by Sonja Yoerg
I learned a lot from that day. I learned I could do something immoral and irreversible and get away with it. I learned that people see what they want to see, even people trained to look deeper, like law enforcement. I learned it was not difficult to kill someone should the need or the desire arise again (which, as you know, it did). I learned that my mother got along just fine without my father. There was, curiously enough, a sense that his departure from the world had restored the rightful order of the Appletons, and this led to the final lesson. Some people, even seemingly successful and important people like my father, are not valued much less cherished. He should have stayed in Kansas.
You might be wondering why, after killing my father because he belittled my career choice, I didn’t become a doctor. Three weeks after the boating accident, as it came to be called, I returned to Dartmouth. My introductory psychology class was taught by a revolutionary man, John Gregory, who jumped over the field’s arcane history (who really cares what Freud thought?) and commonsense interpersonal nonsense (optimistic people are more popular!) and lectured instead about the brain and behavior. I was hooked.
Yes, yes, how fitting that a narcissist should develop a fascination with his own brain and use what he learns to manipulate the behaviors of others. What would you prefer I study? Empathy? Attachment? Morality? Perhaps instead of judging me you ought to feel sorry for me, you who have empathy to spare. I was born this way, after all, and cannot be trained to care more about others than I do. And I do care about other people, to a degree. The reason I didn’t want Jackie to move in with me, the reason I would not marry her, was, in part, selfless. What Jackie and I had was working—for both of us—but I had no confidence that I could tolerate more time together or greater intimacy or a firmer commitment. It might not have been healthy for her. If I had allowed her deeper into my lair, so to speak, she might never have left.
Look what happened to Jeffrey. I didn’t plan to murder him, but the moment I saw him kiss Jackie, I knew I had to, very much like I made the decision to kill my father. I was appalled and enraged. There simply could not be a world in which dashing little Jeffrey Toshack would replace Miles, replace me. I followed Jeffrey to the river, keeping to the shadows, waiting for my chance. The longer I waited, the more my outrage was transformed into cunning. My concentration became laser-like, and as he walked ahead of me, my mind took in the possibilities, calculated the probabilities, and eventually revealed the correct strategy.
Seeing his trajectory, I took a shortcut. He neared the boathouse, and I was ahead of him on the towpath, pretending to be searching for my keys on the ground using a flashlight app. Nice guy that he was, he stopped to help. Our search strayed toward an alley where a broken oar became a convenient weapon. If it hadn’t been there, I’d have surprised him by knocking him over, kicking him in the head, something like that. But improvisation is risky, and the oar was handy. The first blow was well placed and the second laid him out cold. I finished him off, took his wallet, and dragged him into the water. I was wearing gloves, so I left the oar in the alley. Job done.
My lawyer says Jackie’s recordings are problematic but not definitive. It’s now two weeks after the body was found, and the cops have no clear physical evidence, nothing placing me at the scene, as they say. (I told them I found the photo the following day during a walk, thought it might be Jackie and her friend, having seen them at the bar.) The lack of evidence is vexing for the DA, as is my unflappable nature. I’ve answered some of their questions, but their efforts to get me to implicate myself have been futile.
As for moral quandaries, I’ll leave you with this: if you think about what happened, really think about it, all I did was show Nasira, Miles, and, most important, Jackie who they truly were. That makes me less of a monster and more of a mirror. What did I tell Jackie? Open your eyes.
Jackie’s Story
Brownsburg, Virginia, 2009
Grace’s wedding was so, well, Grace: perfect precisely because she never cared about perfection. She was the anti-bridezilla, caring about everyone, but not everything, remembering always that a wedding is a celebration, not a show. I’m certain that even if she and Hector had all the money in the world, they would not have spent a dime more.
Grace’s best friend, Kendall, grew up on an old farm in Brownsburg, ten miles from where Grace and Hector now live. Kendall’s parents offered their barn as the wedding venue. I was doubtful when Grace first told me about it, but it was, in fact, an oak cathedral. On that bright May afternoon, the ceremony—officiated by a minister friend of Hector’s—took place in front of the open barn doors. The guests sat on folding chairs and logs, listening to bluegrass music played by whoever picked up a fiddle or a banjo. I was stunned by how many musicians were present; in my own life, I didn’t know a single one.
I wasn’t in the wedding party because Grace and Hector decided against that structure. My mother told me she disapproved of this break with tradition, but her disapproval of marriage as an institution was greater, and she knew her protest on either score was futile. Before the ceremony started, Cheryl perched on the edge of a folding chair, as if poised to leap to her feet should the chair snap closed beneath her. Elegant but unduly formal in her navy shift, she seemed to be reminding herself to smile.
Hector wore a simple gray suit, a white shirt, and a tie the color of fresh-cut hay. He stood, with his hands clasped in front, next to his friend the minister, and waited for Grace. All the children in attendance had been given wands with colored ribbons and waved them as they ran around the perimeter. Their laughing and shrieking became part of the music.
An elderly man sitting at the front turned his chair toward the group, took a harmonica out of his pocket, and sent the first exquisite notes of Pachelbel’s Canon in D into the air. I was so transfixed I didn’t notice Grace had arrived. A hush poured over the crowd like cream.
She wore an antique ivory dress with an Empire waist—right out of a Jane Austen novel—and held a bouquet picked from the meadow behind the house. No veil or tiara or headband, just her wavy auburn hair falling over her shoulders instead of in its usual ponytail. She looked exactly like herself in the very best way. Her joy was everywhere that day. Hector’s was, too. Their shared joy was as wide as the blue Virginia sky.
This wasn’t just my perception. Everyone sensed the magic of the day and would remember it always. I could see it in every beaming smile, in every gesture. People danced to every tune, helped with children who weren’t theirs. Even those who drank to excess—and there were plenty—didn’t turn mean or sloppy. The scent of spring fields swept in through the barn doors, and sunlight streamed through the chinks. On the notes of fiddles and banjos, laughter rose to the rafters of the barn and rained down on Grace and Hector’s loved ones, soaking them with joy, and sending music and laughter high once again. That day, the feeling of it, would forever run through Grace and Hector’s marriage like a golden thread; it was undeniable.
I shared in it, drank it up. My sister, my little sister, bathed in the grace for which she was named. I don’t know how many times I hugged her or how often I caught her eye and felt my heart swell. We were replete with wine and love, helped along by the most glorious spring day I’d ever witnessed.
Sounds incredible, doesn’t it? And unforgettable; my memory is vivid. At dusk, white Japanese lanterns were lit, casting a gentle light, and the first stars shone through the open barn door. I went out.
I wasn’t alone in the night air. The celebration had spilled over, and people had gathered on the logs and by the carriage house next door. Children raced through the fields, arms outstretched to skim the tops of the grasses, releasing daredevil screams as the night closed in.
I’d taken only a few steps from the epicenter of the party, but it was enough to expose the other sensation I harbored but had not acknowledged. It was as powerful and convincing as the joy I shared with my sister, my brother-in-law, and everyone who gathered to celebrate with them.
I kn
ew with certainty I would never know a day like this, or a love like theirs.
The feeling wasn’t pity, nor was it envy; I didn’t want to be Grace. Rather, as I stood at the edge of the night-dark field, I had a solid sense of being walled off from the love radiating behind me. I was happy for them—I’ve said that before, but it bears repeating—but I would not carry that happiness away into my relationships because I could not imagine, much less replicate, what they had. Their love was a faraway city, and I lacked a map and the courage to wander.
Did I want it, though?
Not then. I had Harlan. Or, rather, Harlan had me. He had discovered me. His attention toward me was a sincere expression of his delight in his discovery. Even a thoroughly deceitful and ruthless person can act with honesty, nurture a bond, and become deeply attached. Harlan’s emotions are real, as real as anyone else’s, but for him the correspondence is of intellectual interest only. He knows other people have emotions; he simply doesn’t care about them. He may act as if he cares, but it’s a performance designed to attract something he wants. Or someone.
I allowed Harlan to decide for me what relationships ought to be, what love was and wasn’t. Having no map and not knowing where to search, I closed my eyes and could not see for myself. He saw for me, and I mistook my relief for satisfaction.
I mistook a great many things.
Perhaps everyone has stories they keep in a lockbox, stories they are not willing to own much less share. But if you don’t acknowledge your own history—all of it, especially the underside—then aren’t you creating blind spots of your own?
CHAPTER 31
On January 2, the day after Harlan confronted her, Jackie is making chili and corn bread, tired of takeout and makeshift meals. She’s listening to the podcast This American Life, which features a story about a phone booth in Japan, in the coastal city where the tsunami hit in 2011. The phone inside isn’t connected, but people come, alone or in family groups, to have one-sided conversations with their lost loved ones. It’s heartbreaking and beautiful at the same time, the way intensely human things often are.
Her phone warbles beside the chopping board. It’s Vince.
“Hi, Vince.” It’s odd for him to call during the break, and Jackie steels herself for bad news.
“Happy New Year, Jackie. I hope it’s okay for me to call.”
“Of course. What’s going on?”
“If you haven’t found someone already to audit your data, I’ve got a lead.”
Jackie had shoved the necessity of the audit to the back of her mind. “I haven’t. Who is it?”
“A friend of mine. He’s between jobs. The start-up he worked for was bought, and he wasn’t part of the package.”
“I know you wouldn’t recommend him if he wasn’t qualified, but what does he do?”
Vince laughs. “Paco’s not qualified. He’s overqualified—a data manager. And don’t worry, he’ll do it on the cheap.”
Jackie shakes her head. “I don’t know what to say, Vince.”
“You’re welcome.”
She laughs. “Thank you. You’re a lifesaver—again.” Her thoughts cast back to Vince’s sleuthing to uncover the problems in her data. “Hey, Vince? Do you happen to be free this evening?” He’s shuffling around; she’s made him nervous. “I want to tell you about some things that’ve been going on, connected to the data breach.”
“Oh, okay. Where should I meet you?”
“How do you feel about chili?”
Before Vince arrives, Jackie has already decided to tell him everything. It seems the best way to get his help, and he is too smart not to catch her skipping over things. She relates the whole story over dinner. At first, he’s clearly uncomfortable being in her house, but as she unfolds the incidents of the past three months—the ones he hasn’t been privy to—he is as quiet as a stalking cat.
She finishes telling him about yesterday, about the photograph and Detective Cash’s assessment of the voice and video recordings.
He moves his bowl to the side, slowly, as if it were delicate. “So the detective is hoping the security footage will show Harlan on campus that night.”
“Right. But Harlan was probably aware of the cameras.”
Vince frowns. “I never liked that guy. And I’m sure the feeling is mutual.”
He’s quiet for a long while, staring into the middle distance. Jackie watches him, as if she might view his thought processes, observe his neural networks sorting and analyzing the data. She sips her wine and waits.
He turns to her. “You’re fairly certain Harlan saw you with your friend near Wolf Hall the night he was killed?”
“I’m guessing that’s what triggered it.” She doesn’t mention kissing Jeff again. Earlier, Vince frowned at that point in the story.
Vince nods. “If the police are on the ball, they will have subpoenaed his phone records already. But I’m guessing Harlan was smart enough not to leave his location services on when leaving his house to commit a crime—assuming that was his intention.”
“I’m not sure what his intention was, maybe just to follow us, see what the relationship was about.”
Vince leans forward, holds Jackie’s gaze. “It’s not his intention that interests me. He says he was at home, and I think his phone says something else.”
Jackie’s not following. “How?”
“When you walk up to Wolf Hall, what happens?” He reads her blank expression. “Ah, well, you probably have the notifications off, but when you come within range of the Wi-Fi there, it automatically connects you, assuming you have the Wi-Fi turned on. Most people do.”
She sits up straighter. “So if Harlan had his phone on him, he might’ve logged on to the Wi-Fi without realizing it.”
He grins. “And guess who’s got access to those records?”
Four days later, Detective Cash calls to say they arrested Harlan. Using Jackie’s recordings and testimony, the police obtained a search warrant for Harlan’s house and phone. Vince was right; the phone placed Harlan on campus, close to where Jackie had last seen Jeff. Tests revealed that a black woolen coat of Harlan’s had recently been dry-cleaned. Blood along the sleeve was detected via luminol and matched to Jeff’s. Harlan either didn’t know about the stains or was unaware that regular dry-cleaning wouldn’t remove them. When he was first questioned, he tried to implicate Miles, knowing nothing about the MedFit data, thereby digging a deeper hole for himself. The judge refused him bail, and the DA is confident of a conviction.
Jackie cries after Cash delivers the news, relieved she no longer has to look over her shoulder when she leaves the house and gratified that Harlan will likely receive the punishment he deserves. Harlan Crispin, always in control, is no longer. Jackie doubts there’s a lesson in that for him, but that has always been his problem. He isn’t capable of change, of learning how to live, only of putting on a different mask.
It doesn’t take long for the news to spread of the arrest of a prominent professor on murder charges. Three days after Harlan is locked up, someone leaks information about Jackie’s link to the victim. To avoid the media vans outside her home, Jackie hides in her lab, working sixteen-hour days. When she’s absorbed in her research, she forgets—at first for minutes, then hours at a time—what has befallen her and everyone else in Harlan’s path.
A week after the news hits, Amy Chen, the department chair, calls Jackie into her office.
“I heard reporters found their way into your lecture and caused a disruption. I’d like someone else to take over that class.”
Jackie suspects Chen is less worried about a disruption of learning than she is about negative attention. “Simmons is a large hall with lots of entrances. The reporters foiled campus security. All this will blow over soon.”
“Maybe. But what about when the trial starts?”
Chen has a point. Jackie has been focusing on getting through each day, putting her life back together, but the media isn’t going to let her forget about Harlan anytim
e soon. The thought exhausts her, and she fantasizes about escaping somewhere until the storm passes. It’s an impossible fantasy, however; her commitments to her research and her students will keep her right where she is.
“If you insist,” Jackie says. “But since none of this is my doing, I expect the lecture credits.”
Chen reluctantly agrees, and Jackie brightsides the development: she now has a few more hours a week to work with Vince’s friend to sort out the mess Harlan made of her data.
Jackie sits cross-legged in the upholstered chair in her office, her laptop balanced on her knees, reading a draft of Kyle’s dissertation. It’s Martin Luther King Day and the lab—in fact, the entire campus—is empty. Her plan is to read the first three chapters, then see if she can walk into town for lunch without reporters dogging her. She’s adapted to being recognized by students who stare at her not so surreptitiously, but having a microphone thrust in her face still rankles her.
Someone enters the lab. A moment later, Nasira appears in the doorway.
“Hi, Jackie. Do you have a sec? If you’re busy, later is fine.”
“Now’s good. Have a seat.” Jackie’s been worried about Nasira, who confided to Jackie that she hasn’t been sleeping well since the truth about Harlan surfaced. Who could blame her? She and Nasira have distracted themselves with movies and takeout dinners at Jackie’s house, but there is no papering over the horror of having slept with and having had feelings for a murderer.
Nasira removes her jacket and settles herself in a chair. “My parents called last night. They’d been in Jordan and in France and hadn’t seen the news about Harlan until now.”
“And obviously you hadn’t volunteered it.”
She spreads her hands. “It’s so much to explain, and over the phone? I didn’t know how.” She sighs. “Honestly, I didn’t want to get into it. They disapproved of him, and boy did they ever turn out to be right.”
