I guiltily hailed a taxi. Sitting in the black vinyl womb of the backseat, I thought about the conversations Nathan and I had been having lately, and a knot of fear tightened in my gut as I pictured the set of his jaw from this morning. Standing in the bathroom doorway in his pajamas, watching me brush my teeth, he couldn’t have laid things out any clearer, though I suppose he could have been less cliché:
No man is an island, Miranda, even if that’s how you’d rather live your life.

According to Nathan, he was tired of being married to a woman who wasn’t a “team player,” who wasn’t “emotionally available,” who never let him “in.” Though I could clearly see the hurt in his eyes, I couldn’t help but feel that he was grasping at buzz words and catch phrases, trying to create that picture-perfect marriage he thought people were
supposed
to have. Still, I wanted to understand, so after I rinsed my mouth and put my toothbrush away, I followed him into the bedroom and pressed him for specifics. He couldn’t come up with anything tangible, and that’s where the conversation had ended.
It’s just an attitude, a way of living and being,
he had said, which made no sense to me at all.
My way of living and being is married,
I had replied,
and how could you be more of a team player than that?

Now, as I watched the reflection of the city lights roll along in front me, I played his words back again and again in my mind. There was a solid, Plexiglas shield separating me from my driver, standard equipment for all New York taxis, which I assumed was there to provide a layer of safety for the man at the wheel. But as a passenger that divider always made me feel safer too. I liked interacting through something clear but solid, me in my space and them in theirs. I wondered now if that’s what Nathan meant, that I lived life that way: Looking but not connecting, seeing but not feeling, emotions through Plexiglas, to everyone including him.

The vehicle pulled to a stop in front of my building, so I put those thoughts out of my mind for now. After paying the driver, I looked from side to side and then opened the car door and got out. For the first time
ever, I regretted that we didn’t live in a place with a doorman. Steeling my nerve, I walked briskly to the door of our building, opened it, and stepped into the empty lobby. I felt safe enough in the elevator, but when the doors slid open on our floor, I half expected at least one of the men I had crossed paths with today to be standing there waiting for me. My hands were trembling as I fumbled with the lock in the key. Once inside, I quickly closed and locked the door, breathing a sigh of relief that I was safely home and at the same time mad at myself for being so unglued.

Until I felt a warm hand on my shoulder.

Spinning around, I swung my purse as hard as I could, realizing just before the moment of impact that I was about to bean my own husband. Though his upraised hand deflected most of the blow, my bag still managed to clip him on the ear and raise a big red welt almost immediately from his cheek. I yelled at him for scaring me; he yelled at me for having disappeared for two and a half hours. Then we both just stood there, catching our breath and trying to calm down.

“I’m sorry,” I said finally, wincing at the redness of his cheek. “Does it hurt?”

“My gosh, Miranda, you’ve had me worried to death,” he exclaimed, ignoring my question and his injury. “I’ve been calling your cell phone, calling everywhere, trying to find you, but nobody knows anything.”

“I’m sorry. My battery died. What are you doing home so early anyway?” I walked farther inside and put my purse and keys away. “Didn’t you have to work until ten?”

“Yeah, sure, until I got a message from AJ and called her back and found out what happened to you. Did you think I would stay there after that?”

“Didn’t AJ tell you that I’m okay?”

“You’re my wife, Miranda!” he yelled, the vein in his temple throbbing. “Whether you’re okay now or not is beside the point.”

“But tonight was important for you,” I said, realizing with a sinking feeling that if the situation had been reversed, I might not have left a big event connected with my job for him, not as long as I knew he was all right. Then, seeing the look on his face, I remembered our discussion from
this morning, not to mention AJ’s words from a while ago, that husbands needed to be needed, especially at a time like this. Somehow, though I tried to see Nathan’s concern as reassuring, to me it just felt stifling. I couldn’t play the “needy” game he and AJ wanted me to play.

“I’m sorry, Nathan,” I said, going to the kitchen for something to drink. “I didn’t mean to worry you. I was at the library, trying to find out more about—” Feeling a flash of shame about the tattoo, I stopped talking and turned to look at my husband, who was still standing near the door, watching me. “Did AJ tell you everything?”

“We talked at length,” he replied, his eyes moving to the side of my head, as if he could read my mind. “She’s incredibly worried about you. So am I.”

I left him there and went to the kitchen, pulling a bottle of water from the fridge. I couldn’t explain it, but between my aunt and my husband, what I wanted most to do right now was leave them both behind, race off to the airport by myself, and simply fly down to Louisiana to get this whole thing taken care of.

Returning to the living room, I looked at Nathan, who was standing in the same spot, hands on hips, his straight blond bangs falling forward to cover one eyebrow. Even when he was being difficult, I couldn’t help but be struck at how handsome he was, the angular set of his chin so strong, the deep blue of his eyes as piercing as ever. Once upon a time, I had fallen in love with those eyes and the man behind them. I still loved him very much, but these days it seemed that was no longer enough.

Swallowing my pride, I put down my water and stepped toward him, and that was all the signal he needed. Suddenly, he had crossed that space that separated us and swept me into his arms, hugging me so tightly I could barely breathe. I surrendered to the moment, letting him hang on, knowing he must have been nearly as rattled by what had happened as I was.

“I’ve been going nuts,” he whispered into my hair, “thinking about those men and what they did, what they could have done…”

“Shhh,” I said, pressing a finger to his lips and then following it there with my mouth.

I kissed my husband deeply, wanting to connect, wanting to make him understand how much I loved him. When the kiss ended, he placed a gentle hand on each side of my face and tried to look into my eyes. Instinctively I looked away, moving back out of his embrace.

“Okay. Anyway, I need to get packed,” I said, suddenly feeling awkward and embarrassed.

I headed for the bedroom, but behind me I knew that he was still just standing there, watching me.

“Does anything ever reach you, Miranda?” he asked hoarsely across the widening distance between us.

I stopped walking and let out a long, slow breath.

“Not again, Nathan,” I said tiredly, turning to look at him, surprised at the anguish in his eyes.

He didn’t reply. Instead, he simply met my gaze for a long moment before turning and walking in the other direction. He moved down the hall to his study and then quietly closed the door.

The rest of the evening was difficult, to say the least. With my hair still in a ponytail, I managed to make dinner, even though cooking was not my forte and meals were usually Nathan’s job. As soon as Tess got home, chattering happily about her adventures of the day, I was sorry I had asked Rosita to bring her back early. In theory, quality time always sounded good, but in reality, it could be incredibly distracting.

Nathan remained in his study a full hour, until I knocked on the door and pushed it open. He was sitting at his drafting table, pencil in hand, his expression cold and remote.

“Yes?”

“Supper’s ready.”

“Thanks, but I’m not hungry.”

I stepped inside and closed the door behind me.

“We need to discuss logistics,” I said, trying to keep my voice light. “I booked a flight to New Orleans in the morning.”

He sat back in his chair and looked at me.

“What’s to discuss?” he asked finally, a shadow passing behind his eyes. “Tess and I will be fine. Have a good trip.”

With that he pointedly returned to his work, so I left him to it, walking back to the dining room to sit at the table with my daughter. She wasn’t hungry either, having already eaten at Rosita’s. I didn’t feel like talking, but that didn’t seem to matter to Tess, who talked enough for both of us as I ate.

Halfway through the meal, I got an idea, so I told my daughter to wait there and I went down the hall to her room, where I retrieved paper, crayons, and colored pencils. Back at the table, I told her that playtime and dinnertime were going to have to be done in combination tonight, because Mommy was leaving on a trip in the morning and I still needed to pack.

“Are you going on an airplane?” she asked, reaching for a piece of paper. “Will you bring me back a toy?”

Tess chattered on and on, and I answered her endless questions as simply as I could without really listening. Though we often drew and colored together at playtime, the picture I began to draw now had nothing to do with quality interaction for my child and everything to do with creating a good likeness of Jimmy Smith, the man who had come to my office with the symbol in the painting. I wanted a likeness to give to the police and to museum security, not to mention to bring down and show Willy Pedreaux. On the phone, he claimed not to know who the man might have been or what he wanted, but maybe if Willy saw a picture of the guy he would recognize him. As all of this symbol business was connected somehow, I thought it couldn’t hurt to try. I only wished I had caught a glimpse of my attackers in the alley so that I could draw them too.

I sketched the face for a while then traded out the black pencil for brown, disappointed that it wasn’t as easy as I had thought it would be to capture on paper the likeness of a man I had seen in person only once. I kept erasing, redrawing, shading, and erasing again, and as I did I gained a whole new respect for police sketch artists. When I was nearly finished, I just stopped and stared at it for a moment, knowing I hadn’t gotten it quite right but that it was the best I could do. I glanced at Tess’s picture, which featured an elaborate series of different-colored scribbles.

“That’s good, honey,” I said. “Very colorful.”

“Thanks, Mommy,” she replied, glancing at mine. “I like yours too. But why did you draw the telephone man?”

My hand paused in midair, my heart suddenly in my throat.

“What?” I asked, trying to sound casual.

“That’s the man that fixes the telephones.”

“Here in our apartment?”

“Yeah.”

“All the time?”

“No, just once.”

“When?”

She paused, trading a pink crayon for purple.

“I don’t know. Six or seven years ago, maybe.”

“You mean days? Six or seven days ago?”

“Or ninety-two. I’m not sure.”

Heart pounding, I pushed back my chair.

“Was it this week, Tess?”

“Yeah, I think so.”

“How long was he here?”

“I don’t know, Mommy. Like for the whole
SpongeBob.
”

“What did he do?”

“He just went around fixing all the phones. I don’t know. Why are you asking so many questions? Did I do something wrong?”