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Back The Mother Next Door Save as PDF
Chapters (84)
  1. Cover
  2. Praise
  3. Dedication
  4. About the Author
  5. HALLOWEEN
  6. Seven Weeks Before Halloween
  7. ONE
  8. TWO
  9. THREE
  10. HALLOWEEN
  11. Six Weeks Before Halloween
  12. FOUR
  13. FIVE
  14. SIX
  15. HALLOWEEN
  16. Five Weeks Before Halloween
  17. SEVEN
  18. EIGHT
  19. HALLOWEEN
  20. NINE
  21. TEN
  22. HALLOWEEN
  23. ELEVEN
  24. TWELVE
  25. Twenty-Five Days Until Halloween
  26. THIRTEEN
  27. FOURTEEN
  28. HALLOWEEN
  29. FIFTEEN
  30. SIXTEEN
  31. SEVENTEEN
  32. EIGHTEEN
  33. NINETEEN
  34. TWENTY
  35. HALLOWEEN
  36. Eighteen Days Until Halloween
  37. TWENTY-ONE
  38. TWENTY-TWO
  39. HALLOWEEN
  40. TWENTY-THREE
  41. TWENTY-FOUR
  42. Eleven Days Until Halloween
  43. TWENTY-FIVE
  44. TWENTY-SIX
  45. Eight Days Until Halloween
  46. TWENTY-SEVEN
  47. TWENTY-EIGHT
  48. TWENTY-NINE
  49. HALLOWEEN
  50. THIRTY
  51. Four Days Until Halloween
  52. THIRTY-ONE
  53. HALLOWEEN
  54. THIRTY-TWO
  55. Two Days Until Halloween
  56. THIRTY-THREE
  57. The Night Before Halloween
  58. THIRTY-FOUR
  59. HALLOWEEN
  60. THIRTY-FIVE
  61. Halloween, Present Day
  62. THIRTY-SIX
  63. THIRTY-SEVEN
  64. HALLOWEEN
  65. THIRTY-EIGHT
  66. HALLOWEEN
  67. THIRTY-NINE
  68. HALLOWEEN
  69. FORTY
  70. HALLOWEEN
  71. FORTY-ONE
  72. FORTY-TWO
  73. FORTY-THREE
  74. FORTY-FOUR
  75. HALLOWEEN... NOW
  76. FORTY-FIVE
  77. Seven Months Later
  78. FORTY-SIX
  79. FORTY-SEVEN
  80. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
  81. ALICE SWANSON’S
  82. Reader's Guide
  83. Questions for Discussion
  84. Booklist

They smile and ooh and aah at the little bats and rain clouds and mummies and princesses—so many goddamn princesses—as they bend down and present their bowls.

“Just take one,” they say.

Notice how similar our five mothers look—it is hard to tell them apart sometimes, especially tonight. So much shared between them. Recipes. Gossip. They have keys to each other’s houses. They know each other’s dress sizes (mostly). They’ve found each other jobs. They offer to drive each other to scary doctor appointments. There was that one time one of them threw up in another’s car after a strange night at the bar.

A friendship hard to break, solid, smooth. Only by the light of those jack-o’-lanterns might you be able to see the beginnings of a fissure. For they also share something darker. Secrets. Shame. Jealousy. A desire for control.

A desire for power.

A desire to be loved.

A desire to kill.

Yes, it’s nearly pitch-black now.

NINE

Theresa

You could only see part of Alice’s backyard from the lake path that ran by her house—the small deck and the concrete pad with the firepit. The rest of the yard was shrouded in trees and was much bigger than I’d expected. Big enough, in fact, to host a swing set with a slide and monkey bars, a trampoline, and a giant storage shed she called the Barn.

Alice had texted us late last week about going through the Halloween decorations she stored there. I wasn’t sure we needed any extra decorations, but I couldn’t imagine saying no to the Ivies.

Turned out that only Kendra and I could make it. And she seemed distracted—something with work, I supposed, since she kept checking her phone. I was also in my head. I’d been trying to draft an article about instructional coaching budgets for my former editor at the Inquirer all day and was still mulling it over.

Alice tried to fill in the silent spaces with chatter. “Is anyone thirsty? I made lemonade. Literally squeezed it myself.” She held up her hands. “My fingers are crazy sore right now, but Jonah’s been asking about it, he loves it—Greta, just give the doll to your sister, darlin’. Honestly it’s not that hard to be nice.”

When we declined the lemonade, she pulled a large key from her pocket and ushered us to the Barn. Her kids tumbled over one another, rushing to be the first ones on the trampoline.

Alice was still talking. “Theresa, brace yourself. We have a lot of stuff. It’s such a blast. But it terrifies my kids, of course. They won’t set foot in here.”