Part 30 (1/2)
The guest room was at least tidy, albeit dusty. ”You can see part of Amy and Hemma's garden from here.” Marian raised the blinds. ”I helped build that fountain and retaining wall. And the arbor.”
”They're the ones who are moving, right? Maybe they can put visitation rights for the fountain in the sales contract.”
”I wish.” She was suddenly nervous. What if Liddy noticed the window opposite?
”You have a box of ruins?”
She turned from the window and realized Liddy was standing next to the box in the corner, reading the label. ”From the vicious ex.” She paused. ”I should get rid of it.”
Liddy just looked at her. ”I'm so sorry it happened, Marian. I'm sorry she hurt you.”
”So am I.” Making up her mind, Marian began pulling tape off the box. ”Ellie and Hemma helped me clean all this up, but I haven't looked at it since.”
”Are you sure you want to?”
”I think I can.” She pulled open the flaps and slowly lifted out the cover of Francie to the Rescue. She had to swallow hard. ”I had a collection of old books.”
Liddy took the cover and turned it over. ”Where's the rest?”
When Marian gestured at the box, Liddy looked inside. ”Holy s.h.i.+t.
How could someone do that? To books?”
185.
”She was nuts. She knew it would hurt me.”
Liddy lifted out a handful of torn pages. ”This was sick.”
”I didn't know what she was doing. It took a couple of hours.”
Marian made herself breathe through the stab of remembered pain.
”Oh. While you were-”
”Yeah. Tied to the bed.”
Liddy dropped the papers and threw her arms around Marian.
”That's so awful. I'm so sorry it happened. It makes me so angry to think of someone being cruel to you!”
”It's okay.” Marian held Liddy for a long moment and realized it was true. ”It's okay now. Well, not okay. But . . . better.”
”I'm sorry that yesterday I tried to compare my rotten ex to yours. That's not appropriate, is it?” Liddy gave her a rueful look.
”But I have to admit this is more along the lines of my crazy ex.”
”Do you want to talk about it?”
Liddy hesitated. ”I've only told my mom, and my thesis advisor had to know. It's just-she left. No word. And took my laptop, books and research notes with her. They were in her apartment and she packed up everything and left.”
Marian took Liddy's hand. ”There's more, though, isn't there?”
Liddy nodded. ”That was bad enough. That was actually the most work to get past. I had a backup, but I lost a lot of time redoing a lot of work. No, it gets worse with the part I can't really fix.”
Marian drew Liddy to the spare bed. ”I'm not suggesting we lie down, but we can sit.”
”Oh, I don't know. This is more comfortable.” Liddy stretched out on the bed and patted it invitingly. Marian couldn't move.
”What?”
She shook her head slightly. ”You're so beautiful. I can't believe you trusted me that way last night.”
Liddy reached for her hand. ”I'll never regret a minute of it, you know. Never.”
Marian eased onto the bed, feeling nervous. But she had to smile at the twin clomp of shoes being kicked to the floor. ”So, your crazy ex.”
186.
”Yeah, well, she walked out of her teaching job. And her reason was me. She said I'd stolen money from her and threatened her.
That I was a stalker, basically, the crazy one. I didn't know she'd told people that. So then I showed up at the office she shared with another prof demanding to know where she'd gone, and I was angry, and upset and not exactly pleasant about it. I didn't know they'd been sleeping together, either. I found that out later.”
”Oh. So the other woman believed you were the crazy one.”
”Yeah. She believed it. And told my thesis advisor to find a way to fail me, because she'd been told I was buying my research.”
”Oh, wow.”
”Word got around. I could never be sure which professors knew and which didn't. I thought everyone was talking about me.” Liddy's sigh was deep and heartfelt. ”I couldn't do anything about that. She smeared my reputation and you don't realize until that's done what it meant. I knew a lot of faculty. I had switched my major a lot.”
”But you graduated.”
”Yes, but that's where I got a little lucky. I finally broke down and told my thesis advisor everything. And because she knew me, she sided with me. At least, she believed that my research was my own, and the thesis was my writing.”
Marian felt a small s.h.i.+ver run through Liddy's body. ”And you were able to finish?”
”I did, and graduated. I took this job to get out of Berkeley for a while, plus it's a great job.”
”Do you know I have not the least idea what you're researching?”
”Oh.” Liddy raised up on one elbow. ”You weren't there, that's right. You are in bed with the woman doing research for Dana Moon's next book.”
Marian blinked. ”Wow. Is that great or what?”
”Great.” Liddy grinned. ”It's like a dream come true. Getting paid to learn stuff and write it down. And then I met this incredibly hot librarian who has been very helpful to me. Very . . . very . . . good to me.”