“I hate you!” he screamed, his voice filled with such sureness and certainty.
“What car?” Wendy asked, her eyes wide with not fear but an awful incredulity.
“The Mercedes. That car that just drove down the lane.” I was pointing at an empty street.
“Mr. Ellis—that car just happened to be driving by. What is going on?”
“No, no, no. Didn’t you see the person get into that car and drive off?”
Wendy was staring at something behind me. I whirled around.
Jayne was walking slowly toward us, her arms crossed, her face grim.
“Yes, what is going on, Bret?” she asked quietly, nearing me.
I mistook the expression on her face for compassion but then saw that she was furious.
“Wendy, could you take Sarah to her room?” I walked up to the babysitter, who backed away as I reached out a hand toward Sarah, who turned her head from me, crying so hard she was drooling.
Jayne brushed past me and whispered something to her daughter and then to Wendy, who nodded and carried Sarah back into the house. Still panting, I wiped the spittle from my mouth as Jayne walked to where I was standing, limp with exhaustion. She was staring at the gun and then back at me.
“Bret, what happened?” she asked quietly. Her arms were still crossed.
“I was sitting in the Allens’ yard talking with the guys and looking up at the house and I saw someone in our room.” I kept trying to control my breathing but failed.
“What were you guys doing out there?” She asked this in the tone of a professional who already knew the answer.
“We were just hanging, we were just—” I gestured at something invisible. “We were just hanging out.”
“But you were smoking pot, right?”
“Well, yeah, but that wasn’t my idea . . .” I stopped. “Jayne, there was something—a man, I think—in our room and he was looking for something, and then I came over here and went upstairs to check but he pushed past me and ran into Robby’s room and—”
“Look at yourself.” She cut me off.
“What?”
“Look at yourself. Your eyes are completely red, you’re drunk, you reek of grass and you freaked out the kids.” Her voice was low and rushed. “Jesus Christ, I don’t know what to do anymore. I really don’t know what to do anymore.”
Our voices were contained because we were standing on the front lawn, out in the open. I involuntarily scanned the neighborhood again. And then, wracked with frustration, I said, “Wait a minute, if you’re telling me the grass caused me to hallucinate that thing upstairs—”
“What thing was upstairs, Bret?”
“Oh, f**k this. I’m calling the police.” I reached for the cell.
“No. You’re not.”
“Why not, Jayne? There was something in our house that should not have been there.” I kept gesturing. I thought I was going to be sick again.
“You’re not calling the police.” Jayne said this with a calm finality. She tried to reach for the gun but I pulled away from her.
“Why shouldn’t I call the police?”
“Because I am not having the cops coming over here to see you in this pathetic condition and scaring the kids even more than they already are.”
“Hey, wait a minute,” I said, teeth clenched. “I’m scared, Jayne. I’m scared, okay?”
“No, you’re wasted, Bret. You are wasted. Now, give me the gun.”
I grabbed her arm and she let me pull her toward the house, where I pushed the front door open. She was standing behind me when I pointed into the living room and the rearranged furniture. And then I pointed at the footprints, in some kind of sickly triumph. I waited for her to react. She didn’t.
“I arranged that furniture this morning, Jayne. This was not how it was when we left tonight.”
“It wasn’t?”
“No, Jayne, and don’t take that f**king condescending tone with me,” I said, scowling. “Someone rearranged it while we were gone. Someone was in this house and rearranged this furniture and left those.” I pointed at the footprints stamped in ash and realized I was jabbering and soaked with sweat.
“Bret, I want you to give me that gun.”
I looked down. My hand was a white-knuckled fist clenched around the .38.
I breathed in and glanced at the palm of my other hand. The small puncture wound appeared to be healing itself already.
She calmly took the gun away and resumed talking in a hushed tone, as if to a child. “The furniture was rearranged for the party—”