flynn_gillian_gone_girl (1) (858987), страница 61
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That’s him. Nick Dunne. The bartender never came back.You can’t yell, you can’t strong-arm: Hey, jackass, will you get me a goddamn drink orwhat? You can’t be the asshole they believe you are. You just have to sit and take it. ButI wasn’t leaving. I sat with my empty glass in front of me and pretended I was thinkingvery hard. I checked my disposable cell, just in case Andie had called. No. Then I pulledout my real phone and played a round of solitaire, pretending to be engrossed.
My wifehad done this to me, turned me into a man who couldn’t get a drink in his ownhometown. God, I hated her.“Was it Scotch?”A girl about Andie’s age was standing in front of me. Asian, black shoulder-lengthhair, cubicle-cute.“Excuse me?”“What you were drinking? Scotch?”“Yeah. Having trouble getting—”She was gone, to the end of the bar, and she was nosing into the bartender’s line ofvision with a big help me smile, a girl used to making her presence known, and then shewas back with a Scotch in an actual big-boy tumbler.“Take it,” she nudged, and I did. “Cheers.” She held up her own clear, zzing drink.We clinked glasses. “Can I sit?”“I’m not staying long, actually—” I looked around, making sure no one was aiming acameraphone at us.“So, okay,” she said with a shruggy smile.
“I could pretend I don’t know you’re NickDunne, but I’m not going to insult you. I’m rooting for you, by the way. You’ve beengetting a bad rap.”“Thanks. It’s, uh, it’s a weird time.”“I’m serious. You know how, in court, they talk about the CSI e ect? Like, everyoneon the jury has watched so much CSI that they believe science can prove anything?”“Yeah.”“Well, I think there’s an Evil Husband e ect. Everyone has seen too many true-crimeshows where the husband is always, always the killer, so people automatically assumethe husband’s the bad guy.”“That’s exactly it,” I said.
“Thank you. That is exactly it. And Ellen Abbott—”“Fuck Ellen Abbott,” my new friend said. “She’s a one-woman walking, talking, manhating perversion of the justice system.” She raised her glass again.“What’s your name?” I asked.“Another Scotch?”“That’s a gorgeous name.”Her name, as it turned out, was Rebecca. She had a ready credit card and a hollowleg.
(Another? Another? Another?) She was from Muscatine, Iowa (another MississippiRiver town), and had moved to New York after undergrad to be a writer (also like me).She’d been an editorial assistant at three di erent magazines—a bridal magazine, aworking-mom magazine, a teen-girl magazine—all of which had shuttered in the pastfew years, so she was now working for a crime blog called Whodunnit, and she was(giggle) in town to try to get an interview with me. Hell, I had to love her hungry-kidchutzpah: Just fly me to Carthage—the major networks haven’t gotten him, but I’m sure I can!“I’ve been waiting outside your house with the rest of the world, and then at thepolice station, and then I decided I needed a drink.
And here you walk in. It’s just tooperfect. Too weird, right?” she said. She had little gold hoop earrings that she keptplaying with, her hair tucked behind her ears.“I should go,” I said. My words were sticky around the edges, the beginnings of aslur.“But you never told me why you’re here,” Rebecca said.
“I have to say, it takes a lotof courage, I think, for you to head out without a friend or some sort of backup. I betyou get a lot of shitty looks.”I shrugged: No big deal.“People judging everything you do without even knowing you. Like you with the cellphone photo at the park. I mean, you were probably like me: You were raised to bepolite. But no one wants the real story.
They just want to … gotcha. You know?”“I’m just tired of people judging me because I fit into a certain mold.”She raised her eyebrows; her earrings jittered.I thought of Amy sitting in her mystery control center, wherever the fuck she was,judging me from every angle, nding me wanting even from afar. Was there anythingshe could see that would make her call off this madness?I went on, “I mean, people think we were in a rocky marriage, but actually, rightbefore she disappeared, she put together a treasure hunt for me.”Amy would want one of two things: for me to learn my lesson and fry like the badboy I was; or for me to learn my lesson and love her the way she deserved and be agood, obedient, chastised, dickless little boy.“This wonderful treasure hunt.” I smiled. Rebecca shook her head with a little-Vfrown.
“My wife, she always did a treasure hunt for our anniversary. One clue leads to aspecial place where I nd the next clue, and so on. Amy …” I tried to get my eyes to ll,settled for wiping them. The clock above the door read 12:37 A.M. “Before she wentmissing, she hid all the clues. For this year.”“Before she disappeared on your anniversary.”“And it’s been all that’s kept me together. It made me feel closer to her.”Rebecca pulled out a Flip camera.
“Let me interview you. On camera.”“Bad idea.”“I’ll give it context,” she said. “That’s exactly what you need, Nick, I swear. Context.You need it bad. Come on, just a few words.”I shook my head. “Too dangerous.”“Say what you just said. I’m serious, Nick. I’m the opposite of Ellen Abbott. The anti–Ellen Abbott.
You need me in your life.” She held up the camera, its tiny red light eyeingme.“Seriously, turn it off.”“Help a girl out. I get the Nick Dunne interview? My career is made. You’ve doneyour good deed for the year. Pleeease? No harm, Nick, one minute. Just one minute. Iswear I will only make you look good.”She motioned to a nearby booth where we’d be tucked out of view of any gawkers. Inodded and we resettled, that little red light aimed at me the whole time.“What do you want to know?” I asked.“Tell me about the treasure hunt.
It sounds romantic. Like, quirky, awesome,romantic.”Take control of the story, Nick. For both the capital-P public and the capital-C wife.Right now, I thought, I am a man who loves his wife and will nd her. I am a man who loveshis wife, and I am the good guy. I am the one to root for. I am a man who isn’t perfect, but mywife is, and I will be very, very obedient from now on.I could do this more easily than feign sadness. Like I said, I can operate in sunlight.Still, I felt my throat tighten as I got ready to say the words.“My wife, she just happens to be the coolest girl I’ve ever met.
How many guys cansay that? I married the coolest girl I ever met.”Youfuckingbitchyoufuckingbitchyoufuckingbitch. Come home so I can kill you.AMY ELLIOTT DUNNENINE DAYS GONEI wake up feeling immediately nervous. O . I cannot be found here, that’s what Iwake up thinking, a burst of words, like a ash in my brain.
The investigation is notgoing fast enough, and my money situation is just the opposite, and Je ’s and Greta’sgreedy antennae are up. And I smell like fish.There was something about Je and that race to the shoreline, toward my bundleddress and my money belt. Something about the way Greta keeps alighting on EllenAbbott. It makes me nervous. Or am I being paranoid? I sound like Diary Amy: Is myhusband going to kill me or am I imagining!?!? For the rst time I actually feel sorry forher.I make two calls to the Amy Dunne tip line, and speak to two di erent people, ando er two di erent tips. It’s hard to tell how quickly they’ll reach the police—thevolunteers seem utterly disinterested.
I drive to the library in a dark mood. I need topack up and leave. Clean my cabin with bleach, wipe my ngerprints o everything,vacuum for any hairs. Erase Amy (and Lydia and Nancy) and go. If I go, I’ll be safe.Even if Greta and Je do suspect who I am, as long as I’m not caught in the esh, I’mokay. Amy Elliott Dunne is like a yeti—coveted and folkloric—and they are two Ozarksgrifters whose blurry story will be immediately debunked. I will leave today. That’s whatI decide when I walk with my head bowed into the chilly, mostly uninhabited librarywith its three vacant computers and I go online to catch up on Nick.Since the vigil, the news about Nick has been on repeat—the same facts on a circuit,over and over, getting louder and louder, but with no new information. But todaysomething is di erent. I type Nick’s name into the search engine, and the blogs aregoing nuts, because my husband has gotten drunk and done an insane interview, in abar, with a random girl wielding a Flip camera.
God, the idiot never learns.NICK DUNNE’S VIDEO CONFESSION!!!NICK DUNNE, DRUNKEN DECLARATIONS!!!My heart jumps so high, my uvula begins pulsing. My husband has fucked himselfagain.The video loads, and there is Nick. He has the sleepy eyes he gets when he’s drunk,the heavy lids, and he’s got his sideways grin, and he’s talking about me, and he lookslike a human being. He looks happy. “My wife, she just happens to be the coolest girlI’ve ever met,” he says. “How many guys can say that? I married the coolest girl I evermet.”My stomach flutters delicately.
I was not expecting this. I almost smile.“What’s so cool about her?” the girl asks off-screen. Her voice is high, sorority-cheery.Nick launches into the treasure hunt, how it was our tradition, how I alwaysremembered hilarious inside jokes, and right now this was all he had left of me, so hehad to complete the treasure hunt. It was his mission.“I just reached the end this morning,” he says. His voice is husky.
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