One
It felt surreal.
Which was kind of crazy. It was the most commonplace of activities, shopping in a grocery store. Pushing her cart up and down the aisles. Pausing to look at all the fresh produce. Checking out a head of cauliflower. Looking for bananas that were still green. Glancing at the dozens of different boxed cereals. Sugary and delicious and bad for you, or full of fiber and yucky and good for you. About a hundred different kinds of coffee. Had she ever noticed before today how many brands there were? Maybe this was why an activity so mundane suddenly felt strange and unfamiliar. It was as though she were doing it for the first time.
Or at least the first time in ages.
She had grocery-shopped a thousand timesāand that was in no way an exaggeration. A thousand, easily. Say you went out for provisions twice a week. That was more than a hundred times a year. And given that she was in her mid-thirties, and had been doing her own shopping since moving out of her parentsā home at age twenty, well, there you go. Do the math.
Thatās a lot of trips to the local Stop & Shop or Whole Foods or Walmart.
But today was different because she really didnāt know what to buy. Did it even matter what she tossed into the cart? Sheād entered the store without a list. The basics seemed like a safe way to go. Milk, eggs, fruit. A six-pack of beer. She wondered if a list would have been a good idea. It would have helped her pick up things Andrew liked.
Maybe what made this trip feel so strange was that she didnāt want to be spotted. Didnāt want to run into anyone who knew her. Not at this point. So she kept her head down as she went up and down the aisles. Tried to withdraw into herself. She was thinking that the next time she went out for groceries, sheād pick a place she didnāt usually frequent.
At one point, she thought maybe sheād been spotted, recognized, despite the steps she had taken. As she was passing by the meat counter, a man, shopping alone, attempted to engage her in conversation. He was probably fifty, gray hair, tweed sport jacket, white shirt with a button-down collar. Handsome and, she was betting, divorced or widowed, because he was clearly hitting on her.
They were almost shoulder to shoulder when he picked up a roast wrapped in cellophane and said, āHow long would you cook something like this?ā
Trying to strike up a conversation.
āIāve no idea,ā she said. āI donāt eat meat.ā
Not the best comeback, considering she had already dropped a small package of ground beef into her cart. The man noticed, and said, āWell, you might want to put that back, then.ā
She ignored him and quickly pushed the cart farther up the aisle, pretty sure she heard him mutter, āBitch,ā under his breath.
As she went down the aisle stocked with multiple varieties of potato chips and other snacks, she thought one woman had given her a second look, but then convinced herself that she was being paranoid. It wasnāt like anyone had stopped her and said, āHey, is that you?ā
She was starting to wonder whether this shopping excursion had been such a good idea, but sheād really believed it necessary. Anyway, by this point she thought she had enough in the cart, and headed for the row of checkouts. Sheād bought half a dozen too many items to qualify for the express line, and wondered whether to put a few things back. But in the time it would take to return them, she might as well go to one of the regular checkouts.
āYou need bags?ā the hefty woman at the register asked.
She nodded.
āYou got one of our points cards?ā
āIām sorry?ā
āA points card.ā
āNo, no, I donāt have one of those.ā
When the groceries were bagged and in her cart, the cashier said the total was fifty-five dollars and twenty-nine cents.
āHow you paying?ā
The woman reached into her purse and brought out three twenties. āCash,ā she said.
āOkey dokey,ā the cashier said.
The woman had her hands on the cart and was turning it around to point it toward the exit when the cashier said, āLady, your change?ā
Sheād been so distracted, she hadnāt thought to wait for it. She held out her hand, took the money, and dumped it into her purse.
She wheeled the cart out into the parking lot and opened the tailgate on a black, mid-2000s Volvo station wagon. She put the bags in, closed the tailgate. Affixed to it was a license plate with letter and numbers smeared with enough dirt and grime as to be illegible.
She got behind the wheel and waited the better part of a minute for other cars to pass before she backed out. Given that it was a Saturday morning, when a lot of people did their weekās shopping, the parking lot was busy.
āDonāt have a fender bender,ā she said to herself. That was the last thing she needed.
Once she was out of the lot, she headed across town into one of Milfordās west end neighborhoods.
She put on her blinker when she saw the Mulberry Street sign and turned down it. There was a lot of activity in the neighborhood today. Being the second of Aprilāone day too late for April foolās, she thought grimlyāmany homeowners were engaged in yard cleanup. Raking leftover debris from the fall before, jamming it into paper recycling bags. Men wielding leaf blowers that made as much racket as a low-flying jet. A woman ran alongside a girl, no more than five years old, as she learned to ride a bicycle. Two other women stood at the end of a driveway, one of them still in pajamas and a housecoat, each holding a mug and chatting.
What a nice neighborhood, the woman in the Volvo thought. Like something out of one of those 1950s TV shows. Not that she was old enough to have seen them when they first ran, but hey, was that June Cleaver over there, bringing a tall glass of lemonade out to Ward? Was that young Opie running past with a slingshot sticking out of his back pocket?
To think that something so horrible could happen on a street such as this.
Oh, there it was. Her destination was just up ahead.
She put her blinker on again, waited for a kid on one of those motorized skateboards to whiz past, then steered the Volvo into a driveway. She noticed that at the house next door, a man was sweeping the steps of his front porch. She put the car into park, got out, and went around back to raise the tailgate. She grabbed two bags, came around the side of the car, leaving the tailgate open, and it was at this point that she actually gazed upon the house.
It was, clearly, a new build, judging by the architectural style. Sharp angles, huge panes of glass. Solar panels built into the roof. A modern, contemporary design.
The woman stopped, as though sheād bumped into an invisible wall.
āWhat ā¦ā
The man sweeping his porch glanced over in her direction.
The woman turned her head to look at the house to the left, then the house to the right, as though confirming to herself that she was in the right place. Finally she focused on the number affixed to the door of the house she stood before.
Thirty-six.
āWhere ā¦ā
She dropped her groceries to the ground. A carton of eggs toppled from one, the lid popping open and a single egg shattering onto the driveway.
āWhere is my house?ā she said aloud. āWhere the hell is my house?ā
The front door opened and a teenage girl with pink highlights in her hair and wearing workout sweats poked her head out. āCan I help you?ā she said.
āWhereās my house?ā she cried, a frightened edge in her voice. āAn old house. Red brick. A porch, a railing. Where the hell is it?ā
The man next door took several steps in her direction.
The girl said, āUh, I think maybe youāve got the wrong place?ā
āThirty-six,ā the woman said.
āYeah, thatās right. But maybe youāve got the wrong street?ā
āThirty-six Mulberry,ā the woman said. āThis is thirty-six Mulberry.ā
āYeah,ā the girl said slowly.
āThis is all wrong. This house doesnāt belong here. Thereās supposed to be an old house here. Withāwith red brick and a porch, that kind of sagged. My house. It was right here. Right here! How does a house just disappear?ā
āYeah, well, that house youāre talking about? They tore that down like three years ago and my parents built this one. Did you say your house?ā
āThis is not right,ā the woman said.
The girl shrugged and went back inside, leaving the woman standing there, staring open-mouthed at the three-year-old home.
āThis is not happening,ā she said.
The man with the broom was standing at the property line now. He studied the woman, narrowing his eyes as if trying to improve his focus, like maybe he didnāt believe what he was seeing and needed to be sure.
āBrie?ā he asked.
The woman glanced in his direction, her face blank.
āJesus, Brie, is it you?ā he said.
Suddenly the woman got back into her car, keyed the ignition, and backed out of the drive, crushing the remaining eggs with the front wheels as she turned, the tailgate still in the raised position. The carās transmission whirred noisily as the car bounced into the street, narrowly missing the kid on the motorized skateboard making a return trip.
The Volvoās brakes squealed as the car came to an abrupt halt. It sat there for half a second while the woman put it into drive, then took off down the street, the man with the broom watching it speed away.
