Melanie Gideon - Wife 22

I repeat the same process with the photo of the horse and once again the pushpin is stuck in San Francisco, but the location is Crissy Field. He’s got to be athletic. He probably runs and bikes. Maybe he even does yoga.

I click on the photo of the dog, but this time the red pushpin appears on Mountain Road in Oakland. Wait a second. Is it possible he lives in Oakland? I just assumed he lived in San Francisco, based on the Netherfield Center’s proximity to UCSF.

I click on the photo of the labyrinth and the pushpin again shows his location as Oakland. But this photo was taken minutes from my house. In Manzanita Park.

I click on the photo of his hand, my heart thudding. Stop this, Alice Buckle, stop it right now. You extracted yourself. You just said goodbye. A map of my neighborhood pops up. I enlarge the map. It zeros in on my street. I drag the icon of the little yellow man onto the pushpin, wanting more detail, and an actual photo of an actual house appears. 529 Irving Drive.

My house.

What? The photo was taken from my house? I try and process this information.

Researcher 101 has been inside my house? He’s been stalking me? He’s a stalker? But this makes no sense. How could he have gotten into my house? Somebody is always home, between school being out and Caroline working only part-time, and Jampo would have barked his head off if somebody broke in, and William never-William… Jesus.

I zoom in on the photo of the hand. And when the familiar details of that hand come into focus-the big palm, the long, tapered fingers, the little freckle on the top of the pinkie, I feel sick because- it’s William’s hand.

“Alice, can I borrow some conditioner?” Bunny stands in the doorway wrapped in a towel, clutching her toiletry bag in her hand. Then she looks at my face. “Alice, dear God, what happened?”

I ignore her and go back to my computer. Think, Alice, think! Did Researcher 101 somehow hack into our family’s photo library? My brain feels folded over, like an omelet. Researcher 101 is a stalker, Researcher 101 has been stalking me, has been stalking William, William stalking, William is a stalker, Researcher 101 is a stalker is William is Researcher 101. Oh, my, God.

“Alice, you’re mumbling. You’re scaring me. Did somebody get hurt? Did somebody die ?” she asks.

I look up at Bunny. “William is Researcher 101.”

Bunny’s eyes widen, and then, to my surprise, she throws back her head and laughs.

“Why are you laughing?”

“Because of course it’s William. Of course! It’s too perfect. It’s-delicious.”

I shake my head in frustration. “You mean duplicitous.”

Bunny steps into the room and peers over my shoulder as I frantically scroll back through our emails and chats, seeing them in an entirely different light this time.

Me: I can have the weather delivered every morning to my phone by weather.com. What could be better?

101: Getting caught in the rain?

“I can’t believe it. The nerve of him. The Piña Colada song?” I shriek.

“My God, that’s clever,” says Bunny. “I guess he was tired of his lady; they’d been together too long.” She winks at me and I scowl back at her.

Me: You’re very lucky. He sounds like a dream dog.

101: Oh, he is.

“Oh, yes, very funny, so funny, so terribly funny, William, ha-ha,” I say.

“Do you recognize that dog?” asks Bunny.

I look at the photo more closely. “Goddammit. That’s our neighbor’s dog. Mr. Big.”

“Your neighbor is Mr. Big?”

“No, the dog is Mr. Big.”

“How could you have missed that?” asks Bunny. “It’s almost like he wanted you to know, Alice. Like he was giving you clues.”

Me: Yes, please change my answer. It’s more truthful. Unlike your profile photo.

101: I don’t know about that. In my experience, the truth is frequently blurry.

“That son of a bitch,” I say.

“Mmm. Sounds like he’s been reading a bit too much Eckhart Tolle,” says Bunny.

Me: If we had met? If you had showed up that night? What do you think would have happened?

101: I think you would have been disappointed.

Me: Why? What are you keeping from me? Do you have scales? Do you weigh 600 pounds? Do you have a comb-over?

101: Let’s just say I would not be what you had expected.

I groan. “He was toying with me the entire time!”

“One person’s toying is another person’s dropping clues and waiting to be discovered. Maybe you were just slow on the uptake, Alice. Besides, I have to tell you that so far, I haven’t read one thing he’s written that wasn’t true.”

“What? Everything was a lie. Researcher 101 was a lie. He doesn’t exist!”

“Oh, but he does exist. William couldn’t have made him up if Researcher 101 wasn’t somehow a part of him. Or a him he wanted to be.”

“No. He played me. He just told me what I wanted to hear.”

“I don’t think so,” says Bunny, chuckling.

“What is wrong with you, Bunny? Why do you seem so delighted about all of this?”

“Why aren’t you delighted? Don’t you understand, Alice? You can carry on with both Researcher 101 and William. Forever. Because they’re one and the same!”

“I feel so humiliated!”

“Again with the humiliation. There’s no reason to feel humiliated.”

“Of course there is. I said things. Things I never would have. Things he had no right to know. Answers he cheated out of me.”

“Well, what if he had asked you those things to your face?”

“William never would have asked me.”

“Why not?”

“He wasn’t interested. He stopped being interested a long time ago.”

Bunny tightens the towel under her arms. “Well, all I can say is that he went to an awful lot of trouble for a husband who wasn’t interested in knowing what his wife thought or wanted or believed. And now I just have one question for you.” She gestures to the Ann Taylor suit that I’ve spread out on the bed. “You aren’t planning on wearing that to dinner, are you?”

“You got something from your father,” says William, walking into the bathroom. “I had to sign for it.”

I’ve been upstairs for an hour, stewing, and avoiding William, trying to will myself into a positive frame of mind for dinner. But the sight of him infuriates me all over again.

“You look great,” he says, handing me an envelope.

“I don’t look great,” I snap.

“I’ve always loved that suit.”

“Well, you’re the only one, then.”

“Jesus, Alice. What’s going on? Are you mad at me?”

“Why would I be mad at you? Should I be mad at you?”

My phone chimes. It’s a text from Nedra. Hope you’re getting that toast ready! Practice, practice, practice. So excited about tonight. Xoxoxo.

“Damn toast,” I say. “That’s the last thing I want to do.”

“Oh-that’s why you’re so snappish. Nerves,” says William. “You’ll do fine.”

“No, I won’t do fine. I can’t do it. I just can’t do it. I can’t be expected to do everything. You do the toast!” I cry.

“Are you serious?”

“Yes, I am. You’re going to have to do it. I’m not doing it.”

William looks at me aghast. “But Nedra will be so disappointed. You’re the maid of honor.”

“It doesn’t matter who gives the toast. You. Me. It just has to be somebody from this family. Get Peter to do it. He’s good at those sorts of things.”

“Alice, I don’t understand.”

“No, you don’t. And you never have.”