The Watcher

43

Fast, bordering on reckless, that’s how I drive. But it’s late Friday afternoon, and it takes time to get out of town. In some spots, traffic is so heavy and slow that I start yelling. At one point, I have to stop myself from jumping out of the car and continuing by foot. Adrenaline bolts through my body. How much of a head start does Veronica have? Fifteen minutes? More? She’s probably stuck in traffic, too, right? I cling to that thought, needing to believe it’s true, because then I can hopefully catch up to her as soon as we’re out of the city.

But as the height of the buildings along the side of the road gets shorter and the traffic lights fewer and farther between and traffic thins out, what can’t happen does. I take a wrong turn. Realizing that I turned left too soon, I swear out loud and hit the steering wheel. I slow down and do a U-turn, turning right across the solid line, and I don’t care about my fellow motorists’ angry honks. All I can think about is that I’m losing valuable minutes. My head is throbbing. Fuck, fuck, fuck. Then I’m back on the right road and I floor it. I pass one car, then another. The sun sinks toward the horizon. No sign of a gray SUV yet.

I picture Philip, unlocking and opening the door to the cabin, the cabin he, Veronica, and Leo have been to so many times, where they spend their weekends and celebrated holidays, laughing and resting and spending time together, just the three of them. Now he brings a stranger over the threshold. He lets her tromp right into their most sacred space—and trample it. He crosses the limit of decency so uncaringly, so unsuspectingly. And he underestimates his wife, underestimates the strength of her anger, the unbridled power of her desire for revenge. What will Veronica do when she gets there? What is she planning? Lines of text flicker past—sentences I wrote during the last week.

The intensity in the air between them one second and then, a moment later, stillness and silence, deadly silence.

My fingers tighten around the steering wheel.

The life and bustle of the city feels increasingly distant. The highway stretches out ahead of the windshield without much variation. The exits are few and far between. The longer I travel, the more bucolic it becomes. After a while, a gas station appears on the right-hand side, and as I approach, another car pulls out of it—a gray SUV. The driver zooms past, and I catch a blurry profile, but there’s no doubt: It’s Veronica! She must have stopped to fill up, maybe buy something.

I slow down and settle in at a comfortable distance behind the car with Veronica’s nervous facial expressions and jerky movements fresh in my mind, remembering how the gravel sprayed from under her tires when she pulled away. But there’s no sign of her agitated mental state here on the highway. The SUV doesn’t weave in the lane. It just proceeds calmly and soberly ahead. No reckless passing, no furious speed. Quite the contrary, Veronica sticks to the speed limit and doesn’t seem to be in a hurry. But maybe she’s taking her time for a reason. Maybe she’s waiting for it to get dark out.

We continue for another fifteen or twenty minutes before she signals and takes an exit that leads to a traffic circle and then onto a narrower country road. There’s one car between us. A small bridge leads over a stream, and we pass a farm with brown-speckled cows in a pasture. Then the woods take over altogether. We drive for a long time without anything other than conifers visible on either side of the roadway. The sun peeks between the trunks every now and then, its light richer and now flame colored.

After a while, the driver ahead of me turns off onto a side street, and there’s no longer anything between me and the SUV’s taillights. There are no other cars in sight, neither farther ahead nor behind me. The woods grow ever denser. Finally the SUV signals again and turns onto a road leading into the thick of the woods, a road so narrow that I probably would have missed it otherwise.

The road is rough and uneven. The car bumps, and I drive even slower. The sun has set, and it’s dark in among the tree trunks. Way up ahead I see the glow from the SUV’s lights. There are a few cabins along the road, but we pass them, penetrating deeper into the woods. My heart is pounding harder and harder in my chest. We must be almost there. What will happen then?

The SUV is no more than maybe fifty yards ahead of me now and veers left at a fork in the road. A few seconds later, I do the same. We pass several cabins of various sizes, and then the woods thin out a tiny bit. There’s something reflective a little farther ahead, and I realize it must be the lake where they used to go swimming and fishing when Leo was little. Just then the gray vehicle slows down and parks, and oddly enough only then do I notice it: the Storm family’s cabin. It’s right at the edge of the forest and looks exactly like I’d imagined after hearing Leo’s description. A wooden gable facing the narrow road, a patio, and a balcony. The front door isn’t visible from here. It must be on the other side, facing the water.

I scan the patio with the covered grill and the stacked furniture, then the balcony with its empty window boxes on the upper floor. All the windows are dark. That doesn’t seem right to me. This isn’t how it’s supposed to be. As if in a trance, I open my car door and get out. The SUV’s lights are off now, and it’s too dark to determine if Veronica is still in the car. I think I hear the sound of footsteps hurrying across the gravel, but then the noise is swallowed by the soft grass and can no longer be heard.

“Hello!” I yell into the darkness.

No response.

Something is wrong. Something is very, very wrong. Get back in the car and drive away, a voice whispers inside me. Instead, as quietly as I can, I sneak closer to the cabin. It’s over, the voice continues, don’t you understand that? It’s over. Go! But I can’t. I have to finish what I’m doing. For Leo’s sake, and for my own.

Slowly and cautiously, so I won’t trip over a root or a stump, I make my way forward. The cabin and the gray SUV, which is parked right by the cabin, are the only things whose outlines can be discerned. Everything else is distorted by shadows. How did it get so dark so quickly? I take another few steps, then look up and focus on the house. There are two windows on this side, but no lights on inside as far as I can tell. The windowpanes stare back at me like a couple of empty eye sockets.

From somewhere I hear a quiet crunch and then the sound of a branch breaking. For several seconds, I stand still, listening to the woods. Then I continue sneaking closer. The SUV sits silently, but is it empty, or is someone sitting inside of it? I imagine someone is but can’t be sure. It could just as easily be the seat and the headrest that make it look like someone is in there, leaning back. Leaning back or dead.

Soft grass beneath my feet, the cool evening breeze on my face. Soon I’m up next to the SUV. Only a few more steps and I can look right into the vehicle. Instinctively I clench my fists and stare through the window. There’s no one inside.

As I turn around again, I see her come running from the other direction, heading for the cabin. Despite the darkness, there’s no doubt that the figure racing across the lawn is Veronica. The high ponytail whips back and forth across her back, and she’s holding something in her hand. I can’t see what it is, but suddenly I know—the knife, the one that was under her bed! The pieces begin to come together, and in a fraction of a second, I understand exactly what’s happening.

Philip and the redhead must have parked on the other side of the cabin, closer to the front door. They probably had heavy grocery bags with them, meals that they intended to cook together, but then they walked in the door and lust took over. Maybe they tumbled into bed without worrying about turning on any of the lights. Maybe they’re having sex right now. In a few seconds, Veronica will fling open the door and surprise them at their most vulnerable.

Yet another passage of text flickers through my mind, and my body stiffens.

Did she already know how it was going to end when she went there, that the other woman, the lover, wouldn’t survive this encounter between them?

I hurry forward, running as fast as I can. I need to catch up to Veronica before she reaches the cabin, before she yanks open the door and storms in. I have to keep her from spreading blood and destruction around her, from ruining her own life and those of the people she loves. She turns her head slightly and sees me coming. She has a head start, but I’m not far behind. When she picks up her pace, I do, too. My consciousness shrinks, reduced to a few sensory impressions. There’s a metallic taste in my mouth, the sound of nearby footsteps when the lawn switches to gravel, a wooden front porch with substantial railings all the way around. Only a few steps left now, then I’ve caught up.

A solitary round porch light illuminates the wooden deck and throws a spooky gleam over Veronica, who has reached the door. She fumbles with something, drops what she’s holding, and turns around. Her face is pale and contorted. A scream finds its way up and out of her throat, sounding almost like an animal’s cry, and I slow, stopping right in front of her.

“Veronica,” I pant, “you can’t—”

I don’t have a chance to say any more before she lunges. An instant later something smacks my rib cage and I lose my balance, teetering to the side and colliding with the railing. There’s a loud crunch above and behind my eyes, then everything goes quiet, so quiet. I fall down and lie there. Something warm and sticky flows over my face, over my neck—and when I look up, Veronica is standing over me.

Then I can’t see anything, because the warm redness is everywhere now, blinding me.

Then it’s not red anymore, but black.

And after the black… after the black, I see only white.

I sink down, rise up.

Mama, are you there?