Killing Monica Read online

  So much for so-called male authority.

  On a strange sort of autopilot, as if Jonny had never come to the house at all, Pandy poked her head into the kitchen. The large clock on the wall indicated that it was two p.m.; traditionally an ideal time for a swim in the marble pool. The sun would be high overhead, and the pool would be at its warmest point of the day.

  She grabbed a long striped towel from the mudroom and slung it around her neck. The fabric, softened by years of washing, was like a pashmina. Stepping outside, Pandy draped the towel over her head.

  She set off along a path of cedar wood chips that rose gently into the pines. Under the trees were thick beds of pine needles where you could lie down and make a bed, the way the deer sometimes did.

  Heading down into the private hollow where the pool was located, she removed her negligee, tossing it onto a piece of statuary. Then she stood naked at the side of the pool, staring into the mirrored surface. The stream running through the pool would be about fifty-eight degrees. The water in the pool, heated by the reflections of the sun’s rays against the black marble, would be about sixty-eight degrees. Not a completely unreasonable temperature, but for the uninitiated, shocking.

  She dove in.

  The smack of the cold water was like an electric jolt. Every circuit in her body lit up like a Christmas tree. She swam underwater until she could feel her body screaming for oxygen. Pressing the last bit of air out of her lungs, she popped up out of the water, heart thumping with adrenaline, giddy with relief, her mind clear and her heart restored.

  Striding out of the pool and up the marble steps, she stared straight into the western sun and knew what she needed to do.

  And then she blinked, suddenly aware of a cartoonish blot in the periphery of her vision. The blot grew arms and legs, and appeared to be engaged in the sort of frenetic dance practiced by the Romans at a bacchanal.

  In the next second, the reveler burst toward her in full living color: Jonny, naked and screaming, scratching at his groin so fiercely that Pandy was afraid he would rip his cock off.

  Chiggers.

  While Jonny lay sleeping on Old Jay’s mattress, the heat of his body had warmed the dormant chigger larvae. They had awakened from their long nap and had begun doing exactly what Mother Nature intended: They began feeding.

  Chiggers had exceptionally small mouths, and were only able to bite through the body’s more delicate skin. Specifically, the crotch, the armpits, the ankles, the groin, and behind the knees.

  “Help me!” Jonny screamed.

  Pandy took one look at him and thought, I told him not to sleep in Old Jay’s bed. Then she did what she had been taught to do in just this sort of emergency:

  She pushed him in.

  The cold water would immediately kill the chiggers, and act as a sort of ice pack on the bitten areas.

  Jonny landed safely in the four-foot shallow end, and flailing like a monkey, he began screaming again, scratching at his underarms as he plowed through the water to the steps. He pushed Pandy aside, collapsed onto the grass, and curled up in the fetal position.

  He felt Pandy’s shadow looming over him and stared at her accusingly, his eyes full of black hatred.

  “You pushed me in!” he screamed.

  “I had to.” Pandy shrugged.

  “I nearly drowned.”

  “Oh, stop,” Pandy said. “The top of your hair is barely wet.”

  Hauling himself to his feet, Jonny took a few threatening steps toward her. “Don’t you know I can’t swim?”

  “Yes, Jonny. I do.” Pandy nodded sharply. “You told me, remember?” And before he could begin shouting again, she said quickly, “I want a divorce.”

  Fifteen minutes later, Jonny was dressed and at the car. Hauling open the trunk, he threw his overnight bag inside. “I’ll never forgive you. You tried to drown me!” He slammed the trunk, spun on his heel, and pointed his finger. “You’re going to pay for this, baby. Boy, are you going to pay.”

  “Fine!” Pandy spat as he stomped around the side of the car. “I’d do anything to get rid of you.”

  “And you want to know something else?” He yanked open the door, got in, closed it, and stuck his head out the window. “I only went out in that fucking snowstorm because my mother thought you would be good for my career.”

  “I knew it!” Pandy screamed. “You are a fucking mama’s boy. Henry warned me—”

  “Henry? Henry?” he spat, tilting his head back and laughing maniacally. “As if Henry knows anything about being a man.”

  “He knows a lot more than you do, Diaper Boy.”

  “You frigid cunt. Hasta la vista, baby. Nice knowing you.” Jonny started the car and stepped on the gas, flipping her the bird out the open window.

  “Fuck you!” Pandy screamed. “Fuuuuck youuuu!” She ran down the drive after him, continuing to yell until his car disappeared around the corner.

  Jesus H. Christ, she thought, marching back up the driveway barefoot. What a way to end a marriage. With a “fuck you.”

  How incredibly…unoriginal.

  She went into the house, slammed the door behind her, and marched into the library.

  She didn’t care. There was only one thing that mattered now.

  She knew exactly what her next book was going to be about, and it wasn’t Monica.

  * * *

  And so, as she danced to the music of her own imagination, dreaming of great triumphs, the divorce cyclone out in the real world began to whirl. First it picked up people—lawyers, private investigators, process servers—a whole Dickensian underworld of characters, each with his or her hand out.

  Then it picked up the press: ANOTHER CELEBRITY MARRIAGE ON THE ROCKS!

  And then it picked up paper: endless requests for bank statements, contracts, emails, and texts. And on and on, and back and forth about what was or was not relevant, and who’d said what to whom. She had managed to live through it only by escaping from it as often as possible. Specifically, into the eighteenth century and the mind of Lady Wallis Wallis when she arrived in New York City, circa 1775.

  At the time, Pandy didn’t know if what she was writing was literary or historical. It might have been YA. All she knew was that trying to tell Lady Wallis’s story was what had given her courage.

  What she’d never imagined was that it could fail.

  Now, Pandy looked out the window of the town car Henry had arranged to drive her from the Pool Club and saw that she was nearly back in Wallis. Where she’d been only once since that long, awful day when she had told Jonny she wanted a divorce.

  Through the endless dealings with Jonny’s lawyers and demands for money, Pandy had assumed that Lady Wallis would make it all okay in the end.

  Except she hadn’t.

  The driver hit the brakes. “Which way?”

  “That way,” Pandy said, pointing to the narrow rutted track that was Wallis Road.

  And right there, at the last outpost of cell phone service, her phone began fluttering those happy notes from Monica’s theme song.

  Pandy picked it up.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  HENRY?”

  Her voice came out thickly, like she was speaking through clotted cream. She had to take a sip of water before she could continue. “Please tell me what I think happened two hours ago back at the Pool Club didn’t happen?”

  “I wish I could, my dear,” Henry said with firm sympathy.

  “You mean, it did happen?”

  “Yes.”

  “Are you sure?” Pandy began to protest as she became aware of a terrible poisoned feeling. Her body felt stuck between a blackout and a terrific hangover, in a sort of alcoholic purgatory.

  It was all that champagne she’d drunk. At the Pool Club. With her friends.

  She shook her head, trying not to remember too much. If she did, she might very well become sick. In fact, she probably would be sick.

  And yet, there was something in Pandy that still wanted to resist r
eality, especially when it was this bad. She took another gulp of water. “Are you absolutely and completely sure about the book?” she asked.

  “Yes. They rejected it,” Henry said.

  “Lady Wallis?” Pandy sat back in her seat, still reluctant to embrace the truth. “Are you sure you sent them the right manuscript?” she asked desperately.

  “Was there another one?” Henry asked drily.

  “But why?” Pandy moaned softly, like an animal in pain.

  “They didn’t like it,” Henry said simply. “They said the book didn’t sound like you. They said it wasn’t a, quote, ‘PJ Wallis book.’”

  “And what did you say?”

  “I said, ‘Of course it’s a PJ Wallis book. How can a book written by PJ Wallis not be?’ And then they said, ‘But PJ Wallis doesn’t write historical fiction. So people who are looking for a PJ Wallis book will be angry. Disappointed.’ I said that begged the question as to their publishing it under another name. Which they’d likely do, but not with your current advance. So if you want to keep the advance, you’ll have to give them their PJ Wallis book. And they want it to be about Monica. They suggested that Monica get divorced. Try online dating. The thought, I agree, is terrifying. I told them, ‘We’ll see.’”

  He paused. He must have realized that Pandy hadn’t interrupted him. “Pandy?” he asked. “Are you there?”

  Pandy looked out the window. They were just starting up the driveway.

  “What happens if I refuse to write another Monica book?” she asked.

  “Let’s not worry about that now,” Henry said firmly. “Right now, I want you to take a deep breath and relax. Go for a walk through the pine forest. Take a swim in the pool. Or better yet, canoe around the lake. And then have a nice hot bath. Get a good night’s sleep, and call me in the morning.”

  “So this means I won’t get the money.”

  “You will get the money. When you deliver the next Monica book. If you work really hard, I’m sure you can knock one off in six months. After all, you do know all about ugly divorces now.”

  “Thanks, Henry,” she sniped.

  Henry sighed. “I did warn you about historical fiction. Most editors won’t go near it these days. It’s not popular.”

  She lost Henry when the driver slammed on the brake and her phone dropped to the floor. They had reached the final switchback to the house, and the driver turned around to gape at her. Then he slowly turned his head and looked back at the house, as if trying to put two and two together.

  “You live here?” he asked.

  Pandy sighed, gathering her things. “It’s not what it seems.”

  She got out of the car and started briskly up the path to the house, pausing for a moment to admire the rose garden. The S. Pandemonia and S. Hellenor, the two roses for which she and Hellenor were named, were in full bloom.

  This situation—the looming divorce settlement and the book’s being rejected—was going to be a huge problem, she realized as she went hurriedly up the stairs and into the house. Without pausing to wind the clock, she went right into the kitchen.

  She placed her sack of groceries on the counter, opened the refrigerator, took out the container of milk, and threw it in the trash.

  The milk was from the one and only time she’d been back to Wallis House since that terrible scene with Jonny. It had been nearly a year since the night when she’d secretly moved all her papers to Wallis House.

  All the files and contracts; the tax returns, the old phone bills, drafts of manuscripts and Monica scripts; a copy of the will she’d just signed that left everything to Hellenor—including the rights to Monica—on the off chance she might have something to leave behind when Jonny’s lawyers got through with her. In short, anything and everything that Jonny might get his hands on and could then use against her.

  He’d already tried to claim that Pandy had attempted to murder him when she’d pushed him into the pool.

  Pandy sighed and began unpacking the groceries Henry had shoved into the back of the car at the last second. If she’d known then what she knew now about Jonny, would she have let him slide under the water, watching those last air bubbles rise to the surface—a series of small ones, then a pause, and at last that final balloon-shaped burst of air as the water rushed in and forced out the last molecules of oxygen?

  She would have only had to wait fifteen minutes for Jonny to be brain-dead and dead-dead. And then, for the sake of authenticity, she would have retraced her steps, hurrying down the path as if she’d just discovered he wasn’t in the house. When she spotted him floating in the pool, she would have splashed in, lifting him under the arms and laying him flat in the grass. She would have pulled back his head and pinched his nose.

  She would then have performed textbook-perfect CPR. After ten minutes, she would have given up. She would have run back to the house, called 911, and waited the thirty minutes it would have taken for the volunteer fire department to arrive.

  And by then, it would have been far too late.

  Jonny would be dead—an accident! He had taken a nap in Old Jay’s bed, been attacked by chiggers, and had run into the pool to escape them, where, unfortunately, he had drowned.

  And what a happy widow she would have been! Free of Jonny without the bummer of becoming another middle-aged divorcée in New York. Instead, her reputation would have grown as that of a tragic figure.

  She would have had what her English friends called “the black wedding.” The black wedding was what you wished for ten years after you’d had the white wedding. After you’d produced a couple of children and had had enough time to realize that yes, indeed, your husband was totally useless. You wished for the black wedding—your husband’s funeral. You’d get the money and the lifestyle and the children, without the hassle of the man.

  Of course, when it came to marriage, the English had always been far more practical than the Americans.

  Fuck, she thought, extracting a package of Cheddar cheese.

  The pathetic fact was, Jonny had managed to get so much money out of her during their marriage that when it came time to talk about a settlement, she’d had no cash left.

  Neither, unsurprisingly, did Jonny. In fact, it turned out that technically, Jonny didn’t own anything at all.

  As a matter of fact, Jonny owed money. And that meant she owed money, too. This, at least, was the gist of it. This, and the fact that Jonny did, indeed, own something, after all: half of everything she owned.

  She’d had to promise to pay him her entire advance—the very same advance she’d been expecting her publishers to pay her when she delivered the book.

  And now, because her publishers had rejected her book, she would have no money to pay Jonny after all.

  She wandered into the library, looked up at the portrait of Lady Wallis Wallis, and cringed.

  On the other hand, it would be easy enough to pay Jonny off. All she had to do was sell the portrait. It was probably worth millions.

  Pandy emitted a harsh laugh. Forced to sell a painting that had been in her family for three hundred years to pay off Jonny Balaga? Never. What would Lady Wallis say?

  Disgusted with herself, Pandy went upstairs to her room. There, she sat down at her desk and looked at her pile of old Monica notebooks. Of course she didn’t have to sell Lady Wallis Wallis. Not when she still had Monica.

  And people still wanted Monica.

  Which meant there was absolutely no excuse for her not to write another Monica book. She would agree to it, and her lawyers would make some kind of arrangement with Jonny’s lawyers as to a payment schedule. Nevertheless, Jonny’s settlement would be delayed; to compensate, Jonny’s lawyers would attempt to up the amount. And then, it wouldn’t be just one more Monica book that she needed to write, but two or three.

  If, indeed, Monica even lasted that long. Eventually, people would grow tired of Monica. And then Monica and PJ Wallis would end up back here. Back where they started. And eventually the cats would come…
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  Pandy picked up one of the notebooks.

  It was the first Monica story, entitled “Monica: A Girl’s Guide to Being a Girl.” She’d created the perfect imaginary little girl—Monica—who knew everything about being a girl, for the instruction of Hellenor. By seven, Hellenor was becoming what her teachers deemed “a problem child.” She refused her mother’s and then Pandy’s entreaties to dress like a girl, act like a girl, be a girl, and so Pandy had created Monica and the Girl’s Guide to help her. She had used the Girl Scout Handbook as her inspiration.

  Pandy picked up another notebook. Dated 198–, it was the last installment of Monica. She flipped to the back page. It was blank, save for the small lettering written in Hellenor’s hand. Pandy held the page away to read the tiny block letters painstakingly formed in red ink:

  KILL MONICA. PLEASE.

  And for a brief moment, Pandy laughed. Hellenor had always hated Monica.

  Until she hadn’t. Once Monica started making money…

  She snapped the book shut and replaced it on the pile.

  She should have put her foot down after the second Monica book. She should have said, “No more.” But how was she to know what the future would hold? When she’d reinvented Monica ten years ago, she’d made her a more perfect version of herself. Bad things might happen to PJ Wallis, but only good things happened to Monica. In Monica’s world, everything always worked out.

  And then, some of Monica’s stardust rubbed off on Pandy herself, because suddenly good things were happening to Pandy as well. And for a while there, it seemed she really was Monica…

  Until she wasn’t. Because the bad things that were now happening to PJ Wallis were not the kinds of things that were supposed to happen to Monica.

  The audience wouldn’t like Monica if she were the way Pandy was now: destitute, on the verge of a breakdown; a pathetic woman who’d dared to believe in herself and had lost everything.