The Ivies - Alexa Donne Page 0,24

neatly over her chair. When did she come in? Why did she go back out? And why the boathouse? Emma didn’t row.

The questions itch up my throat, make my tongue weigh heavy in my mouth. I need them out, spewed at the first detective who will listen to me. The answers will fill me up, sate the acid churn of hunger clawing at my stomach.

“Tell me it’s not fucking true.” Avery crashes through the lobby doors, eyes wild behind a chic pair of glasses. No time for contacts means she rushed to get here. She snaps a finger in front of my face. “Olivia!”

“You’re not wearing makeup.” My voice is dreamy as I marvel at a constellation of pimples on Avery’s cheek. I’ve never seen her without her mask.

“I got a text. It said Emma is dead. What the hell, Liv? What the fuck is going on?”

I blink up at her. Swallow hard. Then I stand and pull her into a hug. “I’m so sorry.” Like it’s my fault, my job to apologize for the inconvenience.

Avery pushes me away. She’s not a hugger, and I forgot. “What happened? Who found her? Did you see? Why didn’t you text me?” She sneers the last question, like an accusation.

“Sorry I didn’t think to pull out my phone while I was screaming over her dead body, Aves.”

She inhales sharply. “You did see her. It’s true.”

“Yeah, it’s true.” I stare down at the floor. If I look at Aves, I’ll start crying, though maybe that would be a good thing. I haven’t cried yet. Upstairs, a dozen girls are sobbing; every so often their histrionics echo down the stairwell. Snatches of grief when someone opens a door. And I’m down here, dry eyed. You can’t cry if you don’t feel anything.

Avery plunks down on the bench. “The last thing I said to her was that I hated her.”

Actually, it was that you could kill her. I don’t make the correction. This is a rare sighting, a vulnerable Avery. Twice in twenty-four hours. I’ll have to note this in my Mean Girl Field Journal.

December 16, 7:20 a.m.: Avery displayed feelings today. Remarkable.

I sit down as well, and we spend the next few moments in our own stunned silences. I catalog a dozen more questions to ask. Avery scrolls through her Instagram feed.

The door to the rowing room swings open, and both of us jump to our feet. A woman emerges, careful to shut the door behind her so we can’t see the body.

Emma, I correct myself. So we can’t see Emma. I won’t let her be a body. She was a person only hours ago.

The woman looks at us, grim faced. Her frown accentuates a hawklike nose and severe chin, but her eyes—big and brown—and the aura of seriousness she carries remind me of my mom. I peg her for mid-thirties, and her messy ponytail and the way her makeup has separated around her nose and mouth tell me she was called here at the end of a long night shift. She looks tired.

“I’m Detective Cataldo,” she says, offering a push of her chin in lieu of handshakes. “Which one of you is Olivia Winters?”

I raise my hand as though I’m still in class and this is nothing more than a teacher calling roll.

“I’ve known her since we were six.” Avery sniffs, as if she needs to one-up me.

Detective Cataldo ignores her. “You discovered the body?”

I bob my head. “Me and Sierra Watson. She’s upstairs.” Last I saw her, she was curled into a ball on the locker room floor, alternately weeping and hyperventilating.

“We’ll need to bring both of you down to the station for formal questioning—”

Headmistress Fitzgerald rushes through the rowing-room doors, as if she was eavesdropping on the other side. “Detective, I must insist any questioning take place on school grounds, with a Claflin representative present and our grief counselors on standby. We take the well-being of our students very seriously.”

What Carmen Fitzgerald actually takes very seriously is the possibility that one of her students might say something that reflects poorly on Claflin or, god forbid, incriminates a staff member or a student with well-placed parents. I imagine phone calls have already been placed to lawyers and board members, who are no doubt on their way.

“I have an AP Calculus final today,” I say. It’s the first thing I think of, for some reason. Like nothing could be more important than a test. I feel stupid for having said it, but