Lisa Scottoline - Everywhere That Mary Went

The next time I hear the telephone ring, the water is cool. Barely conscious, I hear the answering machine pick up the call. A woman’s voice says, too loudly, “This is Stephanie Fraser. We met in Judge Bitterman’s courtroom after your argument. I’ve been calling your office, but you haven’t returned my calls. We just can’t sweep this under the rug, Mary. We need to send a message. So please return my call. I know you must be busy, but this is important. Thank you.”

Click.

“Go away, Steph. I gave at the office.”

But now the water is cold, and I’m awake. How unpleasant. And I have to shave my legs, a task that used to make me feel grown-up but now is merely a pain in the ass. Cranky, I fish under the water for the Dove and soap up the stubble on my legs. I use a new plastic razor, for that extra-close shave. This way I can let it go for three more days. I’m negotiating my ankle bone with concentration when the telephone rings again.

The rings stop and the machine engages.

Silence. No message. No static. It’shim.

Click.

I feel a sharp pinch at my ankle. A crimson seam crosses the bone. The soap makes it burn.

“Shit!”

I hurl the razor against the tile wall, and it falls to the floor.

That’s when I see it: Mike’s picture, the little one of his face, in a porcelain heart frame. The only picture of him I haven’t packed away. I keep it on my makeup shelf in the bathroom. It’s a private place that only I can see, every morning.

But it’s not on the makeup shelf tonight. It’s on the floor. Shattered.

“No!” I climb out of the bathtub and pick up the frame. It lies in pieces in my hand as I stand dripping on the tile floor. The porcelain has cracked into separate shards, and the glass over Mike’s face is a network of tiny slivers.

How did this happen? I don’t want to think what I’m thinking.

I check the makeup shelf frantically. A tube of Lancôme foundation. A glass of eye pencils and mascara. A couple of lipsticks and a bottle of contact lens solution. None of the makeup has been disturbed. If it was Alice who knocked over the picture frame, she was pretty choosy.

I look down at my hand. I can’t see Mike at all. It’s as if a storm cloud has passed over his features.

If someone is trying to hurt me, they sure know how to do it.

Itake a cab to work at the ungodly hour that Jameson gets in. My nerves feel taut, my stomach queasy. I’m losing weight, but it’s not worth it.

I get off the elevator on Jameson’s floor, Lust. When I reach his office, his secretary, Stella, tells me he went to the bathroom. I suggest to Stella, mypaisana, that if Jameson didn’t come to work so early, he could take his morning poopie at home like everybody else. This makes Stella laugh, so she tells me a joke too raunchy to repeat. It’s for her jokes that Judy calls her The Amazing Stella.

I go into Jameson’s office and sit down. The office is vaguely nautical in theme, a place for Jameson to pretend he’s the captain of something. For Jameson is short, and has the complex in spades. Suddenly he runs in like a pug off the leash and slams the door behind him. “Well, Mary, I guess what I’ve been hearing is true.”

“What do you mean?”

Jameson remains standing, dipping his fingers into the pockets of a navy blue blazer. “What I am about to tell you is for your own good, Mary. I’m telling it to you because I know you are very interested in becoming a partner here at Stalling.”

“What is it?” He’s making me even more paranoid than I am already.

“I’ve been hearing that you’re Berkowitz’s girl now and that you do your best work only for him.”

“But I-”

Jameson holds up a tiny paw, like a doggie pope. “At first, I thought it wasn’t true. It didn’t sound like the Mary DiNunzio I know. But I got theNoone brief yesterday and I was extremely disappointed in it.”

“I-”

The paw again. “I know you can do better, Mary, because you have in the past, and for me. But if you think you can make partner in this firm just by keeping Sam Berkowitz happy, you are in error. I should not have to remind you that you have an obligation that runs directly to the client in this matter.My client, Noone Pharmaceuticals. Noone is almost as big as SmithKline and growing by leaps and bounds. Noone is not a client I would like to lose. You understand that, don’t you?”

I nod, dry-mouthed.

“Good. I thought as much.” He plucks the brief from his desk and hands it to me. “Rework this according to my comments, which you’ll find in red. Spend time in the library. Get authority for your position. If you can’t find the cases, I want your assurance that they don’t exist.” He makes a note in his day journal to bill the two minutes it took to dress me down. “I need it by the end of the day.”

“I can’t, Timothy. I have-”

“You’d do it by the end of the day for Sam Berkowitz, so you’ll do it by the end of the day for Timothy Jameson. End of discussion.”

“Okay…I’ll postpone some things.”

“Fine.”

I leave his office, red-faced, with a rose garden abloom on my chest. As I hurry by Stella’s desk, she hands me a Styrofoam cup of coffee on a tray. “Don’t take it too hard, Mare,” she whispers. “He’s got no one else to piss on, you know what I mean?”

I escape to my office and collapse into my chair. I feel like crying, and not just because of the brief. My life is going haywire. The center isn’t holding. My work is going downhill; I’m forgetting depositions, offending clients. The partners are bad-mouthing me. Somebody’s harassing me, maybe even breaking into my apartment. What goes around comes around.

And it’s coming after you, says the voice.

“Mary, you in there?” says someone at the door.

Before I can answer, the door opens a crack and a white paper bag pops through the opening, followed by Ned’s handsome face. His expression darkens as he comes in, closing the door behind him. “Mary?”

It’s no use, I can’t hide it. I feel wretched. It has to show.

“What’s the matter?”

Ned looks so concerned and his voice sounds so caring that I lose it. I start to cry and find myself in his arms, which only makes me cry harder. I cry about Mike, who’s not coming back, and Jameson’s brief, which I can’t possibly rewrite in one day, and Angie, who would rather talk to God all day than to her twin. I cry about my apartment, myhome, which I’ll never feel safe in again. I cry like a baby, freely and shamelessly, while Ned holds me close.

In the next moment he’s kissing me on my forehead and on my cheeks. It feels so comforting. I hug him back, and he lifts me onto my desk and burrows into my neck. I smell the fresh scent of his aftershave and can’t even begin to think about what’s happening between us, as I hear my Rolodex tumble off the desk, followed by the splash of a cup of coffee and the creak of my office door.

“Mary! The carpet!” shouts Brent, who looks in, astounded, and slams the door shut with a bang.

It breaks the spell. I push Ned away and wipe the wetness from my eyes. “Jesus. Jesus Christ, Ned. I must be out of my mind.”

“Mary, there’s nothing wrong with-”

“Yes, there is. I shouldn’t be. I can’t.”

“I want to be close to you, Mary. You need that, I can see it. I used to be just like you, keeping everything in-”

“Please, Ned.”

“Tell me what’s happening. I can help.”

“You want to help? Then stop sending me notes. And stop following me.” It’s a test. I watch his face for a reaction.

“What are you talking about?”

“Did you break into my apartment?”

“What?” He looks shocked.