Page 26 of The Good Girl Effect

Rule #7: Rules were made to be broken.

Camille

As Bea eats her breakfast the next morning, I lean my elbows on the kitchen counter and draw a ghost in a suit with a top hat on the front of my grocery list. I hear Jack’s footsteps upstairs, but he hasn’t come down. If I were to guess, I would say that he’s going to be a phantom again, quietly haunting the house as he comes and goes without a word.

I didn’t sleep well last night, and it shows. Mid yawn, I hear a door slam upstairs. Bea and I glance at each other as we wait for his footsteps that never come. I wish I could say I’m dreading the moment I’m face-to-face with him again. But I can’t.

In fact, I’m dying for it.

As I walk Bea to school, she holds my hand in hers, squeezing my fingers as she hops clumsily around the cracks in the cement.

“Tu crois aux fantômes?” she asks innocently.Do you believe in ghosts?

“Ghosts?” I reply.

“Like the one you drew this morning,” she says with her tiny mouth screwed up with curiosity.

“Oh.” I laugh. “Yeah, I guess I do.”

“Do you think my maman is a ghost?” Bea gazes up at me with those big, innocent blue eyes, and I have to swallow down the tension in my throat. How on earth should I answer this question? Perhaps these are the sorts of thingsrealnannies are trained for.

“Um… I don’t know. Doyouthink she’s a ghost?”

“Oui,” she replies plainly. “I can hear her walking around sometimes. She comes into my room when I’m sleeping.”

Comes into her room? Could this have been a dream? I’m struck with confusion, wondering why the hell this little girl would think her mother is traipsing around their home, but then the memory of last night comes back, and it all makes sense.

Jack.

Even his five-year-old daughter thinks he’s a ghost. He must slip into her room after she’s asleep to check on her. Perhaps that’s why he was downstairs last night, lurking in the hallway with tears soaking his face.

I wouldn’t tell Bea that, even if I knew for certain the only haunting spirit in her house is her father. If she wants to believe it’s her maman, then who am I to correct her?

“That’s lovely,” I say as I kneel in front of the girl. “I’m sure that if your maman were a ghost, she would watch over you so you’re never alone.”

Bea shrugs. “I hope she takes care of Papa now.”

“Why is that?”

“Because I have you,” she chirps happily before wrapping her arms around my neck.

I hug her back, trying to hold back the tears that are threatening to spring free.

Without another word, Bea releases my neck and bounds away, running toward her teacher by the front door of her school. I’m left reeling as I kneel on the sidewalk outside.

Feeling a little lifeless myself, I stand and walk mindlessly back to the house. This is normally when I’d do the shopping and the errands, but I can’t seem to focus on work today. There is an electric buzz under my skin. I’m not sure I want it to go away.

When I get back to the house, I listen for movement upstairs, but it’s quiet. He could be sleeping. Or he could be gone.

Going up to his room is forbidden. I’ve been told this more than once. But after last night, I feel at liberty to investigate. If he’s going to prowl outside my room while I sleep, I can snoop a bit in his while he’s gone.

Besides, rules were made to be broken, right?

The house is silent as I climb quietly up the stairs toward the second level. The floor of the landing at the top creaks as I reach it, and I pause, waiting to hear his scolding voice. When nothing comes, I assume it means he really is gone.

Frozen in place, I peer around. The second floor has an open sitting room to the left with a leather sofa, ottoman, and rug. There is a beautiful painting on the wall and a fresh bouquet of flowers on the table near the window.

Facing a long hallway in front of me, I see one door ajar and what looks like an office on the other side. There is a desk and an empty chair.