Savage Lane (28 page)

All the blood in Karen’s body seemed to rush to her head.

“Excuse me,” she said. “What?
What
?”

“That’s what they’re saying, what the reporters are saying, but I know that’s just bullshit,” Mark said. “I mean, I know that’s not you, that’s not who you are, despite your feelings for me.”

“They’re saying that? How could they say that? How could… and
feelings
for you? What feelings for you? I’ve never had feelings for you. We’re friends, just friends, that’s all we are. I can’t… I can’t believe I’m even talking to you about this right now.”

Karen tasted salt on her lips and realized she was crying.

“It’s okay,” Mark said. “We don’t have to discuss this right now.”

“This is so fucked up,” Karen said. “This is fucking ridiculous.” She was losing control; she knew she should pull over, but she couldn’t because she didn’t want to be late for work. “Okay, where the hell is Deb anyway? Where did she go?”

“I don’t know,” Mark said.

There was something odd, tentative about Mark’s tone. Karen wondered,
Was he hiding something
? If their marriage was falling apart, he could’ve snapped and…

No. She didn’t want to even go there.

“Look, they’ll find her,” she said. “They’ll find her and everything will be okay.”

She wished she believed this.

“Thank you for saying that,” Mark said, his voice cracking, getting emotional.

Karen couldn’t help feeling bad for him. She asked, “How are your kids doing?”

“They seem okay,” Mark said. “Riley’s having a hard time, though. She’s very concerned. I took the day off work.”

“Just be strong for them. Did they go to school today?”

“They didn’t want to, but I insisted. I wanted them to have a normal day.”

“That’s good. That was smart.”

“I need you here, Karen.”

Shit, when he was he going to stop with this crap?

“Look, I’m sure everything’s going to be okay,” she said. “Just stay strong.”

“Can you come by later?” Mark asked. “I mean if Deb doesn’t come home by then.”

“She will come home.”

“But if she doesn’t, can you come by? Maybe bring the kids? It would be good for the kids to have your kids here with them.”

Although she felt a little manipulated—Mark knew that pulling “the kids card” always worked with her —Karen knew she couldn’t blow off him and his kids when they were going through something so difficult and needed support.

“Okay, I’ll be there later,” she said, “but I really don’t think it’s going to be necessary. She’ll come home any second now, you’ll see.”

“Thank you,” Mark said.

“Text me if there’s news,” she said. “Goodbye.”

Karen arrived about five minutes late for school. When she rushed up to the principal’s office for the morning staff meeting she noticed she was getting unusual looks from several of the other teachers and staff members. Her initial thought was that it was because of her lateness; she was usually prompt and maybe it had thrown people off. So she apologized, but as Lucy, the vice principal, was talking about a budget issue, Karen noticed that people, including Seth, the principal, were still looking at her weirdly. It almost seemed as if they were judging her and then, with a rush of shame, she realized this was because they
were
judging her. They must’ve heard the reports on the news, or one of them had heard and had told the others, but what exactly was the report on the news? Was it possible that that stupid incident at the country club was on the
news
? What did people think of her? What assumptions were they making? Did they think she was having an affair with a married man? Did they think she was crazy, had done something to hurt Deb? It had been bad enough that her kids had been affected by this, but if this was going to affect her work life, maybe even her career, that would be way too much.

The half hour meeting seemed to last half a day. Afterward, she wanted to avoid the phony conversations, people offering their support when they were probably actually suspicious. Lisa, a special ed teacher whom Karen was very close with, approached her in the hallway and said with a pseudo-concerned tone, “Hey, Karen, what’s going on with—” and before hearing anymore Karen cut her off with, “Sorry, I have a student waiting,” and rushed away.

Even Jill, her best friend at school, wouldn’t support her.

During a break, Karen went into Jill’s office and said, “I think people are talking about me behind my back,” and Jill said, “Really? I haven’t heard anything,” but Karen knew she was lying.

“Wait, don’t tell me you really think I have anything to do with this,” Karen said.

“No, of course I don’t,” Jill said. “It’s just… never mind.”

“It’s just what?”

“Nothing.”

“Tell me.”

“It’s nothing, it’s just…Well, you talk about Mark a lot, so I mean...”

“What?” Karen said. “What does it mean?”

“Nothing. It doesn’t mean
anything
.”

“Do you think I’m involved with Mark?”

“No, of course not.” Jill wasn’t making eye contact.

“Just because I talk about him, doesn’t mean I’m involved with him,” Karen said.

“I’m not saying you are,” Jill said. “But, I mean, I saw the way he was looking at you at the country club on Saturday.”

“That’s
him
. That’s not me.”

“I know. I know that.”

“And if it was true, if I was having an affair with him, why would I keep it a secret? Why wouldn’t I tell you?”

“Well, I guess if you didn’t want his wife to find out you wouldn’t—”

“I can’t believe this.” Karen hadn’t expected this from Jill of all people. She felt as if she’d been punched in the gut.

“I’m not saying you
are
.”

“But you think it,” Karen said. “You really think these things about me.”

“Of course I don’t think you’d actually… You’re misunderstanding me.”

“I thought we were friends.”

“We are friends.”

“Fuck you,” Karen said, leaving Jill’s office.

Karen was so upset and hurt by what Jill thought of her, what
people
thought of her, that she was hyperventilating and actually thought she might faint. To get a hold of herself, she went into the bathroom and splashed her face with cold water. It didn’t work and she left—still angry, still a mess. Her plan was to go on with her day, block out all of this bullshit the best she could, pretend it was a normal morning, because she knew if she accepted what was going on she was going to totally lose it.

Fortunately Karen’s job was all-consuming. Working with autistic kids, trying to figure out the best ways to reach each child, as if each child’s brain were a unique maze that needed its own solution, required intense concentration and focus, and she wanted that feeling of disappearing into a maze right now. It was truly a joy to work with such pure, unaffected souls, with children who needed her, and who had no interest in judging her. Her work, as difficult and frustrating as it was at times, was the perfect escape from the cruel, punishing world.

Her first student was William, an adorable, severely autistic, seven-year-old who had serious medical issues, including diabetes and partial blindness. The boy’s parents had four other children and weren’t giving him proper medical care, or enough emotional attention, which upset Karen but also made her time with him even more precious. With many of the kids she worked with, especially the ones who were most severely impaired, she had the ability to connect with them on an intimate level, to understand their feelings that they were unable to express. In her last session with William, Karen had made a lot of progress, and had been very close to getting him to say his first words. If she could get him to say, even basic words, it would have an enormous effect on his life, so she was eager to get to work with him.

After practicing the sounds he’d made last time, she tried to get him to say the word “ball.” He seemed eager and attentive today, and she sensed that he wanted to speak so badly, and he was trying as hard as he could to take the leap into language. But then an alarm went off somewhere outside the building, it sounded like a car alarm, and the noise upset William, maybe because he had been so locked in, and he kicked and flailed his arms and legs. Karen held him in her arms, trying to subdue him, but he was a big kid, weighed about one hundred pounds, and he broke free and swung one of his arms and slapped Karen hard in the face, over her mouth and part of her cheek. Her lower teeth tore into her gums, and she tasted blood.

Finally she was able to calm him down, but it took a while to get the bleeding to stop. As she pressed a wad of tissues over her mouth, she continued to act normal and playful around William because she didn’t want to upset him, make him feel he’d done anything wrong. Although he could barely see, so he didn’t know she was bleeding, she knew he was incredibly perceptive and knew when something was wrong, even when he didn’t have the physical ability to comprehend a situation. She was mainly concerned about William, but it was hard to completely distance herself from her own feelings. As she made fake smiley faces, and resumed trying to get him to speak, she was thinking,
What next
? After the weekend from hell, she’d woken up to find she was a possible suspect in the disappearance of a neighbor, and now a sweet, innocent child had hit her in the face. The onslaught of things going wrong in her life seemed relentless.

She saw a couple of other students after William, but it was hard to focus and get lost in her work. Then she went online on her phone, hoping there was news about Deb, a break in the case, but she was still missing. Worse, a couple of articles mentioned the fight Deb and Karen had at the country club, and there was even a video posted. Now Karen remembered seeing people with their phones out on Saturday during the scuffle with Deb—she’d blocked it out until now. With dread, she clicked PLAY and then watched a fifteen second-long video of herself, wrestling with Deb.

“Fuck me,” she said.

It was humiliating and surreal, like she was watching two crazy people on a daytime talk show, except one of those crazy people was
her
. She was overcome by embarrassment and shame. All she could think was,
Everyone is seeing this
. Her colleagues, her family, her friends, her neighbors, guys she’d dated, the parents of the kids she worked with. She knew how it must seem to people, taken out of context, and she was angry with herself for letting her guard down on Saturday and for letting Deb coax her into the ridiculous fight. But she had to make people understand that this wasn’t how it seemed, and this wasn’t who she was.

But panic set in when she realized how easily this could all blow up—she could be fired from her job, she could go to jail. She called her union rep and got emotional, and she explained what was going on and how terrified she was. The rep, Mary, calmed her down, and told her to go about her business for the rest of the day and just wait for the facts to come out.

“It’s just a video on the Internet and people talking,” Mary told her. “You haven’t been charged with any crime.”

Mary assured Karen that her job wasn’t in jeopardy. Karen knew this could change if the rumors continued to spread, but she understood that panicking wasn’t helping. She needed to remove herself from the situation, as much as she could anyway, and wait to see how things played out.

As noon approached, she was looking forward to having lunch alone in her office. She’d packed her usual lo-cal lunch—yogurt, an apple, and iced green tea in a thermos. She would eat, relax, and focus on the rest of the day at work. Then, when she got home later, she’d discover that the nightmare was over. Deb would be home, the reporters would be gone, and everything would be back to normal.

After eating, she did feel somewhat better, until she left her office to use the restroom and saw the slim dark-haired guy in a sport jacket approaching her in the hallway. The guy didn’t have to say a word or show a badge—his whole vibe screamed,
Cop
.

Sure enough, he said, “Karen Daily?” and she said, “Yes,” and then he showed a badge, said a few sentences that included “Detective Walsh” and “police” and “Can we talk?” A few teachers, including Stacey, the social studies teacher who’d been at the staff meeting earlier, and a few students, looked like fifth-graders, were eavesdropping, close enough to have overheard the entire exchange. Great, this was all Karen needed—
more
rumors going around school about her. Karen was mortified. It may have been the most humiliating moment of her life which, given what had happened to her over the past couple of days, was saying a lot.

“What’s this about?” Karen asked quietly, practically whispering.

“It’s about a neighbor of yours who’s missing,” Detective Walsh said.

Stacey and the kids were still listening in. Karen glared at Stacey until she got the hint and said to the kids, “Come on kids let’s get to class now,” and they walked away down the hallway, the kids looking back over their shoulders and whispering to one another.