Part 5 (2/2)

VIVIEN WOKE IN the predawn darkness to a silence that simply didn't exist in New York City. There were no cars, no horns, no footsteps on the street below. Coc.o.o.ned in her blankets, cus.h.i.+oned in quiet, she lay there listening intently. But the only sounds that emerged were the occasional snore from Trip's nearby bedroom and the steady tick of the grandfather clock in the foyer.

After a quick bathroom run, she scurried back to bed. Her bladder was now blissfully empty, but her mind was too full for sleep. It called up Melanie's determined optimism, Shelby's belligerence, Trip's stinginess with words. The way J.J.'s absence felt so . . . present. How strange it had felt to see Clay Alexander sitting in J.J.'s seat at the table, presiding over J.J.'s family.

Though she spent much of her waking hours trying not to dwell on her pregnancy, it was always at the core of her thoughts. She'd believed she knew her mind and her body. But now both had become alien and unfathomable. Her body taunted her with each change it went through; it seemed that as soon as she got used to some new indignity another took its place. Worse, her mind seemed stripped of its free will. Not to mention the ability to think.

In a few hours the household would be awake. The kids would head off to school. Melanie would-she realized with some surprise that although she knew Melanie owned and ran a ballroom dance studio, she actually had no idea what Melanie did all day and hadn't thought to ask.

But it was part of her job as a suburban columnist to find out. Which meant she'd have to get up and dress in the morning so that she could accompany Melanie wherever it was that she went. Vivi set the alarm clock beside the bed for six thirty, just in case she lucked out and fell back asleep. But although she closed her eyes again and tried to concentrate on nothingness for a good thirty minutes, she finally gave up and flipped on the bedside light.

There was a novel in her carry-on, but she'd barely finished a page on the plane and she didn't feel like reading it now. What Vivi really wanted to do was talk to Stone, but she was afraid that if she actually reached him and heard his voice, she'd immediately spill all. Clamping down on her neediness, she booted up her laptop and brought up a blank page on the screen. After a few moments of thought, she typed the opening line that had come to her the day before.

I have been observing the denizens of this pocket of suburbia in which I find myself for less than twenty-four hours and have already learned one important thing: here people don't wear their hearts on their sleeves; they put them on the backs of their minivans.

For a few minutes she just sat and thought about what she'd seen on the drive from the airport to Melanie's, replaying her sister's comments in her mind.

As they pa.s.s you, and believe me they will, you'll know everything there is to know about them. Because who they are, what they care about, and where they ”belong” has been reduced to decorative magnets that have been stuck all over the backs of their SUVs.

These magnetized spheres and shapes will also tell you where they wors.h.i.+p and where they vacation, what illnesses they've dealt with or would like to see eradicated, who they voted for in the last election and who they plan to vote for in the next.

She was careful not to quote Melanie too closely in case her sister, who had never been a major newspaper devotee, ever happened across the column. But as Vivien typed, the words began to flow from her mind and through her fingertips in that wonderful way that she didn't understand and tried not to question. Slowly, she began to relax, her body unclenching bit by bit as the words formed in her mind, then found their way onto the page.

All of the schools their children attend from preschool to college are there like some public sc.r.a.pbook. There are magnets and b.u.mper stickers that inform you if their child made the honor roll or was once named the student of the month. Bottom line, if they or one of their children has ever done it or even thought about it, they've got the magnet to prove it. And every magnet deserves to be displayed on the back of the family chariot.

She added a few jabs about what might drive people to reveal so much, then did some cutting and pasting until she had her observations in an order that belied the amount of editing she'd done and, instead, felt like a natural progression. And then she concluded, As it turns out, these clues aren't even necessary because your entire personality is revealed by your choice of vehicle. Apparently you are not only your magnets; you are also what you drive. Just a quick look at the color, make, and model you're driving and your fellow suburbanites will know everything about you from how much money you make to how often you have s.e.x.

She played with the car thing for a while, paraphrasing Melanie's comments in a shocked, yet slightly snide tone that gave it an edge.

She did feel a tiny fissure of guilt for putting her sister's world under such a judgmental microscope, but she pushed it aside; like the pseudonym she'd borrowed for her byline, she'd think about that ”tomorrow.”

After getting in as many zingers as she could under the guise of ”reporting,” she closed with a breezy, I feel like a scientist transported to a newly charted planet that is absolutely teeming with alien life-forms. So stay tuned. I'll have more observations for you next week! She signed it, Your stranger in an even stranger land, Scarlett Leigh.

Then she attached the doc.u.ment to an email to John Harcourt and sent her first postcard from suburbia on its way to New York.

Before she could talk herself out of it, Vivi dialed Stone's cell phone and was both equally relieved and nervous when he picked up.

”Hi there,” he said. ”You're up early.”

”It's so quiet,” she said, cautioning herself to keep it light. ”I'd forgotten the sound of gra.s.s growing.”

He laughed and she smiled in return. Stone had always been her best audience.

”So what do you have planned today?” he asked. If she closed her eyes, she could pretend he was here in the room with her and not on the other side of the world. ”I'm just going to hang around with Mel, see how she spends her days.”

”That's good,” he said and she let his voice wash over her. ”How are she and the kids doing?”

Vivien felt a familiar flush of guilt at how little she'd done for Melanie, Shelby, and Trip over the last two years. Was that why she'd found Clay Alexander's role in her sister's life so jarring?

”They're okay,” she said. ”Well, not really okay. They're all going through the motions, but I don't know if any of them have really moved on. And . . .” She paused, not sure how to put her reaction to Clay Alexander into words. ”His best friend and campaign manger-the one he was with when he died-seems to be very involved in Mel and the kids' lives.”

”That's a good thing, isn't it?”

”I guess so.” She hesitated. ”It's just that now that I'm really thinking about it, the whole idea of J.J. shooting himself while cleaning his hunting rifle seems so absurd. I mean he'd been hunting since he was a child. It's not like he was some novice who'd never used a gun.”

Stone sighed, a sound she knew well. ”Vivi, you covered the police beat starting out just like I did. I don't remember the statistics, but those kinds of accidents aren't at all unusual.” She could practically hear him thinking; she just wished he were doing that thinking here. So that she could tell him about the baby, read his true reaction in his face.

”I mean there was a full investigation, wasn't there?” Stone asked. ”Do you have any reason to believe anything was overlooked?”

She flushed again as she acknowledged she was a bit late in worrying about this now. She knew people at the GBI; a couple of phone calls two years ago wouldn't have been out of line.

”Vivi,” Stone asked. ”Are you still there?”

”Yes,” she said, although the truth was at the moment her thoughts were in a north Georgia mountain cabin two years ago. ”I was just thinking that maybe I should call my contact at the bureau and see if I can have a look at the file.”

”I know that tone, Vivi. If it weren't so early you'd probably already be dialing the number.” She could practically hear him shaking his head and picture the smile tugging at his lips.

”Just take it slow,” Stone said as they prepared to hang up. ”And remember, this is your family you're talking about. Sometimes even when things seem open and shut, it's possible to find out things that no one really wants to know.”

9.

MELANIE FINISHED PACKING Trip's lunch, tucking the frozen water bottle into its own plastic bag to prevent leakage while keeping things ”refrigerated,” then pulled a carton of eggs and a gallon of milk from the refrigerator. Coffee dripped into the carafe of the coffeemaker, the smell of the warm brew almost, but not quite, as potent as that first gulp of caffeine.

Upstairs Trip's alarm buzzed and was followed by the sound of her son clomping to the bathroom. A few moments later water ran in his shower. Trip was like clockwork physically-he got up, showered, and dressed each school morning without prodding, but his brain didn't really kick in until much later. This could not be said of Shelby, who would stay in bed until the last possible moment and then require both prodding and ejecting to remove her from it. When she did get out of bed, she was in a foul mood, which she liked to share with those around her.

Melanie was on her second cup of coffee and had Trip's bacon and eggs plated and on the table when her son thudded down the stairs.

”Morning, sweetie,” she said, wondering as she always did how he managed to shower and dress without actually opening his eyes.

His greeting was garbled and his eyes mere slits as she pulled out the kitchen chair and guided him into it. Without further comment he lifted the gla.s.s of orange juice and drained it. In a matter of minutes his plate was empty.

”Morning, Mel.”

Melanie looked up in surprise at Vivien's greeting. She was even more surprised to see that her sister was fully dressed.

”Oh, my G.o.d,” Vivi said. ”Is that bacon and eggs I smell?”

Melanie hesitated, unable to believe her sister could have an ounce of vacant s.p.a.ce inside her, given the amount of lasagna she'd consumed the night before. ”Yes. Do you want some?”

”That would be great.” Vivien mussed the top of Trip's head as she pa.s.sed. ”I'm completely ravenous.”

Melanie lit the burner under the frying pan without comment. ”You want some coffee?”

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