into the empty place next to me and made a face. “We’re having a few issues.”
Caroline’s expression said she didn’t believe Misty, not for a second, while I wondered about openly using a fight with her spouse as an excuse and showing up for tea dressed like a Skype hooker. After Misty’s biting attack on these women at our lunch, I wondered about her showing up at all.
But, thank God.
Caroline didn’t say a word. She reached for a small wooden box on the Louis XV end table beside her. The signal, apparently, that we were beginning. Every eye in the room was now glued to that box.
“As most of you know, there is one opening in my club this year because of Helen’s unfortunate death. I thought this would be a good way for me to get to know the prospective candidates a little better.”
Who was Helen?
I stared at the box.
Human ashes?
Misty stared at her bitten nails. Tiffany eagerly propped herself forward. Holly appearedto want to power through this as quickly as possible and get after that potato. Lucinda of the multisyllabic last name tossed back two pills from a prescription bottle, a little too late.
“Your husband’s resume is obviously going to be a huge asset to our little community, Emily.” Before I could respond, Caroline nodded at Misty. “I’m sure not everyone will cotton to you two being on the fast track. The other girls here have been applying for years.”
Tiffany shot me a death stare, while I made a vague mental note to Google the etymology of
cotton
as a verb, during the part of my pregnant day when I sprawled on the bed with orange Doritos and Googled random things. During the part of my day where I pretended there was only one of me, not two or three or four.
“In this box, there are five slips of paper,” Caroline continued serenely. “Each one is a secret that belongs to someone in this room. We’ll pass the box, and each of you will randomly pull one out and read it aloud to the group.”
Not the boxed remains of a dead person. But this—what
was
this? I waited for the burst of laughter. For rebellion. For people to jump up and say they’d left these kinds of silly games behind a long time ago, at around fifteen, with séances and slutty bathroom graffiti. But no one flinched.
Caroline passed the box to me. I took it. I had a decision to make. It was a lovely box. Dark mahogany. Old. An intricate ivory rose was inlaid in the lid. My hand shook a little as I fiddled with the brass catch.
When I raised the lid, I smelled the sea. Salt. Decomposition.
Guilt.
The box held a jumble of white slips of paper that appeared to have escaped from fortune cookies. I tried to buy time by running one of my fingers over the words etched into the inside of the lid.
The rose remembers the dust from which it came
.
Caroline leaned over and moved my fingers into the nest of paper.
“Pull one out and read it aloud.” Insistent.
What did she know about me?
I fumbled to separate one piece of paper from the others and smoothed it out between my fingers. I heard a voice, surely not mine, because the smart me would already be in her car, turning the key.
“I killed Alex.”
6
I wanted to take the words back as soon as they floated from my mouth. Words like insidious dandelion seeds, blown from a slight puff of breath. Poisonous words that would thrive in a room like this, where the soil was already disturbed. But that must be the point.
One of the women in the room drew in an audible breath, either of shock or guilt. I didn’t care who.
This was not my secret.
I stared at the other slips of paper, wondering which one was.
“Pass the box,” Caroline ordered.
Reluctantly, I handed the box to Misty.
Misty glanced at her slip and then over at me, hesitating. Then she read in a clear, calm voice:
“This baby is not my husband’s.”
“Are you kidding me?” The words flew out of my mouth. “How could you read that? Of course this baby is my husband’s!”
Caroline’s
Caroline’s expression said she didn’t believe Misty, not for a second, while I wondered about openly using a fight with her spouse as an excuse and showing up for tea dressed like a Skype hooker. After Misty’s biting attack on these women at our lunch, I wondered about her showing up at all.
But, thank God.
Caroline didn’t say a word. She reached for a small wooden box on the Louis XV end table beside her. The signal, apparently, that we were beginning. Every eye in the room was now glued to that box.
“As most of you know, there is one opening in my club this year because of Helen’s unfortunate death. I thought this would be a good way for me to get to know the prospective candidates a little better.”
Who was Helen?
I stared at the box.
Human ashes?
Misty stared at her bitten nails. Tiffany eagerly propped herself forward. Holly appearedto want to power through this as quickly as possible and get after that potato. Lucinda of the multisyllabic last name tossed back two pills from a prescription bottle, a little too late.
“Your husband’s resume is obviously going to be a huge asset to our little community, Emily.” Before I could respond, Caroline nodded at Misty. “I’m sure not everyone will cotton to you two being on the fast track. The other girls here have been applying for years.”
Tiffany shot me a death stare, while I made a vague mental note to Google the etymology of
cotton
as a verb, during the part of my pregnant day when I sprawled on the bed with orange Doritos and Googled random things. During the part of my day where I pretended there was only one of me, not two or three or four.
“In this box, there are five slips of paper,” Caroline continued serenely. “Each one is a secret that belongs to someone in this room. We’ll pass the box, and each of you will randomly pull one out and read it aloud to the group.”
Not the boxed remains of a dead person. But this—what
was
this? I waited for the burst of laughter. For rebellion. For people to jump up and say they’d left these kinds of silly games behind a long time ago, at around fifteen, with séances and slutty bathroom graffiti. But no one flinched.
Caroline passed the box to me. I took it. I had a decision to make. It was a lovely box. Dark mahogany. Old. An intricate ivory rose was inlaid in the lid. My hand shook a little as I fiddled with the brass catch.
When I raised the lid, I smelled the sea. Salt. Decomposition.
Guilt.
The box held a jumble of white slips of paper that appeared to have escaped from fortune cookies. I tried to buy time by running one of my fingers over the words etched into the inside of the lid.
The rose remembers the dust from which it came
.
Caroline leaned over and moved my fingers into the nest of paper.
“Pull one out and read it aloud.” Insistent.
What did she know about me?
I fumbled to separate one piece of paper from the others and smoothed it out between my fingers. I heard a voice, surely not mine, because the smart me would already be in her car, turning the key.
“I killed Alex.”
6
I wanted to take the words back as soon as they floated from my mouth. Words like insidious dandelion seeds, blown from a slight puff of breath. Poisonous words that would thrive in a room like this, where the soil was already disturbed. But that must be the point.
One of the women in the room drew in an audible breath, either of shock or guilt. I didn’t care who.
This was not my secret.
I stared at the other slips of paper, wondering which one was.
“Pass the box,” Caroline ordered.
Reluctantly, I handed the box to Misty.
Misty glanced at her slip and then over at me, hesitating. Then she read in a clear, calm voice:
“This baby is not my husband’s.”
“Are you kidding me?” The words flew out of my mouth. “How could you read that? Of course this baby is my husband’s!”
Caroline’s
Similar Books
