THIRTY-THREE

I’m walking back to my house from the bus stop when Suzette emerges from her front door to collect her mail.

She must be leaving for a house showing soon, because she is dressed to the nines in a skirt suit with red heels that are so high, I would fall on my face if I tried to walk in them. Her hair is so perfectly coiffed, it almost looks plastic. She waves to me, and it’s hard to smile when I wave back, but I force it. I’m not in the mood for Suzette, so when she comes down her steps to talk to me, I almost consider making a run for it. But she’s pretty quick, and before I can reach my front door, she has overtaken me.

“Millie!” she says. “How are you doing?”

“Fine. How are you?”

As Suzette smooths her hair, I notice a diamond-studded bracelet around her wrist that catches the sun. It looks a little like the necklace that Martha tried to steal from me, except I assume that hers is made from real diamonds. I hope Suzette is keeping that bracelet somewhere safe.

“Nice bracelet,” I comment.

“Thank you.” She gazes down at the bracelet. “It was a gift from someone very special. And I absolutely love your…” She rakes her gaze over me, clearly struggling to find something to compliment me on. “Have you lost some weight? Your face doesn’t look nearly as puffy.”

Apparently, that is the best she can do. Also, I don’t think I’ve lost any weight. I’m just as puffy as ever. “Maybe” is all I say.

“Anyway,” Suzette says, “I’ve been meaning to speak with you.”

“Um, sure. What’s up?”

She flashes me a blindingly white smile. I wonder if she has caps on her teeth. “So here’s the thing,” she says. “On the day before trash pickup, would you mind putting your trash out a little later in the evening?”

I stare at her. “What are you talking about? Nico doesn’t put it out until after dinner.”

“Right,” she says. “And you guys must eat dinner super early. Because when we are eating dinner, we can see your trash out in front of the house. And it’s there the entire evening. There’s trash sitting on the sidewalk from, like, seven in the evening until the next morning.” She sniffs. “Honestly, Millie, it’s unsightly.”

“Did you mention this to Enzo?” I ask. She seems to speak with him constantly, so I’m not sure why she’s telling me about all this.

“He just seems so busy. I wouldn’t want to bother him with something so trivial.”

“Okay…”

“Plus, Nico takes care of the trash, doesn’t he? The kids are more your domain, I assumed.”

Suzette somehow assumes I am a 1950s housewife. But I don’t feel like getting into it with her.

“Fine,” I grumble. “What time would you like him to take out the trash?”

“Well, no earlier than eleven, certainly.”

“His bedtime is ten,” I say through my teeth. “He’s nine.”

“Oh.” She taps her chin. “Perhaps you should take out the trash then?”

She has got to be kidding me. I’m tempted to tell this woman where she can shove that trash can, but at that moment, a truck pulls up in front of my house. A man with a big shaggy mustache and potbelly climbs out of the truck, a sour expression on his face. It takes me a second to recognize him as the plumber who came by a few days ago. I called him to fix our downstairs toilet, which was taking about an hour to flush. Enzo kept insisting he could fix it and we didn’t need professional help, but it seemed like every time he tried to fix it, the flush took ten minutes longer. I didn’t even tell him I called the plumber. He thinks the toilet magically fixed itself.

“Hey!” The plumber, whose name completely escapes me at the moment, ambles down the walkway to where I’m standing with Suzette. “I was here a few days ago to do a job, and you wrote me a bum check!”

What?

“I… I did?” I stammer. I don’t know how that’s possible. I keep track of every penny that goes in and out of our checking account. We don’t have a lot of excess cash, but I’m certain we had more than enough to cover the $300 check I wrote for the plumber.

The plumber is not a small man. He’s well over six feet, towering over me, and I have to take a step back as he comes closer. “You sure did, lady!” he growls.

Suzette seems entertained by this interaction. Why can’t she go back to her house? This is so embarrassing.

“I’m so sorry,” I say. “I thought there was enough in the account to cover it. Can I… Do you take credit cards?”

“I don’t,” he spits at me. “I told you when I fixed your toilet: only cash or check. And now for you, only cash.”

Well, that’s a problem. I don’t have $300 in cash just lying around. I probably have forty dollars in my wallet if I’m lucky. Enzo has already taken off for the day, but he doesn’t carry much money either. “Um,” I say, “if you wait, I can go to an ATM…”

The plumber hikes up his pants and plants himself squarely on the sidewalk in front of my house. “I’m not moving one step until I get paid, lady.”

“You know what,” Suzette pipes up. “I might have some cash in the house. Give me a minute.”

She dashes back into the house, walking admirably well in those four-inch heels. A minute later, she bursts from the front door with a wad of cash. She holds it out to the plumber, who immediately starts counting it.

“It’s all there,” Suzette assures him.

The plumber finishes counting the cash and nods at her. “You got that right, pretty lady.” He tips his grimy baseball cap in her direction. “Thank you muchly.”

He gives me one last dirty look and then climbs back into his truck. I’m pretty sure I am blackballed from that plumbing service. Hopefully, Enzo can get better at fixing the pipes.

Suzette watches the plumber drive away, then turns to me with an expectant look on her face. I know what she wants, and I’m going to have to give it to her.

“Thank you so much, Suzette,” I say. “I… I promise I’ll pay you back every penny.”

“Oh, take your time.” She toys with the diamond bracelet on her wrist, which glints in the sunlight. “Honestly, Jonathan and I have more money than we know what to do with. You can’t even imagine how much we pay in taxes!”

Way to rub it in my face. I don’t want Suzette to think of me as some impoverished charity case, racking up debts all over town. And I especially dislike the idea of owing anything to her. Technically, we never paid for her broken window, but that was different because Nico agreed to do chores. I’ll pay her back today, if I can.

Except… can I? I thought we had more than enough money in the checking account to cover the plumbing bill. But obviously, we don’t. Where did the money go? Enzo and I always discuss large purchases. He wouldn’t have just taken the money out without telling me.

Would he?

THIRTY-FOUR

After the plumber leaves, I log in to the computer to check my bank account.

A few days ago, we had more than a thousand dollars in the checking account. I watch the screen, waiting to confirm that the money is still there. My heart sinks when the balance of the checking account pops up on the screen:

$213

What the hell is going on? We’re missing about a thousand dollars from our checking account. And we are not extremely wealthy like our neighbors. That’s not an amount that we can just shrug off.

I access the transactions in the history. I do see a $1,000 withdrawal from a few days ago. Presumably, that is the culprit. Except who took that out of our account? It certainly wasn’t me. I can’t imagine Enzo would do that without mentioning it to me.