Kevin O'Brien - Disturbed

Molly felt a bit light-headed again as the priest gave the final blessing. She was supposed to lead the congregation out of the church, and when she did, Molly signaled to Rachel to help her. Her neighbor quickly came to her rescue, put an arm around her, and helped her down the aisle and out the church.

Outside, a few people shook her hand and gave their condolences. Molly kept thinking she just needed to lie down. But she hung in there, nodding and thanking people while Rachel kept a hand on her back. She looked around for Chris and Erin, but didn’t see them on the sidewalk in front of the church.

Jill and Natalie approached her together, and each one shook her hand. It threw Molly for a loop. She hadn’t noticed them among the congregation and couldn’t believe Natalie, of all people, had come to Jeff’s service. The reclusive neighbor gave Molly a tiny, joyless smile. “I’m sorry for your loss,” she murmured.

“Thank you, Natalie,” she managed to say. “And thank you for coming.”

“Jenna? Jenna, is that you?”

Molly glanced over her shoulder toward the street. A thin, fortyish woman with her frizzy brown-gray hair half hidden by a bike helmet pedaled by on a bicycle. She wore a blue Windbreaker, and her bike toted a little go-cart carriage for a toddler, who was also in a bike helmet and bundled up in a jacket.

The bicyclist was looking right toward her — and her neighbors. “Jenna Corson, is that you?” she called.

Molly twisted around to look at Natalie, who suddenly glanced over her own shoulder. Molly didn’t see anyone else who seemed to notice the bicyclist — or react to the name Jenna Corson.

Why would Ray Corson’s widow want to come to Jeff’s funeral?

Molly turned toward the woman on the bike again. With a puzzled, slightly embarrassed look, the bicyclist pedaled on — the child in the attached cart trailing behind her.

“Well, that’s a little tacky,” Molly heard Rachel whisper, “yelling at someone coming out of a funeral mass. Do you know this Jenna Carlson?”

“ Corson, ” Molly murmured numbly. “Her husband was Chris’s guidance counselor at the high school.” She glanced around for Chris. If he was nearby, he might have recognized Mrs. Corson; but then Molly remembered — he’d never met her.

If anyone had a better reason not to mourn Jeff’s passing it would have been Jenna Corson. “You have a lot of nerve showing up here,” Ray Corson’s sister had growled at her and Chris at the Corson wake when they’d asked to talk to Jenna. “Haven’t you done enough damage? She’s been through hell, thanks to you people.”

Why in the world would Jenna Corson attend Jeff’s funeral?

Had she come to gloat?

The woman on the bicycle seemed to have been addressing one of her neighbors. Molly turned to face Natalie, but she wasn’t there anymore. She’d disappeared among the mourners. “Natalie?” she called. “Natalie?”

No heads turned in the crowd. She wondered if Natalie looked like Jenna Corson.

Then it hit her. What if Natalie was Jenna Corson?

“Jenna!” she impulsively cried out. “Jenna Corson?”

“Molly, what are you doing?” she heard Rachel ask.

“She’s been through hell, thanks to you people.”

Was it Ray Corson’s widow who had asked Kay the week before her death if she thought she was a good mother?

“You’re going to pay for what you did,” someone had told Angela.

That same someone had Angela, her boyfriend, and his daughter murdered. And that same night she’d arranged for Jeff to meet her in Vancouver. She’d known all along Jeff would have to account for his whereabouts that evening. Molly could still hear that raspy voice: “Do you know where Jeff was that night, Mrs. Dennehy?”

She could still see Angela in that booth in the restaurant, a glass of wine in her hand. She’d wondered out loud: “Maybe Jeff has found someone new, and she wants to sit back and watch us scratch each other’s eyes out.”

In order to sit back and watch, she’d have had to be close by all the time. She’d have to be a neighbor.

“Jenna Corson, is that you?” the woman had called, staring directly at Molly and the women from her block. Everyone was there, except Lynette Hahn, who was at the hospital with Courtney.

Molly thought about Courtney’s “accident” and Jeremy’s arrest, their kids getting cut up in the vacant lot, Rachel’s toolshed catching fire, Chris’s locker being broken into, and the smashed pumpkins. Someone had hired a sleazy detective to look into her family history — months before Angela admitted to doing the same thing. He or she planted an anonymous note to Chris inside his locker and sent a letter to Rachel.

“. . she wants to sit back and watch. .”

She remembered Lynette confronting her a few nights ago: “For two years, I lived here — and we were all very happy, and then you moved in. . and everything changed.” But Lynette wasn’t quite right. Molly had lived on the block for ten months, and no had been hurt or killed. But then less than two weeks after Ray Corson’s murder, Kay had had her fatal accident.

“Jenna?” Molly cried out, weaving through the crowd. “Jenna? I know you’re here!” It all started to make sense, and the horrible realization made Molly’s stomach turn. Ray Corson’s widow was there, watching.

“Molly, for God’s sake,” Rachel whispered, trailing after her.

She caught a glimpse of Chris, by the church steps with Elvis. He was scowling at her as if she was crazy. His face seemed to go out of focus. The sidewalk felt wobbly. Molly’s head was spinning. She reached toward Rachel just as her legs started to give out.

Then everything went black.

She could hear people downstairs, chatting quietly. Molly opened her eyes and saw Rachel sitting at her bedside. For a moment, she felt totally disoriented and thought it was morning. But then she saw the digital clock on her nightstand: 12:55 P.M.

Molly realized she was still in her dress from the funeral. She vaguely remembered riding home in the limo, and Chris and Elvis helping her upstairs to the bedroom. Trish was supposed to be hosting a brunch.

Molly tried to sit up. “Who’s downstairs?” she asked groggily. “Are Jill and Natalie down there?”

Rachel shook her head. “No, the brunch was kind of a bust. People could see you weren’t exactly up for entertaining. And the few that came over got one look at the boozefree, meatless vegan spread Miss Crunchy Granola had laid out, and they headed for the hills.” She reached for the bottle of ginger capsules on Molly’s nightstand. “It didn’t even last an hour. The only ones left down there are Trish and a friend of hers, Chris and his pal, and Erin — and a ton of rabbit food no one touched.” She took out a pill and offered her a tumbler of water. “Here. .”

Molly shook her head. “No, I think those are making me even sicker.”

With a shrug, Rachel put down the tumbler and set the pill beside it. “In case you change your mind.” She moved over and sat at the end of the bed. “So — you kind of scared me out there in front of the church. What’s the story with this Jenna person? You said she was the wife of Chris’s coach?”

“She’s the widow of Chris’s guidance counselor,” Molly said, reaching for the tumbler on her nightstand. She gulped down some water. “Her name is Jenna Corson, and I–I think she’s behind all the strange things that have been happening on this block — including Jeff’s death. . ”

Molly somehow felt stronger as she explained to Rachel about who Jenna Corson was and why she would want to hurt the people on the cul-de-sac.