A local woman missing- Mary Kubica

if I told the truth, it might get back to Josh, and then he’d discover the
lie by omission. It’s a catch-22. I can’t win.
The next day, Bea comes to the house. I’m alone when she
comes.
“Should we be seen together?” I ask when we’re behind closed
doors.
“Why would that matter, Meredith?” she asks.
“Because of what we did,” I hiss under my breath.
“And what was that?” she asks. “Go to the bar and have a good
time?” She tells me that to avoid suspicion, I have to act normal.
I recoil, offended. “I am acting normal,” I say, though I’m not. I’m
far from it.
Bea asks what I would do if a client of mine ever went missing. “I
don’t know,” I say, controlling the sudden urge to cry. Bea, before
me, is impassive, tall. She looms over me in the foyer of my home.
She didn’t bring an umbrella and so she’s wet. She drips onto my
entry rug. “It’s never happened before.”
“Don’t be stupid,” she says, deadpan. It comes as a slap to the
face. “Theoretically, Meredith, what would you do?”
I swallow hard. “I’d call her husband. Express my condolences.
See if there’s anything I can do.”
“Then do it,” she commands. “Do it today.”
She leaves the same way she came. I walk to the front window to
watch her go, to be sure she’s really gone.
Outside the world is charcoal gray. It’s foggy. I can only see to the
other side of the street. The world beyond evanesces into clouds.
In the coming days, police descend upon our neighborhood like
snow in winter. I watch from a distance. No one comes to our house
asking questions, though I obsess over what I’ll do when and if that
happens.
What we learn, we learn from word-of-mouth and the news.
Josh is all worked up about it. “How does a grown woman just
disappear?” he asks no one in particular. He’s pacing the house. He