“She’ll be happy to see you,” Emily says, her voice echoing as it draws me back to the present. Her bright, warm smile is back, though it’s not comforting at all. I pull Chloe by the hand toward the fresh air, letting itfill my nostrils and lungs as we continue along the first floor to my mother’s unit.
Resistance halts my forward movement, and I stop, looking back at Chloe who’s rooted her combat boots to the ground. “You’re tense,” she says, and I let the tight breath in my chest loosen. “She’ll pick up on it.”
She takes a step closer, lifting her hand to my face and letting it rest against my cheek. I can’t resist the urge to lean my face into her palm, attempting to find an ounce of peace in this moment that feels thick with uncertainty. I nod against her hand, holding her stare and wondering how I ever saw anything evil in these bright, golden irises staring back at me. The fading purple bruise sits high on her cheekbone, the edges turning yellow and their edges fading even further into the cream of her ivory skin.
I’d called her an optical illusion, and I feel that more than ever right now; the mystery of what you’ll get whether you’re seeing her from far away or up close. Her soft, beautiful skin fading to that ugly bruise. The shiny, worn boots kissing the edge of her flowy dress. Her silent demand to relax and her gentle caress of my skin. She’s a walking, chaotic contradiction, and somehow she’s constantly lulling me into calmness.
She’s saying it all with her eyes, her lips parting as if attempting to guide me through a breathing exercise. I let another breath leave my lungs in a whoosh, expelling a grain of tension from my shoulders with it.
Turning from her to the door, I rap my knuckles lightly against the wood before twisting the knob and pushing forward, the crisp air of my mother’s apartment instantly causing a rush of chills to break out across my skin.
“Hi, Mom.” I cross to my mother as she sits on the couch in the middle of the room. Her gaze shifts from the TV to me slowly, eyes slightly vacant, which tightens my chest again. She appears absent, but she smiles when she sees me, reaching her hands out as I approach. Her fingers are hot when I take them in mine, leaning down to kiss her cheek before pulling away. Herhair is tied back out of her face, and albeit seeming far away, she looks put together—a bit of makeup on her face and dressed like she plans to leave the house today—which is a good sign.
“This is Chloe.” I pull Chloe gently forward, and her gaze bounces between us, a look of something I can’t read flashing across her features before she plasters a smile—a fake smile, because I know what those look like on her—onto her lips. She turns her attention to my mother, reaching out to take one of my mom’s hands in both of hers.
“Chloe Stark,” my mother muses, looking up at her. Her smile grows, adoration lighting up her olive-green eyes.
Obviously, my mother is aware of the work I do. Very aware of my involvement in Caroline Stark’s arrest. Perhapsvaguelyaware of my fixation with Chloe in the months and years after the arrest, because I couldn’t exactly tell her I was stalking who I now believe is a mostly innocent woman.
But the look on my mother’s face is more intrigue and reverence rather than the surprise I’d expected to see from her finding out I’ve brought along the daughter of the murderer I put in prison.
“It’s lovely to meet you, Ms. Mills,” Chloe says, repeating the line I’d heard her practice at her house yesterday. She releases my mother’s hand and flattens them down her dress again, probably wiping the sweat off her hands that I’d felt when I’d taken them myself.
My mom waves a hand at her. “Please, call me Elizabeth.” Lifting her hands in my direction again, I take them and help pull her to standing, giving her a minute to find her balance before she’s headed for the kitchen.
“How are you feeling?” I ask her, glancing around her apartment. We’d unpacked all of her things together before I left, but her apartment feels even more lived in now. Framed pictures of me and my siblings rest across the mantle, and I resist the urge to roll my eyes at my brother and sister,smiling proudly from their frames like they have any care in the world for the frail woman moving away from me.
The curtains over the window are drawn closed, which doesn’t surprise me because some of the usual medications my mother takes causes bright light to hurt her eyes occasionally. Her favorite cat-shaped Tiffany lamp glows softly from the table near the couch, various shades of color shining through the paneled glass and reflecting on the wall behind it.
Regardless of the homey energy I feel, there’s an undercurrent of peculiarity waving through me. A feeling of uncertainty I can’t put my finger on, like something is…off.But what?
“Tired,” my mother calls behind her.
I’m on her heels, and Chloe’s on mine as we continue into the next room and stand over the countertop. “You’re hot.” Exceptionally hot, and her apartment is absolutely freezing. She always used to be so cold, always wanted the fire going or the heater on blast. Sometimes both.
“My meds burn me up,” she explains, moving around the kitchen carefully. Her arm has mostly healed since the fall she had awhile back. It was the catalyst that brought us here, but her treatments are supposed to help strengthen her bones and promote new bone growth.
Still, she moves gingerly, ensuring her steps are even and purposeful, hoping to prevent another fall. She’s otherwise healthy; or she’s supposed to be.
She was only sixty-seven when she got her diagnosis, and the doctor assured us both that her treatment would help. She takes an oral pill every day, and when it was just her and I still living in her home, I’d give her monthly shots as well. They never made her likethis. Shaky. Skinny as a rail. Demeanor slightly…dull.Bright and alert my ass.
“Since when?” They never made her warm before, and I recognized all the medications listed in her file a minute ago.
She moves from the cupboard to the sink, and as much as I want to jump in and take over what she’s doing, that always irritates her. She doesn’t want to feel like her independence is slipping away from her, and I’d never want to take it.
After filling three glasses of water and sliding two across the counter to me and Chloe, my mother leans against the counter, her bony fingers slack against the surface.
“Enough about me, Colin,” she chastises. “I haven’t seen you in weeks, and you show up with a girlfriend? That’s way more interesting than my internal temperature.” Her eyes sparkle as she eyes Chloe, and she waves us to follow back in the direction of the couch, which we do. I help her back to seated, then settle with Chloe onto the oversized loveseat next to it.
“The Baby Widow,” my mother sings, her eyes glued to Chloe, lips pulled into what appears to be a mischievous smile. I cringe inwardly when she says it, the title the local newspaper gave her when they first started plastering her face on the front page—after I’d been less than subtle about my suspicions of her.
But when I glance at Chloe, she doesn’t appear offended. She has a small smile on her face, and she crosses one leg over the other. “How’s your mother?” my mom asks, and the question catches me so off guard that I physically recoil, the words feeling like a slap across my cheek.
“Mom—” I start, but Chloe interrupts me with a soft hand on my knee.
“We’re allowed to talk about her, Colin,” Chloe says gently. That statement slaps me across the other cheek, crimson, hot embarrassment flushing through me.
My mother’s question is a valid one, I guess. Caroline has been in prison for two years, it’d be the kind thing to do to ask how someone’s doing. But she’s amurderer.Why would my mother care?
