Her Perfect Life

by Rebecca Taylor

“Yes, I think so.”

  He nodded once and started to leave again before stopping himself. “I’m sorry. I just… I’m sorry,” he finished and left.

  Eileen stood staring out the door after him for several seconds. Her mind, exhausted, wrung-out, and still addled with wine, refused to try to work anything out beyond what she needed for basic life support. Her heart was beating, her lungs still breathing, and she would need to get herself to the kitchen and find a glass of water soon.

  She tipped her head back and looked up at the heavy-beamed wood ceiling. This room, with its dark wood and heavy upholstery, was so unlike the whole rest of the house. It was Simon’s space, she realized. This was the one room that looked like a historic library. Everywhere else was entirely her sister’s style: white walls, high ceilings, bright spaces. Clare had built her home as she’d wanted and given this space to her husband. Eileen stared at the large bookcase before her, her eyes focusing on titles that lined shelf after shelf, multiple copies of each book Clare had ever written, she realized.

  Clare had allowed him this space to make as his own, and he had filled it with his wife’s work.

  A memory came to her, Eileen and Clare standing at a white linen–covered high-top table in a swanky Manhattan bar, glasses of champagne in hand. Simon was surrounded by his friends and coworkers. His face beamed with obvious joy as he accepted slaps on the back and congratulations on his recent engagement.

  “You love him?” Eileen had suddenly asked her sister.

  Clare took a sip from her long-stemmed flute before placing it on the table in front of them. She tilted her head, her eyes watching her future husband for a moment before turning to meet Eileen’s. “No.”

  Eileen had been stunned by Clare’s brutal admission, but not surprised. She had always suspected. “So why?” Eileen asked, glancing down at the new four-carat rock pinning Clare’s left hand to the table.

  “Because…if I could love someone again, I think it would be him.”

  “Clare,” Eileen had said, attempting to find some way to express that something was wrong without fully understanding it herself. “He adores you.”

  Her sister had nodded. “That’s why I’m marrying him,” she’d explained, then raised her slim glass for another sip of champagne.

  Eileen left Simon’s office and headed for the kitchen. After rooting through several cupboards with no success, Eileen finally located the glasses near the sink. Too exhausted and already overwhelmed to try to figure out the NASA-looking water system built into the refrigerator, Eileen filled her glass at the sink and went to find her room.

  At the landing where the grand single marble staircase split into two heading off in opposite directions, Eileen veered right. What were Henry’s directions again? She continued up until at the top she faced a long hallway with several closed doors. She couldn’t remember which room Henry had said was hers, but she hoped she wouldn’t accidentally stumble into Simon again so soon.

  Without a clue, she cracked the first door off the second floor landing slowly, just in case Simon was in there sleeping, changing clothes—crying. She absolutely did not want to disturb him right now. When she didn’t hear anything, she dared to push the door further.

  She remembered this room. It was Clare’s study. Three years ago she had sat on that white couch, drinking a glass of wine with her sister, watching the sun set over the Pacific. The room looked exactly the same as she recalled. No furniture had moved; no new artwork filled the walls. Even the early evening light flooding in through the massive glass walls was the same. Eileen’s eyes were drawn to the sun on the horizon, the radiant half disc throwing a shattering of orange and yellow light out across the ocean.

  She came fully into Clare’s room and closed the door behind her. Standing with her back pressed to the door, Eileen stared into her sister’s space. The silence—it was so profound, so pervasive, it struck Eileen with a chill.

  Eileen’s life, filled with her children, her dogs, her phone, her…husband—it was a constant chaos. Silence never had any chance of taking hold anywhere at any time. When she had been here before, in this very room, Eileen had dragged all that life chaos with her. She hadn’t realized before, not really, what Clare’s daily world was like—the stillness, the eerie quiet of a day not filled to overflowing with other needful bodies. Eileen had been unable to see how her own family had come in and filled up this empty house. It seemed very different to her now.

  Was this really how Clare had wanted to live?

  Eileen headed for the couch and the view of the sun setting on one of the worst days of her entire life. She lowered herself onto the taut, buttoned leather and gazed out at the sparkling lights dancing across the ocean. Only last night, Clare had been alive. Dressed in a beautiful gown, attending the premiere for her new movie—how was it even possible for a person to die so suddenly? To move so quickly from being a part of your life, to gone forever? Eileen spread her hands out onto the cushions on either side of her. When was the last time her sister had been here, in this very spot? Less than twenty-four hours? Eileen sat upright and looked more closely at her sister’s room. Where had Clare been when she’d killed herself?

  Simon hadn’t yet told her where he’d found Clare.

  This room? It seemed impossible that a violent suicide could have been cleared from this pristine space in only a day. It was impossible, Eileen decided. She didn’t know where Clare had taken her life, but it wasn’t here.

  She swallowed back a fresh wave of tears. She didn’t want to cry anymore today.

  On the glass coffee table in front of her, a slim notebook caught her attention. A rainbow of shiny colors, peeling edges, and My Diary stamped across the center in silver—a child’s book, something Paige would have had five years ago. It didn’t belong in this very adult space. Eileen leaned forward and picked it up off the table before settling back in the cushions. It was old and very familiar. Eileen sucked her breath when the connection came to her. This was Clare’s. Back in their small house in Casper, Wyoming, they had shared a bedroom, and Clare had kept this diary under the corner of her mattress. How many nights had Eileen fallen asleep to the sight of Clare sitting up in bed under the dim glow of their shared night-light, scribbling in this book? This book and so many others, Eileen suddenly remembered.

  She ran a finger over the book’s peeling edges; Clare had kept it all these years.

  Eileen opened the limp and tattered cover to the first page. There it was, Clare’s looping and sloppy penciled script. The words had faded over the years, but she could still clearly read Clare’s first words.

  Mama said Daddy isn’t coming home. And her next—I hope to God it’s true.

  The words surprised her. She placed the tips of her fingers on them. Eileen had been nine when their father died, so Clare would have been eleven when she wrote this—almost the same age as Ryan was now. Her memory of their dad had always been hazy, more a vague remembrance of the emotions she felt whenever he was around—which wasn’t that much, she thought—but that fear, the sharp tension even the sound of his voice in the house always created, that’s what she remembered the most about their dad.

  There were also the moments, highly detailed moments of horror. Her parents shouting late at night, the sound of bodies slamming into walls and the crash of furniture as it overturned. The day their mother came home and installed two locks on the inside of Clare and Eileen’s bedroom, one on the doorknob and another sliding bolt. Still in her cop uniform, she had sat on Clare’s bed and given them explicit instructions to lock the door every night from then on. No matter what they heard, they were never to unlock the door or come out if they heard their dad was home.

  There was also the time at Christmas when their dad bought both Eileen and Clare matching porcelain piggy banks and then filled them with fifty dollars in quarters.

  Eileen closed her sister’s childhood jo
urnal. Their father was a drug addict, heroin to be specific, but in the end he would take almost any kind of pill, powder, or injection he could get his hands on. There were pictures in their house from before, when he and her mother were younger and he was healthy—but Eileen had no real life memories of him without a gaunt and haggard complexion made terrifying by his erratic, unpredictable, and often-violent behavior when he needed money for drugs.

  Clare had hoped to God it was true that their father wouldn’t come home that night from the hospital—that childhood, dredging up those sepia-colored memories, Eileen couldn’t remember if she had felt the same. She had always felt like her father was someone she had barely known; had she wished him dead as well? When he was around, he frightened her and hurt their mom. It wouldn’t surprise her if she had felt the same as Clare; she just couldn’t remember.

  With the notebook in hand, Eileen stood up and scanned Clare’s study again. This was the first of Clare’s journals, but there had been many, many more, and those were just the ones Eileen knew about from their childhood together. Had Clare kept journaling all this time?

  The room was falling into shadow as the sun on the horizon dipped deeper into the Pacific. She got up, flipped the switch next to the bookcase, and cast the entire north side of the room out of the creeping darkness. She scanned the shelves for several seconds before noticing the bottom; row after row of slim volumes pressed tight against one another. She crouched down and pried several out from the middle—they were journals, a hundred at least. Clare’s words about Clare’s life?

  Eileen stood up with the books in hand, and considered all the other journals still on the shelves. It was like holding on to a piece of her sister, an intimate part of Clare’s world, her experiences, her feelings, her perceptions. As kids, Clare had caught Eileen reading her journals many times—her wrath and retribution had been swift and usually painful. But even back then, Clare’s life was so much more interesting than her own. She looked up to her sister, envied her. Reading her journals was Eileen’s way of both finding out about Clare’s life and measuring her own uneventful days. Was it wrong to read these now? She imagined Clare chasing her around this room, as adults, screaming at the top of her lungs for Eileen to “give me that back, you little bitch!” right before she caught the back of Eileen’s shirt and wrestled her to the posh white shag rug. The ridiculous thought made her smile—until reality rushed back in.

  Eileen held Clare’s journals to her chest. How could she have let her own sister drift so far away? She took a ragged breath and let it go. “I’m sorry, Clare,” she stated. “But I don’t give a shit about your privacy,” she whispered. She knelt back down in front of the shelf and grabbed another handful of books. “I need to know, okay? I need to know why you would do this to yourself, and I’m going to find out,” she said.

  When she stood up, her arms now loaded with Clare’s journals, she carried them to the door, checked to make sure Simon was nowhere nearby, and shuttled them into the hall. She had to open and check two more rooms before discovering where Henry had put her bags.

  With her elbow, Eileen pressed the wall switch to turn on the chandelier hanging over the center of the room. It was exactly as she remembered it. She and Eric had slept here three years ago at Christmas, while the three kids had shared the room down the hall. This room had the same west-facing view of the Pacific out of the glass wall that, just like the larger version in Clare’s study, slid open to a private balcony.

  Eileen placed the journals on the dresser, found her tote, and dug her phone out from the bottom. Three missed calls, two from Eric and one from Paige. Eileen lowered herself onto the bed and tried to imagine speaking with Eric right now.

  Should she lay it all out, confront him about Lauren, the affair; tell him about the photos Dave sent? She couldn’t. She had no idea what she’d say or how he would react. And the kids? It was too soon. She needed to think, but she also couldn’t imagine pretending like nothing was wrong either. She pulled up a group text with her whole family instead.

  Arrived safe. There is a lot to manage, and I’m exhausted. I’ll call tomorrow. Good night.

  She hesitated a moment, then finished, Love you, Mom, before hitting send. It was for her kids. Eric could go fuck himself, even if she couldn’t say as much right now. Eileen put her phone facedown on the bed beside her and stared at the stack of journals in front of her. She was exhausted—that was no lie—but she pushed herself up off the bed anyway and grabbed one of the books off the top stack. She pressed the button that controlled the sliding glass door to the balcony. As the wall opened, a rush of cold sea air blew in off the ocean. It made her eyes water and swept her hair back off her shoulders. The briny scent filled her senses and the room behind her, blowing open several of the journal covers and rustling the pages.

  It was early evening; the light was fading and the temperature dropping, so she turned on the balcony light and started up the outside gas heater. She remembered that Clare and Simon kept a small wine rack and a mini fridge with other drinks and snacks in the closet for their guests. She placed the journal on one of the outdoor loungers and went back inside, pulled opened the cabinet, and grabbed a bottle of sparkling water, a bottle of red wine, and a small bag of mixed nuts before settling in on the balcony with the blanket from the bottom of the bed.

  Until she started reading, there was no way of knowing when in Clare’s lifetime this was created. Was this one from her childhood? Her life after she moved to New York? Or here in California? If Clare had kept them on the shelf in chronological order, this was likely one of the earlier journals, but there was no way of knowing until she dove in.

  She pressed open the spine with her palm and read her sister’s words.

  Chapter 12

  Clare

  Twenty-two years before her death

  In the theater seat next to her, Kaylee nudged her arm with her elbow. “Adam’s next,” she whispered and pointed to his name on the single sheet program Bobby Wright had handed them at the entrance to the Cleaver High auditorium.

  Clare gave her a tight-mouthed smile and nodded. She knew perfectly well that Adam was next. She had suffered through the first eleven acts, along with everyone else in the packed auditorium, simply to get to this moment. With her eyes glued to the stage, she could feel her heartbeat in her throat. Everyone knew Adam Collins would be the best act in this year’s annual Cleaver High talent show. He had been the best act since seventh grade in the Ralston Middle School annual talent show. That was why they always scheduled him last, so people didn’t simply get up and leave as soon as they’d heard Adam play.

  Adam walked out from behind the red curtains, pushed open at both sides of the stage. The entire auditorium erupted into spontaneous applause the moment they saw him, long before he was anywhere near the old grand piano in the center of the spotlight. As soon as he heard the roar, the whoops and whistles, the loud and booming “Aaaaduuuuum” being chanted by the standing-room-only crowd, a smile spread over Adam’s face. He lowered his head and gave the people of Casper a one-handed salute wave and continued toward the piano bench waiting for him.

  Clare, neither clapping nor shouting, squirmed in her seat. Clare knew there was more than one person in the audience watching her, judging her. Wondering, still, why the hell Adam Collins, with his good looks, good family, and good chance of one day playing professional basketball, wasted his time with Clare Kaczanowski. Clare could practically hear them thinking, feel their eyes on her back.

  Next to her, Kaylee sat upright in her seat and clapped furiously for her twin brother until someone a few rows in front of them caught her attention. Craning her neck, Kaylee stopped clapping and leaned toward Clare. “Take a look at Ms. Homecoming,” she whispered, nodding her head in the direction she wanted Clare to look.

  Three rows in front of them, Heather Roberts was surrounded by her friends and beaming up at Adam, who was taking
his seat in front of the piano. Clare watched her turn to her left and whisper something to her best friend, Winnie, who nodded approval. Clare bristled, and a white-hot flame of irritation ignited in her gut. It was no secret Heather Roberts wanted Adam.

  “Such a bitch,” Kaylee whispered. “As if Adam would ever… Why doesn’t she give up already?”

  Her mouth suddenly dry, Clare swallowed hard and gave Kaylee a grateful smile, despite the fact that her words did nothing to relieve Clare of her dread. Heather Roberts was exactly the kind of girl this whole fucking town thought Adam should be with. Good looking, good family, and a good chance of making something of herself since she would be heading off to the University of Chicago with her full-ride academic scholarship next fall.

  Heather Roberts would be less than two hundred miles from where Adam would be playing basketball for the Hoosiers and majoring in music at Indiana University.

  One thousand three hundred miles from where Clare would be, right here in Casper, working as a receptionist for Carter’s Moving and Storage out on Old Round Road. Her mother had set up the job for her, bragging to the owner, Roland Carter, about Clare’s “exceptional typing skills.” That’s what Mrs. Cartwright had written on her last report card along with the A+ she’d received in her typing class. “Clare has exceptional typing skills!”

  Exactly what Roland Carter needed in a new receptionist. A pleasant phone voice and fast, accurate fingers on the new computer he’d just invested in. He’d hired her right away. Part-time after school for now, full time starting in less than a month once she graduated from school.

  Less than a month.

  Up onstage, Adam placed his hands on the keys and waited while the noise from the audience died down by degrees until the whole room sat in silence and waited. In a town like Casper, where almost nothing truly special ever happened, Adam Collins was extraordinary. He was this town’s high school basketball star, good enough to lure scouts from a dozen big universities to the middle of Wyoming to watch him practice and play, and turn down offers of full-ride scholarships to other schools before accepting Indiana University. And if that weren’t enough, having the best local teacher for a mother, he also played the piano like he’d been born in front of it. In a town without many cultural highlights, Adam Collins working his way through Chopin’s “Polonaise No. 6” was almost, almost, as great an evening as watching the kid orchestrate the basketball with the fluidity and grace of a ballet dancer.