Perri O'Shaughnessy - Keeper of the Keys

“I hate you!”

“Yes. Hate. It all turns to hate. So you won’t do it?”

“I’ll never do it. Never!”

Ray’s mother, still young then, ran as fast as a spider. Ray admired how spiders run. So small and smart, they instinctively sense danger. A light comes on, freeze. A nearby movement, run for a dark crack in the cupboards. Why hadn’t they run to Canada, to Maine? He had figured that out. He and his mother had hidden far away in the anonymous, huge Los Angeles suburbs because Esmé’s beloved mother was in long-term nursing care in Montebello.

Some bastard had, meanwhile, stalked his mother. Esmé had always conveyed that impression, now that he thought about it. She kept few photos of his childhood, telling no happy stories, and remained mum on the subject of men, probably to spare Ray’s feelings.

A boyfriend, someone she had dated after Ray’s father left? After he died, when Ray was just two years old? It made Ray feel ashamed. He thought warmly of Esmé, who must have lived in great distress for many years. He would get her to share the story, and then they would put it away forever. Put the models away. Put the need to visit the houses away.

He sat down to his drawing board. He was not going to lose his work over Leigh, over the past. The museum design needed tweaking. Then he would design Antoniou a mansion that would go straight into Architectural Digest or heck, even Granta . He would show all the bastards the true meaning of original.

Downstairs at home that night, while studying blueprints, the cassette burning a hole in his workbench, Ray heard thumping on the door. Ray peered at the large LCD screen in the corner of the basement that showed his front door. Two uniformed police officers stood out there, starched, laden with radios and holsters and clipboards and God knew what else. Behind them he saw a police car, red light spinning.

Walking toward the front door, Ray felt hot fear that flared through him like a sparkler, making his legs move slowly, painfully. Maybe everyone dreamed this moment, a moment when the jig was up. Didn’t everyone suffer from some guilty secrets and fear being found out? Had they talked with the kids, somehow identifying him as an intruder? Or was this about Leigh?

Ray shook his head, wishing the mixed-up disarray in his mind would clear up enough so that he could see his way down the hallway, through the door, and beyond, into the future. “What is it?” he asked the two men.

“Raymond Jackson?”

“Yes.”

“You work at Wilshire Associates?”

“I’m a partner, yes.” He asked for their identification, which they provided: Walter Rappaport, police lieutenant, robbery/homicide, a big man with bags flowery as broccoli under his eyes and a leery attitude; and Rick Buzas, police officer II, field training office, unlined and complacent.

“Nice house,” said Officer Buzas, younger, smaller, standing slightly behind the lieutenant. His fresh skin shone in the porch light. “Big. Bet you have a great view.” On this soft moonless night he was looking around at the landscaping, sniffing at the jasmine along the steps.

“What can I do for you?”

The big guy in front butted in. “Can we come in? We have a few questions.”

Ray closed the front door behind him and stepped outside to face them. “No. Sorry.” Ray didn’t want them in his house. He didn’t want them on his porch, either. He recalled a salient fact. The police had no obligation to tell the truth while discovering the truth. What a skewed world. He should be very careful. He didn’t want to get them interested in his business any more than they already were. “Now, could you please tell me why you are here?”

“You know a man named James Hubbel? A deputy sheriff for the County of Los Angeles.”

“Mr. Hubbel is my father-in-law.”

“He’s concerned about his daughter. He got in touch with my sergeant. Thought I’d come out and make sure she’s okay. Is she here?”

“No.”

“No? Where is your wife, Mr. Jackson?”

“I can’t tell you that.”

“You can’t? Why can’t you?”

“I don’t know where she is. She left me. Never said where she was going. Has Mr. Hubbel filed some kind of complaint against me? Is there a missing persons case?”

Rappaport’s big ears seemed to move back like a dog’s.

“How long ago?” he asked.

“Five days now.”

“So you’re all choked up about this, huh?” asked Officer Buzas.

Ray stared at him. Rappaport coughed, eyeing Ray almost apologetically, as if he too was disturbed by Buzas’s bluntness.

If they had a warrant, they would have pushed him aside and would be searching his home right now. Ergo, this was an exploratory visit, the first aside from that unofficial one from Leigh’s father, and not entirely unexpected.

He said, “I understand Mr. Hubbel’s concern, and I wish my wife would call her folks and say she’s okay. But isn’t it fairly common, spouses separating? One leaving the home? Not telling her husband where she’s gone to get her life together or whatever? I mean, she’s a grown woman. She can go where she wants, can’t she?” He couldn’t keep anxiety from creeping into his voice.

“Where would she go?” asked Rappaport.

The ultimate question they had come to ask. Ray scratched beside his mouth with a sharp fingernail. “No idea.”

“When did you last see her?” asked Buzas.

“Late Friday night, as I said. We had some painful things to discuss. She”-he thought back to that night, struggling against emotion-“walked out. She didn’t tell me where she would go.”

“What time was this?” Only now did Ray realize that Officer Buzas was taking notes.

“About nine. I don’t know. Maybe ten.”

“What did she take with her?”

He thought. “A flowered carpetbag she uses for overnight trips. She must have packed that. Some jewelry, I noticed later. Underwear, I assume. Some of her toiletries are missing from the bathroom.”

“I would have tried to stop her,” Officer Buzas said, looking at his partner.

Ray said nothing.

“What was the subject of this fight?” Rappaport asked.

“I didn’t say we fought.”

“Okay. What painful things did you discuss?”

“Obviously, it was about problems in our marriage.”

“You seeing someone else, Mr. Jackson?”

“No, no.”

“What about her?”

“We were just-I’ve been working hard, and she was upset.”

“What have you done to try to make contact with her?”

“Nothing. I think she just wants to have a few days to herself, to cool off.”

“She hasn’t contacted her workplace for three days running,” Rappaport said. “Mr. Jackson, do you want us to find your wife? Because you’re acting mighty strange, if you do.”

“Look, check me out. I’ve never been arrested, never done anything. I’m not a drug addict or alcoholic. I’m just a man whose wife left him.”

“After a violent fight.”

“I never said we were violent.”

“How long did this fight go on? You have these fights often?”

“It wasn’t a fight! It was just-” He stopped, his mouth open, then said, “Look, is this a missing persons case?”

“Like I said, we’re doing a welfare check.”

“An informal welfare check because her father’s a cop. I understand.” Informal because this isn’t your case yet, Ray thought.

“You could make it a missing persons case. The father, he knows she’s an adult; it’s been a few days, he’s worried, but we can’t open a case based on that. But if you come down to the Topanga station and say your wife has disappeared, we’ll find her for you.”