Chapter 11: Happy Place

Tuesdays usually mean a drive into Olympic National Park, followed by lunch at the bakery whose warm popovers have become the group's favorite. I've been thinking about them for weeks. Today, though, the idea of eating anything makes me want a dark room, antacids, and enough ginger ale to fill a bathtub.

We make a quick stop at Tideglass House so everyone can change, drink water, and use the bathroom. Then we load the cars again with the picnic things. Getting six people and their belongings out of the lodge takes longer than it should. Someone is always missing a jacket, a bag, or their sunglasses.

Dane has just come back from the bathroom when Jules realizes she left her sunglasses inside. She turns and races through the door.

Livia watches her go. “Do you think Bianca spends the first two hours of every farm morning sending Jules back inside for one forgotten thing at a time?”

“Only until Jules comes out wearing her boots on the wrong feet,” Bianca calls from beside the cars.

“That wasn't an accident,” Jules says as she barrels back out. “I'm waiting for you to recognize my contribution to fashion.”

“Wear whatever you like,” Bianca says. “I'm more interested in what's under it.”

Jules laughs and kisses the side of Bianca's neck. “Sweet or dirty? Either way, I'll take it.”

Livia presses a hand to her forehead. “The wine. Mara, would you go down to the cellar and get it?”

“Anything pink or white?” I ask.

She shakes her head. “The Silex. The 2018.”

“I understood maybe one of those words.”

“It says Silex on the label, then Didier Dagueneau. Look for 2018. It's white.” She hikes two tote bags higher on her shoulders.

I leave my bag inside the door and turn back. The cellar door is open, and the light is already on. Livia once told us some bottles down there cost more than a month of my rent. I hope the one she wants doesn't have a label I mistake for a different expensive bottle.

A faint sound comes from below as I descend. At the bottom, I turn the corner and stop. Rhys stands under the warm ceiling light, looking tired and handsome in a way that would be easier to ignore if I weren't already stuck in this cellar with him.

“Silex something?” he asks.

“Livia must've sent you too.” I turn back toward the stairs. “I've been looking for ages. It isn't here.”

I stop myself from leaving. I came down to get the wine, and Livia has a way of sticking to a plan once she's made one. Besides, I had imagined a cool, quiet place when I wanted to escape my nausea. This is not the place I meant.

I crouch at the shelves and read the labels. “If one person looks for something long enough, the next person to try will find it immediately.”

“I've checked everywhere,” Rhys says.

“Let's see.” I run a finger past the chardonnays and sauvignon blancs. No Silex.

“Happy?” he asks.

His dry tone catches at the back of my neck. My mind goes somewhere it shouldn't in this room. The cellar holds memories for us. Not frightening ones. The other kind.

“Just pick a white that doesn't look too expensive,” I say, already heading for the stairs.

He glances at me. “Should I look for a clearance sticker?”

“Get something they have more than one bottle of.”

At the top of the steps, I find the cellar door shut. I turn the knob. It doesn't move.

I knock. “Livia?”

Rhys comes up behind me with a bottle in his hand. “It locked,” I tell him.

“Why'd you close it?”

“I thought it might lock from the outside and leave me trapped down here with you,” I say flatly.

He ignores the joke, steps past me, and tries the knob. “Definitely locked.” He knocks hard. “Bianca? Dane? Anyone?”

His body is close enough that I feel the warmth coming off him. I check my pockets for my phone. It's in the bag I left in the foyer.

“Call someone,” I say.

“I left mine in the car. You didn't bring yours?”

“It's upstairs. We'll wait until they wonder why we're taking so long and send someone down.”

Rhys lets out a frustrated breath and sits on the top step, setting the bottle beside his boot. He folds his hands behind his neck and lowers his head. His shoulders are rigid.

At least I'm not the only one losing it. I'm panicking because I'm here with him. He's panicking because he hates enclosed spaces. When he was a kid, a heavy armoire fell on him in his parents' workshop. Nobody else was there. He was stuck for hours before anyone found him.

Once the door opens, he'll be all right. I won't be. I'll still be thinking about that ridiculous sixty-dollar book he bought.

The room seems to tilt. I grab the railing.

Rhys is on his feet at once, holding my elbows. “What happened?” His face comes and goes through dark spots in my vision.

“We brought two cars,” I manage. “The four of them could've left in the Rover.”

He watches my face. “They wouldn't leave us here.”

“They might have.”

“They could be back any second. We don't know what happened.” He looks toward the ceiling as if he can work out the timing.

I go down a few steps to make room between us. He follows. “This isn't my fault, Mara.”

“Did I say it was?”

“You left in a hurry.”

“We're standing in a tiny stairwell. There isn't room to storm off. But if you mean I shut the door, yes. I heard you.”

“I'm not blaming you. I'm saying, who has a door that locks from outside?”

“It's a panic room. There's a control panel on the wall. If we knew the code, we could unlock it.”

His attention snaps to the panel. He takes the steps in a few strides. “There's a button that calls emergency services.”

I wonder how long the others will wait before they come looking. Will they drive all the way toward the bakery first? If they try to call us, will they assume we're on the road and can't answer? My stomach turns again.

“Do you want me to call for help?” he asks.

I picture the cost of replacing the door if firefighters have to break it down. “Let's wait a little. We should give them a chance to notice we're missing.” I draw a careful breath and try to focus on something other than the house and Rhys.

He doesn't like the answer. “Unless you're worried you can't—”

“I'm fine,” he says, cutting himself off. He sits on the bottom step and pulls off one hiking boot.

“Oh, come on. It's been five minutes. Are you planning to take off your pants and choose a corner?”

He peels the foil from the wine bottle. “I don't need a corner. When we finish this, I'll use the bottle. You'll have a harder time unless you learn to aim.”

I cross my arms. His eyes follow the movement. “Do you carry a corkscrew around at ten-thirty in the morning?”

“No. I'm just happy to see you.”

“That's hilarious.”

He keeps his eyes on mine, wedges the bottle into his boot, and strikes the boot against the wall.

I jump. “What are you doing?”

He hits it again, then again. The cork creeps upward with each blow. One more sharp strike and it pops free. He lifts the bottle toward me.

“I'm concerned you know that trick.”

“So you don't want any?” He takes a drink. As he lowers the bottle, his attention shifts to the alcove beneath the stairs.

Heat climbs up my chest. Don't look there. Don't remember.

I know better than to expect wine to help a hangover, but I take a sip anyway. My stomach rejects it immediately. I hand it back.

“Dane showed me how to open a bottle that way,” Rhys says. “First time I've needed to.”

“You've never been stuck with one of your jilted lovers in the last five months?”

He gives a short laugh. “Jilted? That's not how I remember things.”

“Maybe you have amnesia.”

“My memory's fine, Dr. Ellery. Thanks for checking.” His gaze goes to the alcove again. He can't be seeing someone. Rhys flirts, but he doesn't cheat. Unless he's started something new and it isn't exclusive. I have no idea. I'm not part of his life that way anymore.

He takes a few more drinks. The wine doesn't settle him. Soon he's pacing, running his hands through his hair. Sweat gathers at his forehead.

“If only you'd brought that coffee-table book,” I say.

He turns to me. “Then we might have something to look at.”

His eyebrow lifts. “What's your problem with my book?”

“Nothing.”

“Did you have some kind of book-related trauma while I was gone?”

“It cost sixty dollars.”

He shakes his head and resumes his short loops around the room.

“Is it a gift?” I ask.

“Why would it be?”

“Because you never spend that much on yourself.”

His cheeks color. I regret asking. We fall quiet. I sit while he continues to walk in small, tight rectangles.

Even now, it's difficult to watch him struggle. When he lets the easy charm drop, his feelings show plainly. That was part of why I trusted him with things I hadn't told anyone else. He listened as if what I said mattered. He felt it with me. And the reverse was true, too.

“You've been in much smaller spaces,” I say as he passes me again. I've lost count of his laps.

His eyes flick to the spot beneath the stairs.

“Not what I meant.” My face warms. “I meant the cars you've ridden in.”

“Buses have more room than this.”

“That's true. But they smell worse.”

“It smells damp down here.”

“It's the Washington coast. Damp is normal.”

He tips his head back. “I'm freaking out, Mara.”

I stand. “It's okay. They'll come back soon.”

“You don't know that.” The muscles around his mouth tighten. “They could think we decided to stay here.”

“Livia wouldn't leave without all of us. We came to be together.”

He shakes his head. He can see the holes in my argument as well as I can. Livia might be annoyed if she thought we'd stayed behind to be alone, but she'd also given us the best room at the lodge. And if she called and got no answer, she wouldn't hurry back just to catch us doing something. Not that we'd be doing anything.

“You come down here all the time,” I say. “You've probably been here longer than this.”

I try not to return to that memory. I try not to replay it.

The summer after Rhys, Bianca, Livia, and I graduated. Before we left for Seattle to join Dane. We'd driven down from Massachusetts with all our things packed. Dane had flown in from the city after finishing his first year at law school.

He suggested sardines, the reverse version of hide-and-seek. We shut off the lights and rolled dice to see who would hide first. Rhys lost. We gave him five minutes, then set off through the dark to find him.

I knew where he was, the way I always seemed to know. He'd gone down to the cellar and tucked himself behind the waist-high wine rack, into the empty space under the stairs. I nearly missed him. Then I caught a shadow moving.

We had lived together for a year, but we were rarely alone. We went for walks, or studied in the library, where a librarian might appear at any moment. I had almost convinced myself we'd become ordinary friends. Then the rules of the game sent me over the rack to hide with him. My heart beat too fast, and my stomach turned. Whatever I felt for him had not gone away.

I clear my throat. The memory seems lodged there. “We must have been down here for an hour.”

I don't know if that is true. Every second before we touched had seemed endless. Afterward, time stopped mattering. I think of a documentary about black holes that I watched with my father, and the theory that time and space might behave differently in some places. That moment in the cellar had felt like somewhere we could stay.

“I had a good distraction then,” Rhys says. His voice is plain, without any attempt to charm me.

“Same one you have now.” I spread my hands.

He looks unconvinced. “Then distract me, Mara.”

“Where did your manners go?”

His left dimple appears. “Please distract me, Mara.” His voice drops.

I fight the shiver that goes through me.

He drinks again and starts pacing. His hands open and close. I know they go numb when his claustrophobia gets bad.

I have to do something. I only have one idea.

I stand, pass him, and swing a leg over the wine rack under the stairs.

“What are you doing?”

“Helping.” I take care not to knock the bottles loose as I bring my other leg over. I duck under the stairs.

“That's maybe one extra square foot.”

“If you choose to sit in a smaller space inside this room, you can remind yourself you can leave that space whenever you want.”

“We still can't leave the room.”

“It's not a perfect plan. It's something. And we're not trapped without options. If this doesn't help, we call the fire department. But let's try this before Livia has to replace a door and before you have to return your expensive book.”

He lets out a small laugh as he climbs over the rack. That's a good sign.

I shift to make space. The stairs are low, so I sit on the floor and scoot farther into the corner.

“Now what?” he asks.

“Now we put our heads together and solve the Zodiac murders. Sit down.”

He does. I suspect he'd follow almost any instruction right now.

“Pretend this is the game. We have to stay quiet until the others find us.”

“That's not going to work,” he says, breathing unevenly.

“Rhys.”

His shoulders rise and fall with each quick breath. His head stays bowed.

“Rhys.”

“Sorry. I'm trying not to panic.”

“Don't apologize.” Without thinking, I reach for his hand. He startles, then recognizes my touch. His fingers are cold and shaking. I cup his palm between both of mine.

“Look at me. Talk to me.” He keeps his gaze down.

“Talk to me,” I say again.

“About what?”

“Anything. Whatever comes to mind first.”