When her husband brought her to see a psychiatrist, XX admitted that she’d had thoughts of harming her child and that she had suicidal thoughts. She ascribed the suicidal thoughts to another personality, one that she identified with her own name. To test the theory that she now identified with her friend, the doctor called her by her friend’s name, to which she raised no objection. When he called her by her own name, she accused the doctor of forgetting her name and questioned his reputation. She then left the office abruptly—
The words blur in front of me and I feel so dizzy I have to close my eyes and rest my head on the table. The report describes my visit to Dr. Gruener’s office. But if this file is about Laurel, why is my visit to Dr. Gruener here? I remember Dr. Gruener calling me Laurel and then I had left abruptly, but that was because I was sure Peter was trying to steal Chloe, not because I was confused about who I was. I’d rushed home . . . no, I’d gone to Laurel’s house first. But I hadn’t gone in . . .
Or had I? I remember feeling dizzy, putting my head down . . . then I see myself getting out of the car and going up the front path, and letting myself into the house. But is it my house or Laurel’s? I smell something metallic and hear the sound of water. The sound and the smell are coming from upstairs. Then I hear a baby crying. I begin to go up the stairs. My feet feel heavy—as if I’m in one of those dreams where you’re trying to run and it’s like you’re swimming through molasses—only then I realize it’s because the carpet on the stairs is wet. And it’s a different color. Laurel’s carpets are white, but this carpet is red—
The red seeps over everything, drenching my vision, blocking out the stairs and the open bathroom door at the top of the stairs. I don’t want to see what’s inside.
I open my eyes and I’m back in the green room at Crantham, clutching the folder. The door in front of me is open. Dr. Hancock fills the frame, watching me.
“Why do you have this?” I demand, shaking the file at him. “What happened to Laurel?”
Instead of answering, he steps in and to the side so another man can enter: Peter, his face square with barely suppressed rage.
“I know what you did!” I scream. “You and Stan! You murdered Laurel to get her money!” I turn to Dr. Hancock. “I can prove it. I’ve got a copy of Laurel’s will that I found taped to the bottom of Peter’s drawer. Why would he have her will unless they were planning to kill her for her money? There was a photograph with the will, a picture of Peter as a boy, but with another name. He’s not even Peter Marist!” I jump to my feet just as a third man comes into the room. Stan Hobbes. “You killed her!” I scream. “You killed Laurel!”
Stan’s eyes fill with tears. Perhaps he feels remorse, but I don’t care. It’s too late for Laurel. I can see her face now, looking up from the blood-filled tub, her sightless eyes staring at me. He opens his mouth and I steel myself for a lie—he will tell me that she killed herself—but I am unprepared for what he says.
“How can that be true,” he asks, “when you’re standing right in front of me, Laurel?”
And then Peter adds, “It’s my wife, Daphne, who’s dead.”
Part II
Laurel’s Journal, June 11, 20—
First meeting of the mothers’ support group today. Stan insisted. Said it was either this or the hospital and I’d rather die than go back to the loony bin—even one of the posh ones.
Although this may be worse.
The leader is a gormless idiot. Esta—or Estrogena as I have dubbed her because she clearly has a serious case of estrogen poisoning. The women aren’t much better, which I blame completely on Westfuckingchester. I’m sure there’s a better class of loonies in Manhattan, but Stan also insisted that the city’s too stressful for my poor delicate nerves, as if it wasn’t stressful to be stuck out here with a bunch of lactating cows. One followed me out to the car like a fawning puppy, wanting to bond over our shared motherhood. What a doormat! She let her hedge-fund-manager husband bully her into not hiring a babysitter. Please.
Then I remembered that I’m supposed to be bonding with the locals, so I suggested a playdate. I thought she was going to jump in my lap. Seriously, you would have thought I asked her to a weekend in Paris. At least Doormat Daphne will be easy to schlep around, like that hideous diaper bag Stan bought for me. I mean, seriously, KatefuckingSpade.
Chapter Twelve
I died.
That’s the part I understood, the part I believed. The idea that I was Laurel—beautiful, accomplished Laurel—was not believable. But that Daphne had died and that this last week of leave-taking, driving through a dark forest, and starting a new life was all a kind of afterlife, that I could believe. Hadn’t it felt unreal all along? I could feel the pieces of my reconstructed life flying apart like a broken mirror. Only one of those shards pierced my heart.
“Chloe!” I cried. “What did I do to Chloe?”
Stan and Peter looked at each other. Only Dr. Hancock kept his eyes on me. “Which Chloe?” he asked.
“My Chloe!” I screamed. But already I wasn’t sure what that meant. I turned to Peter. “Your Chloe, then.”
He flinched as if I’d hit him. “You took her,” he said spitefully.
Stan stepped in. “But only because you were confused. We think you found Daphne drowned in the tub and Chloe there with her. Maybe in the tub.”
The red-washed image floods my vision: a dead woman with a baby lying beside her—“No! She’s not dead!” I could accept that I was dead, even
