Chapter 5: Diane
I read the message four times.
Patricia was watching me.
"Someone just texted me," I said.
"A woman named Diane Voss."
Patricia set her folder down.
I turned the phone so she could read it.
She read it twice.
Then she said: "Don't respond yet.
Not until we know who she is."
"She knew my name.
She knew what I said tonight."
"Which means someone told her.
Or she's been watching this situation for longer than tonight."
I stared at the message.
*I've been waiting a long time for someone to finally say what you said tonight.*
"What did I say?" I asked, mostly to myself.
"I said Graham h*rt me.
I said Judith pushed me."
"You said it to a doctor in a hospital," Patricia said.
"That report goes into a system.
People with access to that system—"
"She's not a hospital employee."
"No." Patricia picked up her own phone.
"But she might be someone who has been in contact with this hospital before.
For similar reasons."
The air in the room changed.
"You think she's done this before," I said.
"The Mercers."
Patricia didn't answer directly.
"I think you should let me make a call before you respond to that message."
She stepped into the hallway.
I looked at the ceiling.
The fluorescent light above my bed had a faint flicker, so small you only noticed it if you stared long enough.
I had become very good, over six years, at noticing small things.
The slight tightening around Graham's eyes before his voice changed.
The way Judith's smile never quite reached the left side of her face when she was performing warmth.
The way Russell always touched his jacket pocket when he was about to say something he had rehearsed.
Small things.
The things you learn to read when reading them correctly is the difference between a quiet evening and a terrible one.
Patricia came back in.
"Diane Voss filed a police report fourteen months ago," she said.
"Against Graham Mercer."
The monitor down the hall beeped.
"She withdrew it six weeks later," Patricia continued.
"She signed a non-disclosure agreement.
We don't know the terms, but we know it existed because her attorney at the time filed a notice of settlement with the court."
"Russell," I said.
"Almost certainly."
I picked up my phone.
Patricia held up one hand.
"Nora.
If you contact her, it becomes part of this.
It could complicate the legal process.
I need you to let the detective handle first contact."
"She reached out to me."
"I know.
And that matters.
But the way this is handled in the next few hours will affect everything that comes after."
I set the phone down.
It was the hardest thing I had done all night, and I had already done several hard things.
"When does the detective come?" I asked.
"Morning.
Seven o'clock."
"And Carol?"
"Your sister should arrive around five, based on the drive."
Two hours.
I had two hours before Carol arrived, and then two more before the detective.
I needed to be clear by then.
I needed to remember everything in the right order.
"Can I have paper?" I said.
"And a pen?"
Patricia produced both from her folder without comment.
I started writing.
Not for the detective.
Not yet.
For myself.
The wrist, the wall, the wineglass at Christmas.
The Thanksgiving bruises.
The morning Graham had stood in the kitchen doorway and watched me move carefully around the room and said nothing, and the way that silence had been its own kind of message.
I wrote for forty minutes.
When I stopped, my hand was cramping and my ribs were burning and I had filled six pages.
I looked at what I had written.
Six years.
Reduced to six pages of careful, specific, dated memory.
The kind of memory you develop when you have spent years telling yourself it wasn't that bad, so you record every detail to prove to yourself later that it was.
Patricia read over my shoulder without asking.
When I finished, she said: "This is good.
This is very good."
"It's not everything."
"It doesn't need to be everything tonight.
It needs to be true and specific.
That is both."
My phone lit up again.
The same number.
Diane Voss.
May you like
This time she had sent three words.
*I have documents.*
