The Dead Girls Club - Damien Angelica Walters Page 0,52
happened. Do you?”
“No,” I say.
Given her quick swallow, I wonder if she’s remembering how we didn’t speak once I returned to school, many months later. We would sometimes say hi if we passed in the hall, but never more than that.
She shifts in her chair, plucks her napkin from her lap. If she leaves on this note, with this past darkness hovering over the table, we probably won’t ever talk again.
“Okay, enough,” I say. “No more morbid talk. We’re supposed to be catching up and having fun.”
“I second that.”
The rest of the conversation is safe. Innocuous. Recommendations of restaurants, niche stores, parks. Long after our plates have been cleared away, the pause before imminent goodbyes lingers.
“We have to do this again,” she says. “Please tell me you want to too?”
“Definitely.”
When she hugs me, she presses her palms tight into my back for a brief moment. And then we’re going our separate ways. I start my engine but leave the car in park. I want this to have been a normal brunch with an old friend. No ulterior motives. Would she sit with me, eat with me, talk to me, if she knew what I did?
I text Ryan. ON MY WAY HOME.
HOW’S NICOLE?
I feel a pinch of guilt as I reply SHE’S GOOD. Telling him I was meeting an old friend would’ve been fine, but it was easier to lie. Fewer questions to answer.
I call my parents, and after his greeting, Dad says, “Hey, guess what? You know the old field? The county sold the land to a developer.”
I grip the phone even tighter. The field sold? No, that can’t be right. “Are you sure?” I say.
“Uh-huh,” Dad says. “They’re going to build townhouses. Big ones with garages on the bottom floor. Probably have them built in a weekend the way they do things nowadays, but better houses than an unused field, I guess.”
I try to come up with something to say, but words won’t come.
“Hey, your mom’s here, so I’m turning over the phone. Love you.”
“Love you too,” I manage.
Mom says hello twice, and I shake my head hard. One disaster at a time. “Did Becca ever steal from us?”
“What?”
“I remembered something, and I’m not sure if it’s right or not. Did Becca steal money from you and Dad?”
“You’re serious? You called to ask that?”
“Did she?” There’s a long silence. “Mom?”
She sighs. “Yes, we had money go missing a few times.”
“You never told me.”
“Because it wasn’t much. The two of you were already having problems when we found out, so we made the decision not to say anything. Why?”
“What do you mean?”
“Why are you asking? What does this have to do with your patient?”
She’s got me there. “Stealing can be a sign of a troubled kid,” I say. It isn’t really an answer, but it is true.
“You need to let this go. There’s no reason to be so fixated on it,” she says.
“I’m not fixated, I’m—”
“You are,” she says. “If that’s all you needed, I have to go,” she says, not waiting for me to say goodbye in return.
What the hell? That was weird. All I did was ask a simple question.
I try to focus on driving but rub my palms over and over again on the steering wheel. Construction. In the field. I never thought that a possibility. And before they start building, they’ll dig. I have to go back and look for the knife again. If I can’t find it, time will surely have erased anything leading back to me. Fingerprints, DNA—there should be nothing left but rust. Even if they find it, they won’t know what it was used for. They’ll toss it out.
But what about her, and why can’t I remember?
My hands keep moving. Hell is murky indeed.
* * *
When I pull into the office parking lot, only a few spots are occupied, including one bright-red SUV taking up two. The SUV belongs to an accountant in a firm on the top floor. One of those loud, abrasive men who drops sexual innuendos into every conversation and tells women to smile. He tried the latter with me once; I gave my best professional leave me the hell alone face in return. He hasn’t done it again.
The air holds a chill, a promise of the autumn days to come. The sky is a darker shade of blue, daylight slowly creeping in. I catch movement from the corner of my right eye and whirl around, apprehension cemented in my chest. Nothing but parking lot and a few cars.