Sleepwalker (11 page)

Now, Chuck lays it all out on the table.

First, a bottle of Poland Spring sparkling water with lemon essence—there were three left in the six-pack in the fridge back home when he packed his lunch earlier. He took one. This, presumably, is one of the two that remained.

The next two items are also duplicated in the lunch he packed himself: a green Granny Smith apple—one a day keeps the doctor away; the fridge is full of them—and a snack bag of Snyder’s pretzels, which he buys in bulk at BJ’s; there were at least a dozen bags left in the cupboard.

Then there’s the hero sandwich.

His own sandwich is peanut butter and jelly made on Wonder bread, but this—this doesn’t sit well with him.

No, not at all.

He puts the sandwich on the table and dials Cora’s phone again with a forefinger shaking so badly he can barely guide it to the numbers.

This time, it rings only once before a brisk “Hello?”

“Cora!” he blurts, even though he knows in the split second he says it—even in the split second he heard the voice—that it isn’t her.

“
Who?
”

He jerks the phone away from his ear, looks at the screen, and sees that he dialed a wrong number. With a curse, he disconnects the call. Painstakingly, he redials.

This time, the line rings several times, and it’s Cora’s recorded outgoing message that greets him when it bounces into voice mail.

“Please, Cora,” he says hoarsely, “please call me right away. I’m . . . worried about you.”

Yes. He’s always worried about her, but . . .

This is different. This isn’t just casual concern.

Something is wrong.

Some instinct, some sixth sense, had told him that back at the house earlier, when he felt as though he was being watched, and now . . .

He ends the call and looks again at the lunch spread out on the table; at the food; the sandwich in particular.

It looks store-bought, well-wrapped in cellophane, with what looks like meat and cheese, lettuce, tomato, and onion layered thickly between the top and bottom halves of the roll.

Yes, it must be store-bought, because none of those ingredients were in the house when Chuck left just a few hours ago, and he can’t see Cora going out to buy meat and cheese. She’s a vegetarian. She’ll look the other way when Chuck eats meat, but she sure as hell doesn’t encourage it.

Heart pounding, he reaches out and unwraps it.

He lifts the top of the roll.

At a glance, he thinks he’s looking at some kind of mottled slice of meat oozing with ketchup.

Then he sees it.

CN
2
.

Surrounded by a heart.

He sees it, and he knows.

It isn’t meat. It’s skin, human flesh . . .

It isn’t ketchup. It’s blood . . .

It’s Cora
, and the toxic horror washing through Chuck Nowak’s system bubbles from his lips in an unearthly howl.

PART II

To die: to sleep;

No more; and by a sleep to say we end

The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks

That flesh is heir to, ’tis a consummation

Devoutly to be wish’d.

William Shakespeare

Chapter Five

Saturday, October 1, 2011

“A
nd then we have to go buy some new colored pencils so that I can— Daddy!” In the midst of outlining her plans for the day, Hudson breaks off with a happy exclamation. “You’re up!”

Allison turns away from the cup of coffee she was about to stir and sees Mack standing in the doorway, wearing plaid boxer shorts and an old gray T-shirt.

He takes in the Saturday morning scene—Allison in her bathrobe standing at the counter, his nightgown-clad daughters with bowls of cereal at the table, J.J. in his high chair happily finger painting with goo that was once a handful of dry cereal.

Then he smiles. “Morning, guys. What’d I miss?”

Allison opens her mouth, but Hudson jumps in before she can speak.

“You missed that we’re putting on a show! I’m going to be the star and the director, and Maddy is going to be the actress, and J.J. is playing a sheep and maybe a baby. And we’re making posters to put up all over town so people will come. Right, Mommy?”

“Right,” Allison agrees, having long ago realized that when Hudson embarks on a creative project, it’s best to go along with her in the brainstorming stage and rein her in later, when—if—logistics actually come into play.

Maddy—who learned the same thing—just smiles at her father as he bends to kiss her on the head.

“How’s the Cap’n Crunch?” he asks the girls.

Maddy informs him that it’s yummy, while Hudson says wistfully, “I wish we could have it every single morning.”

She shoots a pointed look at Allison, who shrugs.

“Sugary cereal isn’t good for you. That’s why you only get it on Saturdays.”

If she had her way, they wouldn’t even keep it in the house—though if Mack had his, they’d all eat it every morning.

The once-a-week Cap’n Crunch rule is one of countless parenting compromises they’ve made over the years, many about food.

Mack has such a sweet tooth that he can’t even eat an apple without cutting it up and dredging the slices in a cinnamon-sugar mixture. He’s agreed not to do that in front of the girls, though, after unsuccessfully trying to convince Allison that fruit is fruit.

“They’ll never go back to eating plain apples if you let them taste it your way,” she said, “and you know it.”

“Because my way tastes better.”

“Your way isn’t healthy.”

“Don’t be so sure yours is.”

Mack was raised by a mother who did everything right, diet-wise—Maggie was reportedly a health food and exercise nut long before it became faddish—“And where did that get her?” Mack asks darkly whenever the subject comes up. “She died of cancer anyway. We might as well eat the way we want to eat. It doesn’t even matter in the end.”

It matters to Allison. She’s the one who was raised by a woman with a death wish who considered white toast with margarine a square meal, and she’s the one who’s responsible for feeding three kids on a daily basis, the one who’s surrounded by health-conscious mothers who wouldn’t dream of putting anything into their children’s mouths that isn’t whole grain, organic, grass-fed, all natural . . .

Some days, she’s tempted to say the hell with it all, serve candy corn for lunch, let the girls skip school, and stay up late watching cartoons. Yes, and on those days, it gives her great satisfaction to imagine the collective gasps of horror such decadence would extract from the perfect playground moms, whose advice—solicited and not—she relies upon to navigate this tricky suburban domestic landscape.

Why do the stakes seem so much higher now than they ever were in her own childhood? Is it due to geography, or generation?

All Allison knows for sure is that she’s not going to botch her child-rearing responsibilities the way her own parents did. But it’s exhausting, this business of trying to be the perfect mother raising perfect children.

She pours another cup of coffee and hands it to Mack. Black and strong—that’s the way he’s always drunk his coffee, not willing to dilute the caffeine jolt he so badly needs most mornings. It’s how she’s learned to drink it as well—and lately, thanks to J.J.’s early mornings, she’s the one who needs the jolt.

Not Mack. Not anymore. In the space of a few weeks, the Dormipram has worked wonders. Mack is falling asleep at night and getting up well-rested in the mornings.

It’s what may be going on in between that has Allison concerned.

But she doesn’t want to bring that up right now. Not with the kids here.

Mack leans against the counter beside her and sips his coffee. “Other than the girls putting on a show, what’s going on today? Besides more rain?” He glances at the dreary scene beyond the window.

“Errands, dance lessons, and then the party over at Randi and Ben’s.” Seeing his expression, she says, “Don’t tell me you forgot about that?”

The Webers throw a bash every year on the Saturday closest to Rosh Hashanah, to celebrate the Jewish New Year with family and friends. They’ve taken it to a whole new level now that they live in a house big enough to easily accommodate hundreds, rather than dozens, of guests, from all walks of life and various religious persuasions.

“I didn’t forget,” Mack tells her. “I just have a lot of work to get done this weekend, and it’s already been an exhausting week. I’m just not up for a huge crowd.”

“I’m not, either,” she admits. “We can always pretend that we’re sick . . .”

“No.”

Right. Mack and his pesky code of ethics.

“It’s crappy weather for a party,” he says, gesturing at the window. “They’re supposed to have it outside. Maybe they’ll cancel.”

“They won’t. I talked to Randi yesterday. The caterers were bringing in heated tents.”

“Terrific. Tents in a monsoon.” He shakes his head. “I think we should just skip it.”

“Randi and Ben are our best friends. They’re family, really. How can we not go?”

“We didn’t last year.”

“That’s because it fell on September eleventh, remember? We were in Florida with the kids.” And if they hadn’t been, there’s still no way they would have attended a party on that fateful date.

“Oh, right.” He falls silent, drinking his coffee, slipping back into the shadows of September 11 memories.

Allison wishes she hadn’t been forced to bring it up. With this year’s tenth anniversary behind him and his sleeping patterns on track for perhaps the first time in his adult life, Mack generally seems to have turned over a new leaf.

She’s the one who’s inexplicably found herself brooding about the past; about the dead: Carrie, Kristina, Jerry Thompson . . .

“Mommy, is there any more Cap’n Crunch?” Hudson asks abruptly.

She blinks. “Sure. Wait—no, that was the last of the box,” she remembers.

“There’s another one in the cupboard.” Mack turns to open it.

“No, there isn’t.”

“Sure there is.” He roots through the contents of the shelf. “I know I saw it last night when I was looking for— Hey, where did it go?”

All right—he just opened the door—quite literally—for Allison to tell him.

She says briskly, “Girls, if you’re done with your cereal, put the bowls in the sink and go get dressed.”

“But I want more,” Hudson protests.

“Mommy’s right, Huddy. There isn’t any more.” Mack turns away from the cupboard, looking perplexed.

“But I want—”

“You can have Cheerios,” Allison interrupts her daughter.

“They’re not even real.”

Out of habit, Cheerios are what Allison calls the toasted oat cereal J.J. was munching—and is now smearing—even though it’s not the brand-name kind in the yellow box she remembers from her own childhood. This is an organic version she dutifully buys at the health food store in town and feeds the kids most mornings.

Hudson shakes her blond head. “Forget it. Come on, Maddy, let’s go write our script.”

“Get dressed first, okay?” Allison reminds them. “We’ve got about an hour before we have to hit the road.”

“Okay,” they say in unison, and Hudson adds, “I’ll make a shopping list for when we go to the store. I’ll put Cap’n Crunch on the top.”

“I’ll help.” Maddy follows her sister to the sink with her milky bowl.

“You can tell me things, but you can’t write them down. I’m doing the writing,” Hudson informs her, and they head out of the kitchen.

As soon as the girls are out of earshot, Allison turns back to Mack, who’s busy making silly faces at a delighted J.J., the missing cereal box apparently forgotten.

Allison hesitates, wondering if she should even bring it up.

Maybe she’s wrong.

But as Mack bends over their son’s high chair tray, she notices the way his stomach rounds the front of his T-shirt, and she knows that she isn’t.

Mack has always been hard and lean, despite the fact that his only workout these days is dashing for commuter trains and scurrying around the city from his office to appointments.

She first noticed a bit of a paunch earlier this week, when she heard him muttering about the dry cleaner shrinking his suit pants and looked up to see him straining to button the pair he had on.

That was a day after she accused the girls of polishing off an entire bag of pretzels—which they denied—and the day before she noticed that a carton of butter pecan ice cream, which the girls would never touch because it has nuts in it, was missing from the freezer.

It had been there that afternoon. She was certain of that, because she was stuck on the phone for over an hour with her book club friend Sheila, who’s in the midst of an infertility crisis. As Sheila talked on and on, Allison found herself wandering around the kitchen, opening the freezer door repeatedly, giving the ice cream a longing gaze, and then forcing herself to satisfy her craving with diet iced tea, an apple, a tub of yogurt, and, of course, the ubiquitous baby carrots.

She’s been on a diet, hindered by the recent spate of unseasonable cold and rain that have kept her cooped up in the house for days now. The nasty weather is a grim reminder of the looming blustery season that is always unfairly accompanied by gravy and stuffing, eggnog and frosted cut-outs . . .

But this isn’t about that, or about her. It’s about Mack. And ice cream, pretzels, an entire box of Cap’n Crunch . . . for all she knows, that’s just the tip of the iceberg.

Food isn’t even the only thing that’s missing.

She can’t find her good chef’s knife—the one with the red handle—and a couple of bowls are gone, too. One, she found tossed in the garbage, along with soggy cereal, yesterday morning. The girls have been known to accidentally toss cutlery, but a bowl?

“Mack,” she says abruptly, “we need to talk.”

“About the sunroom?” he asks in a weary, not-again tone. They’ve been trying to come to an agreement about what should be done with the window treatments.

Tired of waiting for him to put the shades back up, Allison started to do it herself last week, then realized that the old shades look dingy next to the new paint. They’ve been talking about ordering new ones, or perhaps curtains or shutters, but haven’t been able to find the time to agree on what they want, let alone actually go shopping or place an order.

“No,” she tells Mack, “it’s not about the sunroom. Although—”

“Let’s not get into that now,” he says quickly. “Please.”

“Fine.” She shifts back to the more pressing matter at hand. “Have you ever heard of sleep-eating?”

“Hmm?” Holding his fingers at the sides of his cheeks, he wiggles them at J.J. and sticks out his tongue.

“Sleep-eating. I think you’re doing it.”

Mack turns away from J.J. to face her. “What are you talking about?”

She quickly explains about the missing food, only to have him laugh.

“You think I ate it in my sleep? And then chucked the bowl into the garbage?”

“Yes, I do.”

Before she can elaborate, he shakes his head, still looking amused. “You’re the one who’s on a diet, Al. Are you sure you’re not just—”

“It’s your medicine, Mack,” she cuts in. “The Dormipram. It’s one of the side effects. Didn’t you read the packet that came with it?”

“Not really.” He gratifies a fussing J.J. with another silly finger-waving face.

She shakes her head. Of course he didn’t bother to read the packet. That’s always been her department—the endless investigation into every medication that finds its way into their medicine cabinet.

“Well, I read it, Mack. Look at me. Come on. I’m totally serious here.”

“So you’re saying I’m . . .” He shakes his head incredulously. “I’m, what, sleepwalking into the kitchen at night and bingeing on ice cream?”

“Among other things.” She nods, giving J.J.—fussing loudly now that the clown show has come to an apparent end—a wooden spoon to bang on his tray. Above the commotion, she says, “It makes sense.”

Mack just looks at her, apparently not in agreement.

“You said yourself your suit pants were tight the other day,” she points out.

He immediately glances down at his stomach, then up at her—still not entirely sold, but she can tell he’s starting to believe it’s possible.

“Some medicine causes weight gain, you know,” he tells her. “Years ago, when Carrie was shooting herself up with all that medication trying to get pregnant, she gained a lot of weight. Dr. Hammond—that was our doctor at Riverview Clinic—said that it was from the hormones in the fertility drugs.”

“You’re not taking hormones.”

“I know, but—”

“Look, Mack, it’s true. You can go online and see for yourself—this medicine has a bunch of bizarre side effects. Weight gain isn’t one of them. But sleepwalking, sleep-eating . . . and trust me, it could definitely be worse.”

Over the relentless pounding of J.J.’s wooden spoon, she tells Mack some of the anecdotes she read on the Internet last night when she did her research into the subject. People taking Dormipram have fallen down flights of stairs, made lengthy phone calls, left their homes and had sex with strangers—all in their sleep, without any recollection.

“What do you think?” she asks Mack.

“I can’t even hear myself think!” Mack snatches the spoon from J.J., who immediately cries out in dismay. Ignoring the ruckus, Mack turns back to Allison. “Why didn’t you tell me this before I started taking the stuff?”