Wreckage (8 page)

“Stop it.” I cut her off. “You didn’t
kill
anybody.”

“I don’t know, Dave, she makes a good argument,” Kent snipes. My hand balls reflexively into a fist.

“Shut up, Kent! You’re such an idiot, leave her alone.”

He sits a little taller, sizing me up for a fight, puffing up like a riled rooster. Lillian reaches out a hand toward us.

“Stop, stop! Dave, please let me finish,” she says, as if I’m annoying her. I watch Kent for a half second longer before sitting back, resigned to being an onlooker.

“What I’m trying to say is that I feel responsible for the loss of two lives today. I honestly don’t know what I’d do if you were the third. If you go in that water, Kent, you
will
be the third.” She points to the choppy waves surrounding us. “I don’t expect you to forgive me but stay. Please.”

Kent sits swaying with the rise and fall of the storm-tossed raft. Right when I think he’s gone catatonic, he turns away from us, taking one last sweep of the water. His massive creased forehead wrinkles. He still loves Theresa and now she’s gone forever. I can’t imagine what that must be like.

What if that was Beth still in the plane? What if I knew I’d never wake up to her cold feet pressed against my legs again or hear her sigh at one of my puns? What if one brief moment took away everything we’d planned, including our dreams of one day holding a child in our arms?

For a second I forget about how cold and wet I am, and the way my throat feels so raw it might be bleeding, and I make a decision: if he wants to go back for her, I won’t try to stop him again.

He asks her one last question. “Are you sure? I mean, are you sure she’s dead?” There’s a strange calm about him and, like everything else about Kent, like his volatile temper and the way he never really looks you in the eye, it makes me nervous.

Lillian nods. “Yes, unfortunately I am.”

He opens his mouth like he’s going to start arguing again and then stops, slumping in his seat.

“I’ll stay.”

A sad smile crosses Lillian’s face before she covers it with her hands, sobbing. I want to comfort her like she did for me after Beth’s phone call. Okay, if I’m being honest with myself, I want the warmth of a living human being in my arms because I’m more likely to die tonight than live.

I slide around the octagon till I’m close enough to tap her shoulder. I hesitate a moment too long, and a large wave crashes over us, tipping the boat almost vertical. The raft rolls beneath us, and I grab wildly at anything to keep from being flipped out, but there’s not much to hold on to. Doubling over, I find only one thing to hold onto—myself.

I stay balled up like that for a long time, after the raft goes still, even after the rain slows and the ocean calms to a choppy lull. I can’t let go. Gradually an unsettled sleep overcomes me. I give in gratefully, so physically exhausted that my body starts to shut down involuntarily. My only hope is that even if I have nightmares, they’ll be better than my reality.

CHAPTER 9

LILLIAN

Present

Reaching the top of the stairs, Lillian was overcome with exhaustion. She grabbed onto the handrail, catching herself. Her feet pulsed in the stylish but tight green Versace pumps that peeked out under her designer jeans. It seemed impossible to be this tired from sitting and talking for an hour and a half.

Slipping her index finger into the sling-back strap, she pried the shoes off without much difficulty. Jill had picked out the outfit and was probably sitting at home having a good laugh right now. Lillian would have a word with her when this day was over.

Jill claimed the low-cut, emerald-green wraparound top would bring out Lillian’s eyes and slim her waist, but instead of making her feel curvy and attractive, it made her self-conscious. It was so low in the front she had to sit up taller in her seat to keep the neckline from sagging and showing off an embarrassing amount of cleavage to the camera.

It was hard to get used to her new bra size. She’d been a steady B cup for the majority of her life, even during pregnancy and nursing, but in the past few months she’d suddenly filled out like a girl going through puberty, and she wasn’t just expanding in the chest.

After a year and a half of near starvation, Lillian was never full. It didn’t take much, a tiny stir of hunger in her gut, and then
bam
, this overwhelming surge of panic, an animal instinct, took over. Eight months after their rescue, she was holding strong at twenty pounds over her “before” weight and fifty over her “almost died on an island” weight.

Somehow, even as a woman who had always been effortlessly thin, she loved her new, fuller figure. The simple tug of fabric against her waist was a constant promise that she didn’t have to be hungry all the time, that she could feel pleasantly full with a quick trip to the pantry.

When she walked out of the hospital with Jerry more than two weeks after the rescue, she leaned into his side, flinching away from the flashes and camera lenses. Jerry didn’t pull her in, though. Instead his arms hovered around her thin form, barely touching her skin, as if she was made of glass.

She was sure it was a sign he didn’t love her anymore, or that maybe he was disappointed she was still alive. But standing in front of a full-length mirror at the hotel, Lillian finally understood why he kept her at arm’s length.

Her body was more than lean; it was skeletal. She traced curious fingers along her hipbones. They jutted out so violently that she was afraid to push too hard for fear of puncturing the skin stretched between them. She let her hands travel up to her stomach. Loose skin laced with silvery stretch marks hung sadly under her shriveled belly button. She pinched the wrinkly skin between her fingers nostalgically, finally glad for the marks that reminded her why she’d fought so hard to stay alive.

Other than those nearly invisible lines, the body in the mirror belonged to a stranger. Or perhaps it was more like a once-familiar landscape ravaged by a terrible natural disaster. As she counted her ribs, visible beneath a thin sheet of skin, tears dripped down her cheekbones, her once-bright eyes nothing more than sunken holes. She suddenly understood Jerry’s revulsion, and couldn’t blame him for shrinking away from the woman in the mirror. She was repulsed by this stranger as well.

Things were different now. Lillian rubbed her tingling feet, smiling. Lately it felt like they were newlyweds again. Whenever she stood close to him, his fingers would sink gratefully into her smooth, cushioned skin, and when she woke up in the middle of the night, like she always did, she found his body wrapped around her from behind, his head on her pillowy shoulder or arm.

If it took a few extra pounds and a new wardrobe to keep that spark, she didn’t mind. Shoving her shoes back on, she pulled the straps over her heels reluctantly. It felt like her feet had gone up a size in the minute she’d had them off. Trying not to wobble, she pushed open the door to her room. Jerry lay on their bed wearing his reading glasses, typing furiously, his light brown hair combed into a neat part. He was dressed in a full suit, the blue pinstriped one reserved for weddings and funerals. The one he wore to her funeral.

He rubbed his socked feet together unconsciously, like Daniel did when he zoned out watching a movie. If it wasn’t for the shiny black work computer on his lap and papers sprawled across the entire king-size four-poster bed, she would’ve tackled him with a bear hug. Instead Lillian crept across the room, feet silent on the loose shag of the chocolate-colored carpet in their bedroom.

“Hey there, how’s work?” Lillian whispered, caressing the smooth cherry finish on one of the posts. Jerry glanced up from his computer and took off his reading glasses. A bright smile crept onto his face.

“Hey there, hot stuff, this is a nice surprise. How are things going down there? You holding up?”

“Yeah, we’re not even halfway done but one of the camera battery packs malfunctioned, so we took a break.”

“Mmmm,” he murmured, biting the rubber tip of the temple on his glasses. “I must know, how’s the infamous Genevieve Randall? As scary as she looks on TV?”

Jerry wasn’t a Genevieve Randall fan. He called her fake and overdone. Lillian thought it was incredibly cute of him.

“Worse, I think she might be a robot.”

“Hmmm, good or evil?” Jerry raised his eyebrow playfully.

“Evil, what other kind is there?”

“Touché.” He laughed. “So how’s the robot treating my wife? Trying to take over your body yet?”

“That’s the pod people. Get your sci-fi evil villains straight.”

“Sorry, robots aren’t pod people, got it.” Folding his glasses, he sat up a little straighter. “But seriously, what’s she like? Is she any different from the others?”

Shaking her head, Lillian studied an invisible spot on the bedpost, trying to sound casual. “No, she’s just like all reporters. She keeps trying to get me emotional, get the ‘real story.’ You know what I’m talking about.”

“Yeah, I know.” He closed the laptop and slid it under the bed. “Come here, relax a minute.” He scooched over a little, turning on his side and crunching some of the papers in the process, then patted a small space next to him on the bed.

“I don’t think I’ll fit,” Lillian sighed, assessing the size of the bare spot on the bed and remembering her new generous hip size. He patted again, refusing excuses. Kicking off her heels, she raised a dubious eyebrow, which Jerry ignored. He slipped his hand around her waist, fingers holding on tight to a rear belt loop.

“Oh, we’ll make you fit.” With a quick yank he tugged her into the warm spot he’d just vacated, tucking her legs between his own. He cradled her head neatly beneath his chin, right above his heart.

He smelled like his fancy cologne, the kind she bought him at Macy’s when he made partner a year before her trip to Fiji. He only wore it on special occasions like a big day in court or a date night that included more than grabbing a bite at Taco Bell and walking around Walmart looking for storage bins. He wasn’t like a lot of men, dousing himself in cologne until any open flame could set him ablaze. No, as with everything else in his life he was measured and conservative, allowing one puff of the spray. Lillian buried her nose in the crease of his neck, inhaling his smell.

“You don’t have to do this, you know.”

“I know I don’t.” Lillian paused, considering how to explain it again. “I want to.”

Jerry sat still, right arm wrapped all the way around his wife, caressing her free arm. His light strokes sent shivers down her spine. She tipped her head back enough so she could kiss his neck.

Settling down on the bed, she imagined the thoughts tumbling around Jerry’s brain. At times like this she wanted to blurt out the whole story, no more secrets between them. But then she’d always come to her senses and remember why she had to hold fast, how everything would change if he knew.

“
Why
do you want to do this all over again? I thought you hated it.” She could feel his warm breath in her hair as he pressed his lips against her scalp.

“I want it over, and I think if everyone finally hears the story, the whole story, then they’ll leave us alone. And that contract, you said the exclusivity clause is binding. This will be the last interview . . . ever.”

He laughed, rubbing his lips across her hair as he shook his head. “Well, yeah, but even that has loopholes. Even though you have a pretty spectacular lawyer, I’m afraid it’ll take more than one interview to get those vultures to leave us alone.” He paused. “So I’m assuming Dave agreed to an interview?”

Her pulse exploded at
his
name. Lillian didn’t like talking about him with Jerry, who claimed the jealousy was gone, the burning, ferocious jealousy that once threatened to claim their marriage like a forest fire. But hearing his name come out of Jerry’s mouth still riled her up into a defensive position.

“Apparently he has.” She tried to sound uninterested. “One of the Robot’s minions told me today. He said they’re going to California next week to film his part.”

“You didn’t talk to him, then?” he probed carefully.

“No, Jerry,” she spat. “I haven’t spoken to David—” Lillian gritted her teeth. She shouldn’t call him that anymore. “I mean Dave, since you asked me to stop. It’s been nearly five months.” She stumbled over her words. If Jerry knew what a good liar she was he’d know better than to be suspicious of such a sloppy delivery. Lies, good ones at least, are smooth and well thought out. It’s the truth that’s sloppy. But Jerry didn’t know.

Dropping his hand from Lillian’s arm, he let it hang limply off the edge of the bed. “Hmmm, okay. The last time I spoke with Beth she told me they were done with interviews so it surprised me, that’s all.”

“When did you talk to Beth?” She pulled back just enough to see his face. Jerry and Beth met in Fiji in the days after the crash and had been long-distance acquaintances ever since. Lillian didn’t realize they were still in touch. It wasn’t always safe having Jerry and Beth chat.

“Oh, a few months ago.” He waved his hand casually. “She called me at the office with a few little questions about the Carlton settlement. She sounded so happy with Dave home. She said they weren’t giving any more interviews because they’re trying to get pregnant again and she didn’t want the stress to interfere with starting a family.” Jerry shrugged. “Maybe it’s not an issue anymore. Maybe it worked already.”

“Maybe.” Lillian tipped a shoulder up, copying Jerry’s laissez-faire attitude even though she felt like crying. Jerry put his hand on the broad space between her shoulder blades, gently pulling her onto his chest.

“So, what have you guys covered so far?” He was clearly trying to change the subject. Lillian played along.

“The crash and a little after. We hadn’t gotten that far when the battery died. I can tell you one thing, Genevieve Randall was not happy.”

“I didn’t think robots were capable of emotion.”

“Well, this one is capable of annoyance, that’s for sure.”

Jerry laughed and pumped her for more, “What’s up next, then?”