“Are you saying you think Amanda had sex with somebody else that night?” Zach sounded angry, very angry. “That she cheated on me?”
“No, no, no.” I was taken aback by the force of his reaction. “Idon’t have any reason to think that Amanda did anything with anyone that night. I’m asking what you know, that’s all.”
There was another long, uncomfortable silence.
“I’d be surprised if Amanda had sex with somebody other than me. But then you keep telling me stuff about my wife I didn’t know.” He sounded more hurt now than angry, maybe a little embarrassed, too. “Look, we didn’t really talk, Amanda and I. We weren’t close inthatway.” He hesitated. “You know, it wasn’t like with you and me.”
“Me?” I immediately regretted inquiring. The last thing I wanted was for Zach to elaborate. But the comment had just caught me so off-guard.
“Yeah, you and I had actual things in common. Our backgrounds, our work ethic. We wanted the same things out of life, not to mention that we’re both lawyers and intellectual equals,” he said quietly. I felt my cheeks flush again. But was Ireallythat surprised? Deep down, hadn’t I known back then that Zach had feelings for me? “It would have been different with you. That’s all I mean. With Amanda I wasn’t even looking for some kind of partnership. And neither was she. We had a pleasant arrangement that worked for both of us. That’s it.”
Awkward silence. What could I possibly say next? All I could think was no, we did not want the same things. Because we didn’t. Did we? Returning to the facts seemed best.
“Okay, so Sarah and Maude. Anyone else I should talk to?” I asked. “The DA doesn’t go around interviewing every possible person. They get the information they need for their case and that’s it.”
“Those are the only people she mentioned,” Zach went on. “Listen, I know what this looks like. A distant marriage, a sex party, a dead wife. You don’t have to be a genius to put the pieces together. Except I didn’t do it, Lizzie. I did not kill Amanda. I swear. You know that, right?”
“I do,” I said.
But how could I possibly? Millie was right: given the right circumstances, anyone was capable of anything.
At the office, I spent three hours drafting a damn good habeas corpus writ for Zach’s bail appeal. I left it with the managing clerk’s office for filing first thing in the morning, along with instructions to request an expedited hearing and for them to send someone to Philadelphia to clear Zach’s old warrant.
I brought Amanda’s journals home with me, and started reading the third one as my black car home sped south down the FDR toward the Brooklyn Bridge.
January 5, 2006
Christopher and I went to seeMarley & Meat the theater on Route 1. But I had a hard time even concentrating on the movie. I’ve thought about seeing a doctor. The pain won’t go away. And it was a lot worse this time. Because I wouldn’t hold still, he said. But doctors have to report things to the police …. I went down to the St. Colomb Falls Methodist Church instead. To see Pastor David. I’m pretty sure a minister needs to keep anything you tell them a secret. But when I saw his stooped shoulders and his kind eyes and wrinkled face, I knew there was no way I was saying a word to him either.
I tried asking Carolyn about the pain—without telling her why I was asking. But she was way too interested. And once Carolyn gets herself in the middle of something, there’s no getting her out. I love Carolyn for that. But I’m afraid she’ll make a bigger mess of things.
It was past 11:00 p.m. when I finally got home, haunted by Amanda’s cornered teenage voice in my head. I was glad the apartment was dark and quiet. After reading about what I could only guess was maybe Amanda’s rape by a boy named Christopher, the last thing I felt like doing was talking to Sam about rehab or anything else. I would. I would. Just not right now.
I could hear Sam lightly snoring back in the bedroom as I tiptoed out to our small living room to keep reading. How much more was there about this Christopher? When had Amanda stopped seeing him? It was a long shot that he had anything to do with Amanda’s death all these years later, of course. A very long shot. But also not impossible.
Everything in the living room was exactly as it had been when I’d stopped by earlier that afternoon. Sam’s computer was there, open as I’d left it, his notebooks stacked up.Enid’s. I felt a wave of fresh irritation as the bar flashed back to me.
I lifted Sam’s worn messenger bag to take a seat at his computer, hoping to see on the screen some evidence of work that afternoon. As I put the bag down on the floor, something sparkling in the gaping outside pocket caught my eye. A gift? I felt a little girlish flutter—had that been what Sam was out doing? Shopping for me?
I reached in the pocket to fish it out.
For a very long time, I just stared down at it in the palm of my hand. There was only the one. Not a gift for me, that’s for sure.
I blinked hard when my eyes began to burn. But when I opened them, it was still there. Long and thin and shimmering silver. A woman’s earring. Coiled like a snake in the palm of my hand.
Amanda
FOUR DAYS BEFORE THE PARTY
It was barely dawn, the light dim and gray, when Amanda came downstairs and flipped on the light over the huge island in their enormous kitchen. And to think that when they’d first arrived in Park Slope, Zach had considered purchasing two such brownstones and connecting them. Even the real estate agent, who’d stood to profit significantly from such an endeavor, had discouraged him.
“This isn’t Manhattan,” she’d said simply, as though that settled the matter.
Zach had been genuinely disappointed that the neighborhood culture meant not being able to go quite as far over the top as he was inclined, but he was unwilling to consider living elsewhere. “It’s the ideal community,” he’d kept saying.
Like every place they’d ever lived, their now very modern brownstone felt to Amanda like it belonged to someone else. As grateful as she was to live someplace so nice—and shewasgrateful to Zach for that—their homes always left her feeling like an impostor.
Oh, this drifting of Amanda’s mind was not good. Things worked so much better for her when her mind was contained to the page. That’s what her journals were for.
