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“Well, it varies from week to week.”
“Okay. Let’s be more specific then. How many times did you go out to dinner in the last seven days?”
Shit. I took a few seconds to consider the question. “I think once.”
“You think?”
I nodded. “Yeah, it was once.”
“And can you tell me if Mrs. Lennon has any scars?”
“Scars?”
“Yes, you do know what a scar is, don’t you?”
Oh Jesus. This isn’t good.
Over the next three hours, I was grilled like a criminal. There were a few more questions I wasn’t sure of, and I tried to answer those as vaguely as possible. After the investigator finished with me, he asked me to wait out in the lobby, and Maya and Adam took their turn. I had the urge to pace as the minutes ticked by at a snail’s pace, but I thought it best to stay in my chair and try to not look so terrified, just in case the receptionist reported back to the investigator about my behavior. It was three-and-a-half hours more before Maya and my attorney came walking out from the back.
Officer Weber nodded to Adam. His face was an unreadable mask, just as it had been through most of the interview. “I’ll be in touch,” he said.
Adam nodded back. “Thank you. Have a good afternoon.”
None of us said a word the entire elevator ride down to the street level. I think I might’ve held my breath until we were outside the building.
“So…” Adam turned to face us. “How do you think it went? Neither one of you seemed to stumble much on anything.”
“I felt like it went okay,” Maya said.
I nodded. “I’m afraid to say I thought it went okay, too.”
Adam smiled and rested a hand on my shoulder. “I get it. But at least it’s over now. It will be a few weeks before anything else happens.”
After my attorney left, Maya and I compared notes. We walked toward the train station rattling off questions and answers.
“What did you say for how many times a week we go out to dinner?” I asked.
“I said what I’ve witnessed so far—maybe once, at the most.”
I blew out a deep breath and nodded. “Good…good. I said the same thing. How about scars? Do you have any?”
“Just the C-section scar.”
I stopped in my tracks. “Saylor was born via C-section?”
“Yes.”
“How come?”
“She was breach.”
I shook my head, suddenly feeling rattled—though it was less about how the interview went and more that I didn’t even know how my daughter had been born.
I ran my hand through my hair. “I had no idea you had a C-section. I said you didn’t have any scars.”
“That’s the only one.”
“Do you think we have to get every question right? Is it like high school where a sixty-five is passing, or do we have to score a hundred percent? I mean, I might not have even thought of a C-section scar as a scar. When he asked me, I was trying to remember if you’d told me about any injuries or accidents. So I’m not certain I would have said C-section even if I’d known you had one. People overlook things or forget.”
Maya shrugged and shook her head. “I have no idea what it will take for us to pass.” She held up a finger. “Oh, another one I wasn’t sure about was what color underwear you had on last night.”
“What did you say?”
“I guessed gray.”
“Good guess, because that’s how I answered. Though I wasn’t sure.”
We continued comparing answers the entire walk to the train, while we waited on the platform, and through almost the entire ride back. In the end, there seemed to be only one other question aside from the scar one that we’d gotten wrong. The investigator had asked what day garbage went out at our apartment, and Maya had said Tuesday, while I’d responded Friday. But she said she’d tried to laugh off the question by admitting she was guessing and saying garbage and repairs were my chores, and laundry and dishwasher duty were hers.
I felt like it wouldn’t be uncommon for the person who doesn’t take out the garbage to be uncertain of the day it went to the curb. Other than those two questions, it seemed like we’d done pretty well. I just hoped it was enough. Regardless, what was done was done, and by the time we got off the train at our stop, my shoulders were definitely a lot more relaxed than they had been the last few weeks.
I even felt like I could breathe a little easier as we approached the staircase that led up to street level. Just before we hit the landing, my phone buzzed in my pocket. I took it out to see who it was and tripped over something on the floor. I flailed around for a solid thirty seconds trying to regain my balance before ultimately landing flat on my ass. Before I got up, I looked around to see what I’d tripped on, and found a random work boot in the middle of the floor. I shook my head and started to laugh as I got up. “Who the hell loses one boot in the subway?”
