I Know You Remember

by Jennifer Donaldson

  I watch my as my brother runs around the yard, all gangly limbs. I was just a little younger than him when Ruthie murdered Bailey. The thought makes me feel suddenly protective. He’s so young and so goofy and so vulnerable, and I wish I could protect him from all the mistakes just waiting to be made.

  But they’re his to make. And maybe—maybe he’ll be lucky, and smarter than me, and know better how to do what’s right.

  “Hey.”

  I look up to see Tabitha standing just beyond the fence. She’s holding a garment bag in one hand. Tonight is Merrill High’s senior prom, and even though I’m obviously not going, I’m going to help Tabitha get ready.

  “Hey! Come on around,” I say.

  She looks at the dogs capering through the muddy yard and purses her lips. “Uh . . . maybe I’ll meet you in your room. Hey, Malik, what’s happening?”

  He smirks and shoves his hands in his pockets, suddenly all fourteen-year-old attitude. “Hey, Tabitha, not much,” he mimics.

  She heads for the front door, and I stand up to follow.

  “Tabitha!” says my dad, when we come through the kitchen. He’s still in his work clothes, his pants flecked with paint, but she goes in for a hug anyway.

  “Hey, Ron. Hey, Charity,” she says to my mom at the table.

  Mom smiles up at her. She’s got her most recent project— a line of lip balms she’s still trying to perfect—spread out in front of her. “You ready for your big night?”

  “Not yet,” Tabitha says. She grabs a Coke from the fridge and opens it. “How’s the recipe coming?”

  “I can’t quite get it right,” Mom says, sticking her finger in her mouth. “I’m going for raspberry and it still tastes like cough syrup.”

  I stand back for a moment, still a little bemused by the image: Tabitha, in my home, making small talk with my parents, comfortable enough here to grab a soda from the fridge without asking. For a long time she barely came here if she could help it. She always acted like it was because we had more privacy at her house—undeniably true, since her parents are gone a lot and her house is enormous—but I knew that part of it was that she didn’t want to hang out in a trailer park. She didn’t want to spend time with my weird family.

  And it’s not like she’s done a total one-eighty. There’s still something a little forced in it, a little awkward. But she’s trying. Plenty of people haven’t bothered. I haven’t seen most of the kids on the cross-country team since I got home.

  “Come on,” I finally say, tugging her by the arm. “We’ve got to get started.”

  I love her for trying not to look relieved as she waves goodbye to my parents. “Gotta go,” she says. “Thanks for the Coke!”

  * * *

  —

  MY CRAMPED BEDROOM ISN’T the most convenient setup, especially compared to Tabitha’s en suite bathroom and expensive vanity mirror that mimics natural light—but we turn on some music and set up our makeup on my desk and soon it feels so cozy it doesn’t even matter.

  “How the heck do people get it so close to the lash?” Tabitha asks, liquid eyeliner trembling in her hand.

  “Practice,” I say. “And lots of eye-makeup remover, so you can do it again when you mess it up. Here, let me help.” I step close, pivoting her toward me. “The key is not to think about it too much.”

  “Oh, like denial?” she asks. “I’m good at that.”

  “Me too. Look down.” I draw a thick black line across one lid. It’s intimate, putting on someone’s makeup. I don’t know that I’ve ever done it before.

  Or . . . not with Tabitha, anyway. A memory surges up, the way they do, the way they have done for three years now. Bailey Sellers on the edge of my bed. Me with a stolen Wet n Wild lip pencil, giving her the absurdly over-lined lip that was in that year. “Now we look like twins,” she said, looking at our faces in the mirror, at my thicker lips next to her ridiculous drag queen ones. It hurt, but I never said anything. Because Bailey was so hapless, and so dumb, and had no way to know better.

  I breathe in, breathe out. Focus on the feel of the air in my throat and lungs, moving and circling in and out. It’s one of the very basic exercises Dr. Mabry gave me, to work through my flashbacks. Sometimes it helps. Sometimes, I have to try something else.

  But this time, I come back. Tabitha’s face is angled up toward me, her eyes closed. I breathe, and I do the other eye, flicking the line up at the edge. “There,” I say. “It looks good.”

  “Thanks,” she says. She looks into the mirror. Her hair is curled around her chin, thirties-glam style. She’s wearing black cigarette pants and a green glitter halter that is in no way seasonally appropriate, but that looks amazing. “So do you.”

  It’d been Tabitha’s idea to dress me up, too. It’s kind of silly, since I’m housebound, but after a half year in sweatpants and T-shirts, it’s fun. My dress is dark blue, strapless, and rustles around my ankles like a whisper. “Believe it or not, Grandma got it for me.”

  “Grandma Worthen?” she asks, disbelieving.

  I laugh. “Yup. She got me a bunch of stuff for my court hearings—you know, boring stuff. And then she pulls this thing out and is like, ‘I know it’s not terribly appropriate right now, but I saw it there and I couldn’t walk away from it. I could just picture it on you!’”

  “She must have hidden it from your grandpa,” she says wryly. “He’d throw a blanket over you if he saw you in that thing.”

  She’s right, of course. The whole time I’d stayed with Grandpa he’d insisted on long skirts, heavy sweaters that would cover my whole body. When the three of us prayed together, it was always about chastity and decency and modesty. I remember once, a few years ago, when he showed up at a cross-country meet and told me I looked like “a harlot” in my track shorts.

  Once the truth came out, that Ruthie’d murdered Bailey, that I’d helped, and that Grandma and Grandpa had kept me hidden, there’d been some brief backlash against Victory Evangelical, some talk about charging them with obstruction of justice for helping me. But their lawyers managed to get them out of legal trouble, and Grandpa’s actually managed to turn the whole thing around from a PR standpoint. “Should we not love the sinners among us, and try to save them?” he says. As if he hasn’t talked thousands of times about punishment and shame. It’s actually ended up bringing him some new followers.

  I wrote him, and Grandma, a letter to apologize. I hadn’t been sure they’d want to see me, after all I’d put them through. And while I haven’t seen much of him, except at a few of the court hearings, Grandma’s been coming around a little bit. The first time she did it my mom hid in her room and refused to come out, so I just sat with Grandma at the kitchen table and talked with her. I tried to tell her how sorry I was, how badly I felt that she’d been hurt.

  She just took my hand in hers. “Let’s not talk about it, dear,” she said.

  Let’s not talk about it. A true Grandma response. Better to not discuss how my murderous ex-bestie tried to bash Grandma’s head in because she went out of her way to take care of me. Which was of course the entire root of my problem—and my mom’s problem, and my grandma’s problem, for that matter. Not talking about it. Burying it deep and ignoring the way it made the floorboards buckle and heave beneath you.

  But all I can take charge of is my own life, so I didn’t press the issue. I squeezed her hand. I told her I was glad to see her.

  “Where are you guys going for dinner?” I ask now, smoothing my dress. I try not to sound jealous. Tabitha’s going to prom with Ingrid Bell—which is a surprise, but not actually as much of a surprise as either of them thought it’d be—and she’s meeting her and a bunch of our friends to eat.

  “Some new place. I don’t know. Ingrid was going to set it all up.” She looks up at me, her expression suddenly tentative. “I’m sorry, Zahra, is this, like, salt in the wound?”

 
“No!” I shake my head. “This was my idea, anyway, remember? I wanted to help you get ready.”

  Okay, yeah—maybe a part of this is painful. Watching Tabitha get ready to go out and do the normal senior girl thing with all our friends. Knowing that I will miss it. But that part of my life is over. Aisha’s still working on my plea deal, and I’m not sure what my sentence will look like . . . but I know it’s not going to include a lot of formalwear.

  “I wish you were coming,” she says. “It’s not fair.”

  “Yes, it is,” I say automatically.

  She makes a face. She always acts like I’m blameless in all of this, like I’m a victim of circumstance. Or of Ruthie.

  “That little bitch . . .” she starts. But I shake my head.

  “Come on,” I say.

  “She pulled you into this . . . this nightmare,” she says. “She fooled me, she fooled Ingrid, she fooled Ben . . .”

  “I fooled you, too,” I say. I sigh. “Leave it, Tabby.”

  Ruthie didn’t make me complicit. I could have confessed anytime in the three years she was in Oregon. I was a coward. And no matter how much I wish things were different, there’s no changing it. Scared as I am about what may happen, I’m less frightened than I used to be, before the truth was out. Because now I’m not waiting for the other shoe to fall. Now it’s all in the open.

  The court-mandated therapy with Dr. Mabry probably helps, too. Turns out PTSD is real, and not just something soldiers deal with.

  “Should we get Mom to take a picture?” I say. “You probably have to go pretty soon, right?”

  “Yeah, let’s go.” She gets up, tosses her curls. “Come on.”

  I follow her down the darkened hallway. “You know, this is actually the best of all worlds. I get to wear the sexy dress but I don’t have to put on the high heels or deal with some slob spilling shitty spiked punch on . . .”

  My voice drops away as we step into the kitchen.

  The lights are off, but the room glows with candlelight. Candles flicker from every surface. The table is draped in deep burgundy, china plates and wine glasses laid out at each place.

  Ingrid’s at the counter in dark red velvet, opening the lids on a bunch of caterers’ containers. I see prime rib, scalloped potatoes, green beans with almonds, fresh steaming bread. And at the table . . .

  At the table is Ben, in tuxedo and tennis shoes, pulling out a chair.

  “Your parents took Malik out to Moose’s Tooth for pizza,” Tabitha says softly. “We’ve got two hours.”

  “I know you can’t go to prom,” Ingrid says, smiling at me as she slides an arm around Tabitha’s waist. “But we thought we’d bring the pre-dance dinner to you.”

  I hear them both distantly. My eyes meet Ben’s.

  He’s been at the house almost every day. He’s come over with cupcakes, with books, with stuffed animals. He’s come over with board games and puzzles. He’s come with flowers. I don’t deserve any of it. I’d like to believe I would’ve come out of hiding before the cops got too serious about looking at him . . . but I’d also like to believe I wouldn’t let someone get away with murder. It sucks to know the very worst things about yourself as a fact.

  He told me what happened with him and Ruthie. He’d been so serious, so anxious about telling me—he’d said that he’d been caught up in the emotions, that he was so sorry. “I feel like a moron for letting her manipulate me,” he’d said.

  “You’re not the only one,” I said, putting my hands on his cheeks.

  We’re not back together. Not really. We have kissed a few times since I came back. We’ve . . . done more than that, too, once or twice. But I won’t let it get more serious than that. For one thing, he’s going to University of Oregon in the fall. And if I do go to prison, I don’t want him to think he has to wait for me.

  And then, too . . . he has forgiven me, but I haven’t forgiven myself. Which is exactly what the problem between us has always been.

  But now he smiles, and I melt a little, my shoulders going soft. I take a step toward him, forgetting about the girls behind me.

  “You look beautiful,” he whispers.

  “Thanks,” I say. “You do, too. I mean . . . you look . . .”

  He grins, and it knocks the words right out of my mouth.

  “You guys didn’t have to do this,” I say, looking around at them. “You should be out, at Bootlegger’s Cove, or . . .”

  “Please,” Tabitha says. She puts a bowl of bread down on the table. “Every single boy I have ever made out with is at Bootlegger’s Cove right now with his date. I don’t need that shit.”

  “But the prom . . .”

  “Oh, we’re still going to the prom,” Ingrid says calmly. “After we eat.”

  “Right. I didn’t manage a perfect liquid cat-eye just to sit around here all night,” Tabitha says. She looks at Ingrid, a trace of a smile quirking one side of her mouth. “I’m arm candy, girl, I’ve got to make the rounds.”

  I glance at Ben. He’s watching me, smiling faintly.

  “Well, they’re going,” he says, when he meets my eyes. “I’m not going to that shit-show. Are you kidding me? There’s a Fast and Furious marathon on USA tonight.”

  I mock groan. “Oh, no.”

  “Believe it,” he says. “I’ve got your dad’s permission to park on your couch all night and watch.”

  “Ben, you’ve got to go to the dance. Weren’t you nominated for prom king?” I ask.

  “Yes, but I dropped out of contention. This prom will be a democratic system. Or at least a constitutional monarchy. I would accept the crown in name only. The people will rule.” He gestures grandly.

  Tabitha rolls her eyes. “That’s what he says, but really he doesn’t want to lose to Javonn Carter. The fix is in.”

  “Anyway, we can argue about it—and I’m sure we will—after dinner,” Ben says, patting the chair. “Right now I’m starving.”

  As I sit down, the memory flickers before me. The image of Bailey, cradled by dirt. Her eyes wide-open, her mouth slightly parted. Fragments of that night have come back to me plenty of times over the years, but this is the one that waits for me, anytime I risk a moment of happiness.

  I focus my breath. Breathe in, breathe out. Don’t fight it; acknowledge it. Easier said than done. I feel sweat start to bead along my hairline. I feel my heart pick up speed. My body braces for it all to come flooding back.

  But then I open my eyes, and I look around the table. I look at what my friends have done for me. I look at the way they’ve made the night a thing I could be part of. I look at their faces—these people who came for me, who looked for me, and who didn’t turn away once they’d found me and seen me for what I really was. Tabitha, brittle but fierce, and strange, brave Ingrid. And Ben. Ben, who I’ve loved since I met him, though I’ve never told him so. Ben, who’s been trying to find me for years. Who still hasn’t given up on it.

  We all look at each other in the wavering candlelight, and for a second I believe that we see each other clearly. All our flaws, all our fragility and fear and pain, and all our hope and strength and our desperate attempts to change. We see it, and we accept it, and we still love each other.

  “Let’s eat,” I say.

  EPILOGUE

  LYR

  THERE’S AN ALMOST COMFORTING sameness to every day. Get up. Brush teeth. Brush hair. Get dressed.

  Follow other women down the long linoleum hall to wait for meds. They come in a small paper cup. The nurse checks under your tongue, and then it’s time for breakfast.

  Breakfast, class, crafts, yard time, free time. They watch you all the time to make sure you are not wandering from the path.

  I steer my body through the days and the nights. For the most part it’s easy. Push this button, and the body’s arm lifts. Push that one, and the legs move. I am far down insid
e, a tiny pilot operating the controls, and in here very little bothers me. It’s all simple and mechanical and doesn’t ask much of me. And the meds help. The meds make everything seem so calm and muffled and buried.

  They also make it so I can’t read, though. Which I hate.

  Sometimes a woman visits. Dark blonde hair, scarred face. She sits across the table and speaks softly. Your dad’s not ready to come, she says. He’s trying. He’s . . . trying to understand. He told me to tell you that.

  Dad, a man with a black circle for a mouth. The yelling man. I don’t miss him. It doesn’t matter that he won’t come.

  The other one, though—the woman’s daughter. With her doll-like eyes. Ingrid. I miss her. She won’t visit, either, and when I ask, the blonde woman just looks sad. If I dwell on that too much it’s like pressing down hard on a bruise.

  So I try not to.

  Get up. Brush teeth. Brush hair. Get dressed. Meds. Breakfast. On and on, every day.

  A man in a suit asks, Ruthie, do you understand what I’m telling you?

  We’re in a private room—not the visitation room. I blink a few times, I try to focus on what he’s saying. He has a large folder in front of him, full of paperwork. At one point he’s shuffling through pages and I catch a glimpse of a picture. It’s gruesome, a decomposed body, bits of black hair sticking to the scalp.

  The thing we will have to do is to show that you were delusional, and Zahra . . .

  That name. It shakes everything inside of me loose so the world becomes cloudy and impossible to see, the way a lake looks when the sand at the bottom is stirred by a storm. My insides are full of sand and bubbles and rocks, cloudy and opaque, and when it all settles again the man is gone and I am alone, strapped to a bed.

  After that, no one says the name.

  But I think about her. I think about her all the time. The Starmaiden. Gone forever, eaten by the Elodea. How I will miss her.