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At the time, she’d thought it was cute, so Jack. Now, she flared her nostrils. It wasn’t even something she could give to Lisa because of the disgusting imagery. She tore off the offensive poem and threw it in the trash can. It would be the first of many items she’d cull and burn. She added the charming depiction of a new mother in a lacy bedjacket, holding a newborn daughter, to a pile she’d give to Lisa another time.
Card after card, for anniversaries and birthdays, Mother’s Day and just because, Pam wondered why she hadn’t seen the deception in each one. Without meaning to, she was able to attach each special day to a ruse from Jack. Even reminders of the births of their children left her empty and sad because of the other children he’d had. So far, she knew of Ryan and Alison, and a young boy that had been born right before Jack died, but how many others were out there?
“Why am I doing this to myself?” she said out loud to the air.
Cramming everything back into the box and replacing the lid, she decided that was enough memory lane for one day.
“I’m home! Where the hell are you?” It was Hocus, back from the Bronx.
“I’m in the basement,” Pam called out.
“Get out of there. Nothing good ever comes from a journey to thelower level.”
“I’ll be right up,” Pam replied, mumbling, “I just need to shove all this stuff back into the closet, where we won’t see it again for another ten years.”
Then when she bent over to pick up a piece of envelope on the carpet and lifted the bed skirt, the edge of a cardboard box under the bed caught her eye.
“What the heck?”
Pulling out a Kilwin’s Candy box, she was surprised at its weight, figuring it wasn’t candy since it had been under the bed. Mice would have infiltrated it if it had contained anything edible. Setting it on the bed, she hesitated.
“Just open it!” she told herself.
She lifted the lid, and at first glance, the contents appeared to be more photos and letters. She rifled through them. There were several provocative photos of a young woman. She looked around the room and realized that the pictures had been taken there. Looking closer, she realized the young woman was Ginger Harrow.
A flash of heat zipped through her body. Who had taken the photos? Ginger was fully dressed, posed on the bed, smiling. Jack wouldn’t have stored them under the bed in a candy box, so they had to be Brent’s.
Three pictures of Ginger Harrow. That meant Brent had had her down in the basement, not just in the cottage. Shaking her head, she tried to form a timeline, remembering the first evening he’d brought Ginger to the house and Jack had been smitten, recognizing that she was the senator’s daughter.
In among the photos were playbills to high school productions, programs for concerts Brent had gone to, and even a menu from Shore Pizza. She set those aside and picked up more photos. All of the formal dances he’d gone to with Julie Hsu were immortalized here in formal portraits. Smiling, Pam remembered Brent in a tuxedo. He had been so handsome, tall and lean, his body made for a tuxedo.
Closing her eyes for a moment, she tried to remember if Jack had ever been home when the kids were preparing for their prom dates. She set the box aside and ran up the stairs to the den. Photo albums on the shelves where Jack’s office space used to be would surely have evidence that Jack had been there on those special occasions. The early albums with baby pictures were to the left, the newer ones to the right. She reached for several in the middle of the stack and brought them to the winged chair that faced the windows overlooking the beach. The fog had lifted, but it was still overcast.
She smelled something cooking—Hocus making lunch. Tiptoeing to the den doors, she quietly closed them. A closed door meantleave Pam alone.
In the chair, she leafed through the albums, wonderful memories flooding her brain. Jack posed with the family, smiling, his arms around his wife and children, the loving husband and father. The false presentation made Pam happy. It was proof that he’d shown up enough to validate her desire for a happy family.
Closing the album had a finality to it, but she knew it was short-lived. She had to do this every so often—justify the time spent with a man who couldn’t have loved her after all. It had been a con.
“Knock, knock.”
“Come in, Hocus.”
The door opened, and Hocus entered with a tray. “I know,no entrar,but you have to eat.”
“It’s fine. I feel better now. I needed to justify my marriage to Jack.”
“Honey, he’s been dead for a while. You don’t have to justify anything.”
“Dan was here. He tells me that Lily never showed up for work today.”
“Oh, yeah. Adam blew up my phone while I was trying to visit my mother. The cops have been at the coffee shop all morning, so I might keep my distance.”
Pam looked at her sidelong. “Why should you stay away?”
“I’d be the first suspect if there’s foul play. Her father has already commented how distasteful it was to have a witch on the other side of the wall from where his daughter had to work,” Hocus said, referring to her side hustle reading palms at the coffee shop.
“What makes you think there’s foul play?”
