Amelia Gray - Threats

“That’s it? Either grief or an affair?”

“That’s what it says.”

“Those two options seem to be kind of in opposition.”

Chico shrugged.

“Does all printed paper suggest one or the other?”

“You’re thinking of that letter you found in the sugar. ‘I will strip the bark from a tree and make you new clothes,’ right? Did you find any more of those?”

“You have it memorized.”

“It was memorable.”

“That’s the only one I found.”

The detective leaned back in his chair without breaking eye contact. He slipped his finger under the right-hand page in the dream book and turned it. The scent of old ink rose up and mixed with the paper clips. He was watching David. Chico’s closed mouth moved slightly with the mandibular workings behind his lips, which were thin and colorless in the low light. They parted into a smile, front teeth tucked. “I want us to be friends, David.”

“I trust my wife.”

“You should trust your wife. Respect her memory.”

“I saw that woman Marie.”

“Right,” he said, closing the dream book. He picked a business card from a stack and handed it across the table. “She wants to see you. She has some ideas. She can be incredibly helpful with memory.” David looked at the card:

MARIE WALLS

TRANCE REGRESSION THERAPY

1201 Southland Dr.

(Garage)

“This is my address,” David said, standing to leave.

“Indeed it is.”

“She’s in my garage? Why wasn’t this mentioned?”

“It had yet to become pertinent.”

When David stepped outside, he felt the cars slowing before they reached the stoplight. Passengers turned their heads toward him, though drivers stared straight ahead. An older man sitting on a park bench in the square adjusted the manual lens of a camera in his lap. A pair of pedestrians viewed him askance, dragging bloodhounds. A woman dipped her head into a reclining stroller, adjusting a device. Joggers spoke discreetly into their wrists. He was being watched.

DAVID HAD CLOSED UP THE GARAGE behind the house years earlier, when wasps took over the high-beamed ceilings. Franny always parked in the driveway anyway, and he kept all the gardening tools in the yard shed. They shared the opinion that killing the small wasps and destroying their paper-thin structures wasn’t worth the body count or the overall effort. When he opened the wooden side door, he felt as if he had placed himself ten years back in his own personal history.

Marie was sitting behind a desk in the center of the garage. There were papers and framed certificates stacked on the countertops and shelves where he had once kept the power tools and laundry detergent. Wasps flicked David’s ears and settled on his shoulders. Marie stood with her hand extended. “So glad to finally see you,” she said. “I have a vision problem that presents itself unless I’m under fluorescence.” She pointed at the industrial tubes overhead. “It’s perfect,” she said. She was wearing a professional-looking blouse and blazer over a pair of pressed slacks. The wasps crawled across her neck and swarmed her hair.

“You’re in my garage.”

“Are you sure it’s yours?”

“I’ll have to call the police.”

The wasps settled like rings on her fingers. She waved a hand, scattering them. “Detective Chico knows all about it. He comes to see me.”

“Who said you could be here?”

“I embarrassed myself not half an hour ago,” she said. “I saw you walking a charcoal Weimaraner on a black leash.”

“That wasn’t me.”

“Noble beasts, Weimaraners.”

“I don’t own a dog.”

“I called out to you and you didn’t respond. Of course, others are never quite who we think they are. That was particularly clear to me not half an hour ago. I was taking in the air outside the office at the time. I’m much happier to be inside.”

“My garage.”

“I’m here for you today. Sit down, please. Tell me what’s going on.”

He remained standing. “For your information, you’re trespassing.” A wasp crawled into David’s ear and he stood very still, waiting for it to come out. He watched her without speaking.

“I hope you’re not angry,” she said. “I certainly hope you’re not angry. This is all entirely legitimate in the eyes of the law. I have the paperwork around here somewhere. Your wife rented this place to me a few years back, and I made it clear that I would never make my presence known. Your wife thought that would be easier on the family. You’ll find all of this in the contract. My condolences, by the way. I have that contract here.” She opened a file and withdrew a stack of pages. They looked like the receipts from Franny’s automotive file.

The wasp tickled the tiny hairs lining David’s outer ear canal. He could feel the individual legs as they muffled along the delicate cavity. He clenched his teeth.

Marie flipped the pages over. “Really, this is about your wife. It would be more along the lines of respecting her wishes by allowing you to find me. I was so sad to hear about your wife. She seemed like a mysterious woman. Of course you know. She was the kind of woman I’d like to know better, the kind who doesn’t lay her whole life in front of you like she expects you to pick it up and figure it out. You know? Some people like to build a lifetime of decision patterns. Your wife was not like that.” Marie covered her mouth against a sudden swarm. She waited for them to pass. “I can see why she decided on you,” she said once the wasps lost interest. “You’re kind of a blank slate yourself, aren’t you? It takes the right kind of woman to get a man like you. To understand. I imagine you didn’t find too many dates when you were younger. No offense.”

The wasp crawled out of his ear, and David immediately plugged the ear canal with his finger, preventing reentry. “Mighty hell,” he said, scooping at his ear with his fingernail. “You’ve taken up office in my garage. The police know about it. My wife arranged it. That’s where my world is right now, right at this moment.” He shuffled his feet backward so as not to step on any portion of wasp. “I came in here for plywood and a can of paint. That’s what things are looking like currently,” he said, half turning to check the side door. He saw a can of spray paint beside the door and picked it up. “What are you doing here?” he asked, attempting to wedge the can first into his jacket pocket and then into the back pocket of his jeans. He unzipped his jacket halfway and tucked the can inside. “Chico mentioned you had been thinking.”

“Oh dear, I’m always thinking.” She gestured for him to sit. “That’s the thing we forget about ourselves. I wanted to get into your head the day that Franny had her accident. What were you doing that morning? Where was your mind traveling?”

David shook the spray paint can as he thought. He had spent a fair piece of time considering the moment itself and the moments that followed, but not the time prior. He tried to clear the paths of his memory. He saw the images from a distance, as if he was standing outside the window in the snow. “I can’t remember,” he said.

“It’s in there somewhere. Think about the objects you were looking at, the way you were dressed. The paramedics said they found you in your robe and slippers. A flannel pajama set. Think about the food you ate that morning. The coroner’s office said they found berries in her. Were there berries in the house? Picture yourself opening the refrigerator and looking inside.”

He did as he was told but could see only a more recent picture, of a heel of bread and a carton of orange juice, two bottles of beer. The food featured thriving mold spores. “I don’t know,” he said. “Orange juice.” He heard a wasp and cupped his hand over his left ear.