“I’m sorry,” Martina says again. The words taste sour on her tongue. Aster may not be ready to admit it, but it’s all coming into focus: Aster had been keeping tabs on the flash drive and Caden’s card. When they disappeared, she set the stable on fire. What’s still murky is why.
“When she confessed, I could breathe again,” Aster says. “But then you couldn’t let it go. The police believed her. Everyone believed her except you, Martina.” Aster’s words sing with venom and fear. Blood rushes to Martina’s head, roars in her ears.
Behind her, Martina can hear Mrs. Talbot’s voice, but she can’t make out what the older woman is saying. She must be back at the house by now. Abandoning Martina. Saving herself. She could have left her the parasol, at least, not that Martina’s sure she could have used it, even to protect herself.
Aster takes another step forward, and Martina steps back. Her foot lands on a broken beam, and her ankle rolls. First Mrs. Talbot, now her own body, betraying her. She goes down hard, wood splinters biting into her palms and tailbone cracking painfully against the dirt. The earring and her phone skid away from her, into the ash. A whimper slips through her lips, and Aster takes a step forward, two, until she’s standing directly over Martina, one foot on each side of her chest.
“Let it go, Martina.” It’s part warning, part plea. “Promise me.”
Martina’s eyes fill with tears. Her best friend, petite Aster, too short for swimming and ten times as fierce because of it, is standing over her, metal beam clutched in her hand. It’s shaking, hard.
“Okay,” Martina says. “Okay.”
Aster looks down at the rod, really seeing it for the first time. “Shit,” she mutters. She flings it hard into the grass, like it might bite. Then she collapses down beside Martina, buries her face in her hands. “I’m sorry. I don’t know what I was thinking. I’d never …”
Martina shoves herself up to a sitting position, then places her palm hesitantly on her best friend’s shoulder. “Aster,” she whispers. “It’ll be okay. We’re going to figure this out.”
“Aster Spanos.” A woman’s voice cuts across the lawn. Both girls’ heads snap up. The woman is striding purposefully toward them. “My name is Officer Gwendolyn Park with the Herron Mills PD.”
“Trespassing,” she can hear Mrs. Talbot say from somewhere safely across the lawn. “And now this.” Martina thinks she can make out a second uniformed figure standing next to her. The older woman’s words from earlier flood her ears: Your sister’s the only reason I didn’t call the cops the other times I saw you back here, snooping around. But this time, she’d made that call. Probably before she even came outside.
Thank you, thank you, Mrs. Talbot.
Very slowly, Aster struggles to her feet. She offers her hand to Martina, who takes it, allows herself to be helped up. She searches her friend’s eyes, desperate for the truth, but Aster looks away.
“We have a few questions we need you girls to answer,” Officer Park is saying. She approaches, shines her flashlight beam at their feet until it lands on Aster’s earring. In a minute, her partner is at her side. Carefully, eyes never leaving Aster, he slips on a pair of gloves, then bends down to pluck the earring from the ash. He places it in a baggie, then turns to Martina.
“Is everything okay here?” For a moment, Martina’s eyes stray to the metal rod, where it landed in the grass. Then she turns back to the officer.
“I’m fine.”
Out of the corner of her eye, Martina can see Aster exhale.
He nods. “We need you to come down to the station with us. Both of you.”
Martina hears the words voluntary interview and your parents and your cooperation and then she stops listening as the officers guide them toward the front of Windermere, toward the car. She tries to catch Aster’s eyes one more time, but Aster won’t meet her gaze.
31 October
Pathways Juvenile Center, East New York, Brooklyn
I’M AWAKE NOW.
That’s not quite right. I’ve been awake something like sixteen hours a day—usually more—since I came to Pathways over two months ago. Minimum 1,040 hours of awakeness. But now, these past few days, it’s like I’m emerging from a very long, deeply muddled dream. It’s that feeling the morning after you’ve taken something to help you sleep. The drug’s still there in your bloodstream, fuzzing the edges, padding the air between you and