Chapter 2 - After He Sent Miles Upstairs
The fork was still in my hand.
I hadn't set it down. The broccoli on the white patterned plate had gone cold and the meat beside it was untouched, and Miles's voice was still in the air between us. "But down there, everybody calls her Sarah." He'd said it so calmly, like he was telling Graham what color the sky was. My pearl earring caught the warm dim light when I breathed. I realized I was holding my breath.
Graham didn't look at me at first. He looked at Miles. His hand was flat on the dark wood table, fingers spread a little too wide. The closed door was behind him, pale in the low light, and I could feel it without looking at it.
Graham swallowed. His voice was low and careful, the way he talked when he didn't want to scare Miles. "Buddy, why don't you head upstairs for a few minutes. Go to your room and play, okay? Mom and Dad need to talk."
Miles didn't argue. He slid his chair back. The legs scraped against the floor. He looked at me once, just a quick glance, his brown hair parted neat as always, his striped polo a little wrinkled at the collar. I wanted to say something to him, anything, but my throat had closed up.
"I didn't do anything wrong," he said quietly.
"I know," Graham said. "You're not in trouble. Just give us ten minutes."
Miles nodded and walked toward the hallway. I listened to his socks on the hardwood, then on the stairs. Seven steps up, a pause at the landing. I knew that pause. He always stopped there when he was trying to hear us without being seen. The upstairs hallway creaked once, then his bedroom door clicked but didn't latch.
The dining room felt too quiet after that. The glassware on the table reflected the overhead light. Graham's plate was still half full too.
He waited a beat, then turned to me. His eyes were wide and bewildered, but his voice stayed restrained. Just above a whisper.
"Vivian," he said. "Who is down there."
It wasn't a question. Not really.
I set the fork down finally. It clinked against the plate louder than I meant it to. "No one you need to worry about."
"Don't do that." His jaw tightened. He had that little line between his eyebrows he got when he was trying not to get angry. "Don't give me that answer. Our seven-year-old just told me you're taking food to a man in our basement. And that he calls you Sarah."
My hands were cold. I pressed them together under the table so he wouldn't see them shake. "He misheard something. Or he had a dream. You know how he is, he gets things mixed up."
"He didn't mishear." Graham leaned forward, elbows on the table. He wasn't yelling. That was worse. "He said everybody down there calls you Sarah. Vivian, your name isn't Sarah. You've told me your whole life your name is Vivian. You said you hated being called anything else."
I could hear the faint hum of the heat register. And underneath it, nothing from downstairs. I had told Letty to come and go through the side entrance after eight, and she always locked up quiet. The basement apartment was soundproofed enough that you wouldn't hear the TV unless you were right against the door. For three months that silence had been the only thing keeping us safe.
Graham reached across the table but stopped before he touched my hand. "Is there someone living in our house that I don't know about."
I stared at the closed door behind his shoulder. The key was in the small ceramic dish on the sideboard, right next to the napkin holder where we'd always kept it. Graham never touched it. He thought it was for the old storage closet.
I could have lied again. I almost did. But Miles was upstairs on the landing, and Graham's face was right there, and I couldn't keep the whole thing in my chest for one more second without breaking open.
"Yes," I whispered. The word scraped coming out. "There is someone down there."
His expression didn't change at first. Then his eyes moved, just slightly, toward the hallway and back to me. "Who."
I shook my head. I couldn't give him Robert yet. Not like this, not with Miles listening and dinner still on the table. If I said my father, if I said dementia, if I said three months, it would all come out wrong and he would go straight to that door and open it and Miles would hear everything.
"Not tonight," I said. "Please. Not in front of Miles. He's right there."
Graham looked toward the stairs. He'd heard the creak too. He lowered his voice even more. "You want me to sleep here knowing there's a man under our kid's bedroom and not know who he is."
"I know who he is. He's not dangerous," I said, and my voice cracked on the last word. "I promise you he's not. Let me put Miles to bed first. Let me do this right. Tomorrow morning, before school, I'll show you. Everything."
He stared at me for a long time. I could see him weighing it, the betrayal fighting with the fact that I was still his wife sitting across from him at our table. The restrained panic I'd felt at the start was now his.
Finally he nodded once, sharp. "Tomorrow. First thing."
I stood. My legs felt unsteady. I walked to the sideboard and picked up the small brass key from the ceramic dish. I didn't hide what I was doing. I turned and walked to the dining room door that led to the hall and the basement stairwell beyond, and I turned the lock from the inside. The click was loud in the quiet house.
May you like
Then I slipped the key into the pocket of my blouse. I felt its weight against my hip.
Graham watched me do it and didn't stop me. Upstairs, I heard Miles shift his weight on the landing, listening.
