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I don’t want her anywhere near me. And yet—
And yet.
I see the white glow of the subdivision’s sign, and step out of the woods in the shadow of two houses that I know don’t have security lights. The lots in this neighborhood are about two acres each, and there are plenty of trees and hedges to hide behind as I make my way Nessa’s quiet circle.
Her house is a two-story dollhouse, painted deep lavender with mint green accents. It’s a new home, but it’s meant to look Victorian. Her parents bought it for her after the break she took last year.
I’ve been here dozens of times, but lately I just haunt the yard. Nessa always leaves the curtain open, just for me.
Tonight, I take my time among the hedges and the azaleas that encircle her house, moving from window to window on the balls of my feet. My heart pounds. I start to sweat. Tonight will shape up different from those prior nights. I haven’t done the deed yet, but I can tell I will. It’s... both strange and not. It’s natural and deplorable.
It’s me, making good on a promise.
I find Nessa in a little library, framed by floor-length burlap curtains. She’s wearing blue sweatpants, a giant white Auburn University sweatshirt—probably one of her father’s—and fuzzy yellow socks. She’s sitting on a sea blue couch, blaring Broken Bells from the speakers of her iPhone and moving her shoulders to the beat.
I watch her as she checks her phone—looking for a message from Ryan, her on-again-off-again?—As she runs her fingers through her tight curls. As she paints her toe-nails some greenish color that’s not clear to me through glass, and from this distance. I fall into a calm as I watch her balance her checkbook, a habit I know her mom demands. I watch her drink peppermint water. Take her Kindle from a desk and read a book.
After seven weeks of this, I know her habits. Nessa has ADD, and now that she’s withdrawn from school again, she seems to drift through evenings, moving from one thing to the other, trying to entertain herself without really seeming settled.
After more than an hour peeking through her window, I walk around the house again and mess with a flimsy window in her first-floor half bath. I know from past visits that I could open it without much trouble, but I’m pretty sure that’s not the way I’ll go. Why would I, when I have a key?
I walk through the dewy grass behind the house, where she keeps her garbage cans as well as a small, baby blue bicycle. My pulse is racing as I re-approach the little study room she’s in.
Nessa is still there. Now she’s drinking coffee from an owl mug.
I think of Cleo. Sloth. I’m hoping that the guilt I feel over not sending her away tonight will distract me from the lead ball in my gut right now, but no such luck.
There’s no hiding from tonight—not even behind the shock of Sloth. Tonight has been a long time coming. I just couldn’t get the balls to do it for these last few weeks.
I tilt my head back, look up at the moon. The stars. I can see so many of them out here, miles away from city lights. Even Chattahoochee, an old mill town-turned-college-town of thirty thousand, doesn’t put off enough light to really blot the stars. Not like where I’m from.
Somewhere nearby, a dog barks.
I hold my breath and listen. It’s quiet after the dog settles, nothing but the sound of trees moving and the low hum of traffic, somewhere miles away. I picture Nessa standing out here with me, smiling that faint smile of hers. That smile that said I have a secret.
Like my secret.
I can’t think long of that, can’t think at all of that, so I start walking, around the edge of Nessa’s porch, toward the giant magnolia tree in the middle of her soft, green lawn.
The thing is massive, only a little shorter than the roofline of her house. I turn my body sideways and I work my way between its branches. Its limbs press against my back and shoulders, come around my hips, until I’m hidden by its waxy, oval leaves.
Once I’m settled in, I hold my body still, trying to be sure I know my own mind.
Can I do this?
I can do this.
I pull my phone out of my pants pocket. I can do this, but first...
I rub my thumb over the screen, calling up the picture I took of Cleo a few months ago on the concourse. I clench my aching jaw and peer down at her. After this is over, I can go back to her.
Wrong wrong wrong.
After this is over, I can fuck her.
It’s wrong—because of who I am, my situation; it’s even more wrong because of who she is, and what she is to me—but I know already I will keep her for at least a few more nights. Because I have to. Because I’ll need her after this.
Despite my own assurances, air whistles through my teeth. Blood booms like a drum between my ears.
