My heart is pounding as I force my eyes open and blink back against the blinding morning light to see… the familiar shapes of my own living room. I sit myself up on the couch. Somebody has left a blanket over me. And there’s a glass of water on the coffee table with a note sitting next to it. I down the water greedily before picking up the note and reading it.

  Would have left you some aspirin, but I couldn’t find any. Don’t forget to hydrate! ~ Benton.

  Memories of last night come flooding over me and I groan in shame. What was I thinking, drinking that much? I mean, I wasn’t thinking, obviously, but who goes to a party with their two children and gets so blind drunk that they can’t even remember arriving back home?

  How did my kids get home? Did they get home?

  Oh God. I’m the worst mother in the world. Just wait until their father hears about this, he’ll probably gun for full custody to get them as far away from their irresponsible mother as possible.

  I stand up and my stomach lurches, but I ignore it, focused solely on finding my children.

  “Mory! Cameron!” I shout, and then squeeze my eyes shut in pain from the sound of my own voice.

  “In here!” Mory calls from the kitchen.

  I make my way through to find the two of them at the table eating cereal.

  “Oh, thank God.” I walk over and kiss them both on the tops of their heads. “I’m so sorry, guys.”

  “For what?” Cameron asks, clueless as usual.

  “Yeah, Mom. For what?” Mory smirks.

  I give my daughter a sour look then begin to rummage around in a drawer until I find a pack of aspirin and wash two down with another full glass of water.

  “Why are you still in your dress from last night?” asks Cameron.

  “I… um… I just went straight to sleep on the couch when I got home from the party.”

  He scoops another spoonful of cereal into his mouth. “When is Xavier getting here?”

  I stare at my son blankly, not comprehending a word of what he just asked, until I remember Justin and I had arranged to take the two boys to the zoo today. But that was before I went to my neighbor’s surprise birthday party and drank myself into a coma.

  I look at the clock above the sink at the exact same moment as there’s a knock at the door. Now, I guess would be the answer to Cameron’s last question.

  Before I can stop him, he rushes off to answer the door and I have about five seconds to pull my hair down from its lopsided bun and wipe the dried mascara from underneath my eyes.

  Mory begins to quietly laugh at me.

  “What’s so funny?” I narrow my eyes at her.

  “This,” she says, gesturing to me as a whole. “Just… all of it.”

  I roll my eyes. “Oh, yeah. Laugh it up.”

  I brush my dress down with my hands and can only hope I don’t look nearly as awful as I feel as I see Justin approaching from the hall. Mory slinks out of the room, leaving us alone.

  Justin walks over and looks me up and down. There’s no hiding the amusement on his face.

  “Good morning.” He kisses me.

  “Morning,” I croak.

  “I’m going to take a wild stab in the dark and guess that you may have overindulged a little at the party last night.”

  “What? Why do you say that?” I stand a little taller, trying to conjure up some dignity.

  “Don’t you remember calling me at two in the morning?”

  What?

  “No… I didn’t. Did I?” I cross my arms.

  “Oh, you betcha.” He nods. “I was asleep, so you only got my voicemail. But apparently you think I’m a really great guy. And anyone who thinks differently is a… well, I won’t say it out loud, but you used some very colorful language to describe those who think any less of me.”

  I groan and slump down onto a chair.

  “Oh yeah, I’ve also got a smokin’ bod,” he adds, his lips curling into a crooked smile.

  “I didn’t say that.” I lower my head to hide my radioactive cheeks.

  “Baby, I saved that message so fast I nearly tripped over myself doing it. You’re welcome to listen to it any time.”

  I groan louder this time. “I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t be. You didn’t say anything that isn’t a hundred percent true.” He grins.

  Cameron and Xavier come running in, shouting in unison. “Can we go now?”

  Their voices drive through my brain like a stake and I grab my pounding head.

  “Just a minute, boys, I’ll be right out. You two go wait in the car.” Justin shoos them out with his hands.

  I open my mouth to protest, since I’m not nearly ready to go yet, but he holds up a finger to quiet me. “You stay here. Have a shower, get some rest, drink some coffee. I’ll take the boys out and I’ll drop Cameron home later on today.”

  “Oh, no, Justin. You don’t need to do that. I really just need to change my clothes quickly and I’ll⁠—”

  “Ruby, you’re in no shape for a day at the zoo. We’ll be fine by ourselves, I promise. You just enjoy an afternoon to yourself.” Justin squeezes my shoulders.

  I feel awful about pulling out of our plans today, and I know I should put up more of a fight, but he’s right. I need to ride out this hangover at home.

  “Okay. I’ll stay here,” I concede.

  “Good.” Justin grabs Cameron’s full water bottle from the countertop and turns to look at me before he reaches the door.

  “What?” I ask.

  His face is set in a stony stare. “I just want to be clear. You do understand I’m not kidnapping your son, right?”

  I blink back, confused, before I see his mouth twitch upwards and I realize he’s mocking me about what happened last Halloween.

  “I know, I know,” I say, thinking of Mory also laughing at me this morning. “I’m just one big walking joke.”

  Justin’s face softens and he comes to the back of my chair and leans down to kiss my cheek. “No, you’re not. You’re perfectly imperfect. And to me, that’s as perfect as it gets.”

  38

  RUBY

  I peel off my dress and try not to retch at the smell of liquor that still clings like a haunting perfume to the creased fabric. The acrid stench of dried-on whiskey immediately summons up visions of last night. Did I really attempt to start a conga line at one point?

  Lord, what must the neighbors think of me? For all they know, getting completely hammered beyond all control like that is a common occurrence for Ruby Blake. In truth, I haven’t drunk that much in well over a decade. Since before Cameron was even born.

  Poor Mory must have been mortified, having her mother show her up like that in front of Hutch. Luckily, he doesn’t seem to be holding it against her, since she left to go meet up with him not long after Justin took the boys.

  I throw the tainted dress to the floor and when I step into the shower, every water drop that hits my skin feels like needles on a bruise. I tolerate the aggravating sensation for as long as I can, but rather than feeling like a woman refreshed as I step out, I feel more like a drowned rat. Bloodshot, red-rimmed eyes stare back at me as I brush my teeth in front of the small mirror above the sink. In an echo that rebounds all the way back from my college days, I vow to never drink that much again. Some people can handle their liquor. Me, not so much.

  I need to do better. I’m a suburban mother of two now. I should really try acting more like Felicity and her cronies. Maybe I should bleach my hair blonde, start going for morning walks in yoga clothes, and take pictures of myself holding a coffee-to-go cup.

  Downstairs, I forego eating any breakfast out of concern it could end up making an encore, and as I clear away the kids’ cereal bowls from the table, I decide that rather than letting this hangover get the better of me, I’m going to fight back and use this time to clean up the pigsty that is our house.

  Twenty minutes later, more flashbacks of Felicity’s party are slowly coming to me. The lights flicking on to a rapturous cheer aimed at a woman who was, without a doubt, caught completely off guard. Felicity had been crying. I remember quietly asking her in my inebriated state what the matter was, and her confessing to me that her life isn’t exactly as peachy as it always seems. She let her guard down with me, and I saw a vulnerability that I think I really needed to see. We never know what’s going on in others’ lives and it’s easy to forget that everyone is fighting their own silent battles, no matter how perfect it all looks from the outside. But I remember the smile fixed on Felicity’s face the rest of the evening. That smile never quite made it to her eyes.

  And Benton. Oh God. I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to look him in the eye again. He’d sat there patiently all night as I’d downed half a dozen Manhattans in front of him while shooting a bunch of accusations his way. Then he’d dragged my sorry behind back home and probably had to make sure I was lying on my side so I wouldn’t choke on my own vomit in my near-comatose state.

  I guess he’s a pretty decent guy after all. Even if he is a little shady as a realtor.

  I’m just glad Justin wasn’t there to see me like that. But I still can’t help but cringe internally when I think about the voicemail I apparently left him. I still don’t remember that.

  I pick up clothes and toys from the floor and dust off surfaces with a cloth. How do other people keep their houses so tidy? I can do all this now, but once the kids get home it’ll just go back to the way it was in a matter of minutes. It’s a never-ending battle.

  I keep finding my thoughts worming back to Felicity. I need to apologize to her. I’ll bet she wishes Quinten never invited me to her party. And since Quinten left this morning on a work trip and Hutch is out with Mory, she’s been left alone to clean up the mess from last night. That’s not right.

  What I should be doing is cleaning her house instead of my own. Yes. That’s the right thing to do. And a good way to apologize for last night. I put down the armful of shoes I’ve been collecting from the floor and make my way to my bedroom to grab a sweater, nearly tripping on a row of Hot Wheels cars on the stairs as I go.

  In my bedroom I rifle through my closet wondering which color sweater best says, ‘I’m sorry I nearly ruined your fortieth birthday party’ and after much deliberation end up settling on light blue. Blue has a great calming effect on people, right? I think I heard that somewhere.

  Who am I kidding. Felicity probably won’t allow me back into her house, even if I promise to clean it top to bottom. And I really wouldn’t blame her, either.

  I pull the sweater on and walk back out to the hallway, pulling the bedroom door closed behind me. I’m just about to start down the stairs when I feel it. My consciousness on a lag, now summoning me. Something inside my bedroom was wrong. There was something inside there that was out of place. But what?

  I turn back to the closed bedroom door and stare at the chipped white paint for several seconds. It couldn’t be. No. I must be wrong about what I saw. A hallucination from the leftover alcohol in my bloodstream. But I’m suddenly feeling more sober than ever. And I’m pretty sure I know exactly what I just saw inside that room.

  I reach my arm out slowly and place my hand on the cold brass of the doorknob. It takes me two steady breaths, in and out, before I build up the courage to twist it. The metal creaks in my hand as I push the door open and step inside my bedroom, my heart pounding.

  My eyes move straight to the neatly made bed, which I put fresh linen on yesterday morning but never ended up sleeping on. The ruffled dusty-rose pink pillows are right where I left them, the brushed-cotton throw at the foot of the bed still untouched. But there’s something laying on the bed that I know I didn’t leave there. Something that my tired eyes must have barely skimmed over when I first came in here, but now sticks out like a rattlesnake in a picnic basket.

  I walk slowly towards my bed and look down at the photo. A photo I’ve never seen before. A photo from an instant camera.

  Eyes stare up at me from my sheets. But these aren’t the eyes of Jessie or Sandra or Erica. These eyes belong to someone else. And somebody has left this photo on my bed for me to find.

  I spin around to face the empty room but, of course, there’s nobody there.

  Did someone put this here when I was out at the party last night? Did they break into our home? Who would do that?

  I look down at the photo again and a creeping dread washes over me as I look into the eyes of this woman—fearful eyes, entirely at odds with the smile residing below them—and realize with a stab in my gut that unlike the other three photos I’ve found, I already know these eyes. I’ve seen them before, staring out at me from news articles. I’ve seen them glimmering from a photo hanging proudly on Justin’s kitchen wall.

  And when I finally manage to rip my gaze from hers and look down to the white strip at the bottom of the photo, the bold letters in black ink send an icy drip down my spine. Four letters that change everything.

  Elle.

  39

  ELLE

  Elle wipes the tears from her cheeks as the rain pounds on the windshield in front of her, thankful that Xavier isn’t in the back seat to hear her cry again.

  He may only be a couple of months old, but every time he sees her upset—and that’s a lot nowadays—he begins to cry, too. He wails uncontrollably while she tries to soothe him by forcing herself to smile brightly. See, Mommy’s happy! It’s okay! Don’t cry, sweetie. It’s okay!

  But he knows. Somehow, he just knows. And if Mommy isn’t happy, then neither is he. Which means he’s never happy when he’s with her.

  But, of course, he’s always happy for Justin. Daddy is relaxed. Daddy is fun and his smiles are real. That’s because Daddy isn’t home all day. Daddy isn’t wearing clothes with two-day old milk stains because he hasn’t had a second to himself to shower and change because he’s always holding a wailing baby who hates to nap.

  Elle loves Xavier. She does. She loves him so much that it feels as though her heart is in a vice, about to burst every time she wakes up and sees that sweet little face of his. He is everything she ever wanted. This life is everything she ever wanted. The house, the husband, the baby. Everyone is jealous. They coo at little Xavier, they say he’s the most beautiful baby they’ve ever seen. When people come over, they gasp at the size of Elle and Justin’s extravagant home. They wink at her and tell her she’s lucky to have found a man who is both hot and handy around the house.

  Elle is the luckiest woman alive.

  So why does she feel so empty and hopeless inside?

  The doctor said it’s postpartum depression. It’s totally normal. It’s to be expected with all the hormonal changes in her body from pregnancy and breastfeeding. But it doesn’t feel normal. It feels like there is a bottomless black pit where her hopes and dreams and aspirations used to be.

  Two weeks ago, she considered ending it all. She thought that everyone would be better off without her. How could she be a good wife to Justin or a loving mother to Xavier when she couldn’t even face getting out of bed in the morning?

  When she broke down and shared these thoughts with Justin, he urged her to see a therapist, but she refused. She can’t really say why, but the thought of trying to explain the unexplainable sounded worse than just dealing quietly with it herself.

  The rain is so thick now that she can barely see two feet in front of the car as the windscreen wipers work overtime to clear the wet glass. Trees whip by, casting ominous shadows on the road ahead.

  Xavier is with Elle’s mother at her house this evening. And as much as it’s nice to be baby-free even for a short time, Elle is really not looking forward to meeting Justin for dinner. But she knows that unless they try to talk it out, their marriage won’t last another week. She’s pretty sure that Justin asked to meet up at a restaurant so she wouldn’t end up shouting at him through tears again. So she would have to control herself in front of others.

  The tears have stopped flowing now, likely run dry, but her breath hitches in her chest as she recalls the scene from this morning. The raised voices. The words that neither of them can take back. Elle slamming the door behind her as she stalked off to strap a screaming Xavier into his car seat, headed for her mother’s house, Justin begging her not to go. She’s not proud of how she acted. And she knows she is just as much to blame as Justin. That’s why she agreed to meet him for dinner this evening. To try to fix things and work together. For their marriage. For Xavier.

  Over the sound of the pounding raindrops, she hears a loud thud from somewhere and the steering wheel begins to judder in her hand.

  “What the…” she mutters as she slows down and uses the indicator—for who’s benefit, she doesn’t know, since there’s nobody else around—before pulling over to the side of the road.

  She turns off the engine and opens the door. Water immediately pummels at her face as she steps out to check the source of the problem. She pulls the hood of her jacket up around her face and clutches it tightly as she makes her way slowly around the car until she soon spots the cause of the problem. One of the front tires has blown. Damn.

  Elle is no damsel in distress—she does technically know how to replace the wheel of her car—but she doesn’t have much practice and to top that off, it’s pouring down with rain.

  She quickly decides the best thing to do is call Justin and have him come out to help, since he could have it done about ten times quicker than she could. That way they should still have time to make their dinner reservation.

  Elle reaches into her bag on the passenger seat and pulls out her phone, but with rain-soaked hands it slips from her grasp and falls down between the seats. She slips her hand down between the crack and wriggles her fingers around trying to locate it, but she can’t reach down far enough. Unlike her husband’s huge truck with a damn chasm between the seats, her small car has only a hair’s width to retrieve lost items. Her phone has now entered the black hole, nestled amongst the likes of granola bar wrappers, loose change and about a half dozen or so pacifiers that have fallen down there previously.