That Night

by Chevy Stevens

  That night they came into my room after dinner. My dad was pale, and my mom looked like she’d been crying. Dad sat on my bed, Mom at my desk.

  “Why do the police think you did it, Toni?” Her voice was anguished. “What did you do?”

  “Nothing! Shauna and her friends, they lied and said they saw us fighting with Nicole. But it’s not true. I didn’t even see them out there.”

  My dad was staring at me, like he was trying to look into my soul.

  I met his eyes. “Dad, I swear we did not do this. I could never hurt Nicole like that. The way she died…” I was crying now, hating the look in their faces, the fear, wondering if their daughter was a killer. “The girls are lying. They hate me—I told you they were coming into the restaurant all the time.”

  I could see him thinking it through, remembering. He sat back, looking relieved. “Then it will get cleared up. Angus, he’ll be able to sort this out.”

  Mom said, “But the police, they must have more reasons to think Toni … to think…” She started to cry, her hands shaking as she tried to wipe away the tears.

  “No, I mean, they said other stuff, like about scratches and DNA, but that’s just because we were in the bushes and we touched Nicole, to help her, but we didn’t do anything to her.” I was babbling, talking desperately, my voice pleading through my own sobs. “Please, Mom, you have to believe me.”

  My dad reached over and grabbed my hand. “We believe you, honey.” He looked at my mom. “It’s going to be okay, Pam. She didn’t do anything wrong.”

  She nodded but she was staring at my outstretched arm, her face haunted, almost scared, and I knew she was remembering the scratches from that night.

  I said, “Mom, you believe me, right?”

  She met my eyes, blinked a couple of times. “Your father’s right. It’s going to be okay. If you didn’t do anything, there’s nothing to be worried about.” She stood up. “I have to go to bed.”

  The next months passed by slowly. I thought of Ryan all the time and wrote him epic letters that I couldn’t send or pass to him. Amy came by to see me a couple of times, then stopped. Her mom didn’t want her coming over, said that Amy associating with me was making them look bad. Amy said, “I’m really sorry, Toni. I totally don’t think you and Ryan did it, but…” I told her I understood, but I felt marooned at home, with parents who were still struggling with their own grief, missing my sister, missing my boyfriend. I’d lost my job—not being able to work nights made it impossible. Mike had told me I shouldn’t worry about it. “When you’re cleared, you can come back, okay?” I loved that he said it, but as far as I knew the police weren’t pursuing any leads.

  Three months after our bail hearing there was a preliminary hearing, then a month later the judge decided there was enough evidence for a trial and gave us a date for the end of February 1998, over a year away. It felt like an eternity. I met with my lawyer often, and I knew Ryan was meeting with his. My parents had put up sureties of a hundred thousand so I could get bail and said Ryan’s family had been able to do it too—their house had almost been paid for—which made me feel bad when I thought of his mom always working late at the hospital. I overheard my parents fighting about money, but they’d stop talking when I entered the room. I started working with my dad again, and that was the only time I felt somewhat normal, taking my anger out with the tools. But then I’d see Dad space out in the middle of a project, his face suddenly stricken, like he’d been stabbed, and I knew he was thinking about Nicole, and that his only living child had been arrested for her murder.

  The worst was when I’d catch Mom or Dad watching me. I’d see a hint of something in their faces, like they were gauging me, and I’d know that they were wondering if I had done it. One night, late, Mom stumbled away to their room smelling like wine and Dad stayed in the living room. I sat by him on the couch. He glanced over, gave me a tired smile.

  I took a breath, then said, “You still believe me, right, Dad?”

  He looked confused for a moment, then held my hand and gave it a squeeze. “Of course. I know you’d never want to hurt Nicole.” It bothered me that he’d said I wouldn’t want to hurt her, not that I wouldn’t hurt her, but I was scared to ask anything more and dropped the subject. At our trial, he’d see.

  * * *

  The trial lasted two weeks. I was allowed to sit with Ryan in the prison docket and we held hands, tight. I wanted to cry when we were first seated together, our eyes roaming each other’s faces, searching out the other’s emotions, saying everything without words. I still love you, I miss you, I’m scared. And the trial was terrifying. I felt helpless, listening to people talk about us, analyzing all of our actions. We were only going before a judge, not a jury—our lawyers didn’t feel we were sympathetic enough for a jury. Angus had tried to get me not to look so angry, made me practice smoothing my face into a neutral mask, showed me how to sit and talk, polite and sweet, told me what clothes to wear, but he said I still looked pissed off at the world, a girl with a bad attitude. And I saw it now on Ryan’s face. Before, he’d looked like he could brush off anything, nothing would get him down, but already his jaw was tighter, his neck corded from clenching. I grabbed his hand, and noticed some small circular red scars. I stared at him, horrified. Ryan quickly turned his hand around, hiding it from view, but I knew what I’d seen. Cigarette burns. I wondered if he’d done them himself, or if his father had been taking his anger out on him for the last year and a half. I didn’t even know if Ryan had been working anywhere or what he’d been doing.

  I listened to experts explain about DNA, listened to Doug Hicks and Frank McKinney talk about the night we’d stumbled into the police station. McKinney didn’t look at me once while he was speaking, his voice calm and controlled, sounding like a cop. He only got emotional a couple of times when he described how Nicole had become friends with his daughter, how she’d been at his home often and he knew she was having problems with her sister. Something Shauna was more than happy to back up when it came her time to testify.

  Shauna looked beautiful that day. Her auburn hair gleamed against her chic black suit, and her eyes had never looked bluer than when they spilled tears down her face as she talked about Nicole, how close they were, close enough for Nicole to share about the knife I’d been carrying. A knife Shauna said I’d threatened Nicole with on many occasions. The lies went on and on.

  Rachel also testified, backing up Shauna’s version of everything, tossing her hair with every declaration. “I mean, like, we knew Toni hated Nicole, but we never knew she’d do that, you know?” And Cathy cried so hard that the lawyers had a hard time getting anything out of her. She just sobbed into her Kleenex, saying over and over again, “I can’t believe she’s dead.”

  Kim stumbled over her words when she verified what the other girls had said, that they were out at the lake that night and “clearly” saw me fighting with Nicole, saw Ryan trying to pull us apart. “I keep thinking about that moment,” Kim said, her eyes dead and flat. “If we’d gone to help her … but we didn’t want to interfere. We were all scared of Toni, especially because we knew she carried a knife and she’d already attacked Shauna at school a couple of times.…”

  Though Nicole had died of blunt force trauma, presumably from the tire iron still missing from Ryan’s truck, the prosecutor said my carrying a knife showed intent long before the murder, and much was made of the violence of her death. How that kind of rage had to be personal. Her clothes had also never been found and it was assumed we had disposed of them on the way to the station.

  Ryan and I had the chance to speak for ourselves, and I tried to explain away each piece of evidence, but the prosecutor kept tripping me up, until all I could do was turn to the judge and say, “Please, Your Honor. You have to believe me. I didn’t kill my sister—I loved her.”

  Ryan looked stiff and uncomfortable in his suit on the stand. His face flushed red when the prosecutor kept cutting him off every time he tried to defend me or my
actions. Like me, he tried to explain that Shauna and the girls were lying, but the prosecutor said, “What possible motive could those four girls, exemplary students with no criminal records, have for lying about something so serious? One of them is a policeman’s daughter!”

  The last day of trial the lawyers made their final summations. I held my breath, listening to them plead our case, studying the judge’s face, trying to read what he was thinking. Our lives were going to be decided by one man. My lawyer had told me that this judge had three daughters of his own. I hoped that meant he understood sisters fight, but that didn’t mean they would kill each other. At the end of summations, the judge said he needed a few days to deliberate.

  Finally, we were brought before the judge again. Both my parents were in the courthouse that day. My mom had left the room a couple of times the first week when the coroner testified or whenever there were photos of Nicole’s body. Then she stopped coming altogether when the evidence against me mounted higher and higher. I’d seen her face when Shauna and the girls testified, seen the shock as she looked from them to me and back again. At home she couldn’t meet my eyes.

  Ryan and I held hands as the judge said, “The issue in this case is who killed Nicole Murphy…” He droned on while I tried to focus, but my breath was coming fast, my body breaking out in a cold sweat. Then the words: “I have no doubt that you, Toni Murphy, caused the death of Nicole Murphy. You had motive, you showed stealth, and you intended it.…” I let out a gasp, saw Ryan’s body jerk with the blow.

  From the corner of my eye, I saw my dad put his face in his hands, his shoulders shaking. The judge was saying stuff about Ryan now but I couldn’t hear anything, just the words, No, no, no, no, chanting in my head. I glanced at Ryan. His face was pale as he stared at the judge. He looked at me, his eyes stunned. I reached for him and we hugged, me crying, his body stiff with shock. Then my dad was there, hugging me hard, and Ryan’s mother, sobbing, her arms trying to circle around both of us. The sheriff put handcuffs on us. I saw my mom, still sitting at one of the benches, her hands over her mouth, her eyes horrified.

  “Ryan…” My voice sounded helpless. Our eyes met, and I saw the same panicky despair in his face. The finality of the moment hit me, the handcuffs wrapped around my wrists, the sheriff gripping my arms as he led me out of the room, his clipped orders, my last glance at Ryan. He looked at me over his mother’s shoulders as she sobbed and sobbed. He mouthed, I love you.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  CAMPBELL RIVER

  JUNE 2013

  Ashley stayed away from me after I told her I wouldn’t film a documentary, or at least she stayed away from the subject. She was only working weekends until she finished school, so I didn’t run into her a lot, but whenever she came into the kitchen she was friendly. And when she saw me with Captain one night, she asked if she could pet him and brought him cookies the next day. I knew she was trying to gain my trust and I kept my distance.

  One evening on my break, after she’d been there for a couple of weeks, I went outside to the back alley, which overlooked the docks—my hiding place from the busy kitchen. I sat on a milk crate, caught my breath in the cool air, wiping the sweat off the back of my neck.

  Ashley followed me outside. “That pasta special you made was really good.”

  “Thanks.” I scuffed my feet against the pavement, avoided her gaze.

  “My mom freaked out that I was working here,” she said.

  “I’m sure.”

  “She doesn’t like me working late at night. She thinks someone will attack me in the parking lot or something stupid. I told her I was staying, though.”

  I flashed back to a fight with my own mother. The Fish Shack, Toni?

  When I didn’t say anything, Ashley continued, “She always has to know what I’m doing every second.” Her voice turned bitter. “She’s always checking my Facebook and I can’t have a password on my cell or my e-mails or anything. That’s why I want to go away to school. Working here, it’s kind of the first step.”

  I had no idea why this kid was telling me all this, but I was struck by how much it reminded me of my own mother and how she had wanted to control everything. I felt a pang, thinking that maybe I should have listened more.

  “Sounds like it’s between the two of you,” I said.

  “Yeah, I know. I just thought you’d get it.”

  It seemed like Ashley had created this whole character for me, based on things she’d read. She probably imagined it would be like the movies: we become buddies, she solves my case, and everyone lives happily ever after. I didn’t want to be an asshole, but I didn’t want to feed into her fantasy either. I stared down at my feet, making it clear that I didn’t want to talk about this anymore.

  She glanced at her watch. “Time for me to get back to work, I guess.”

  * * *

  The next day we were slammed at the restaurant. Later, after most of the kitchen staff had left and I was cleaning the grill, Ashley came to talk to me.

  “Wow, that was crazy busy!” She leaned against the counter, stole a french fry out of the deep fryer. “Least I made good tips. I wasn’t sure I’d like waitressing, but it’s fun. Did you like waitressing when you worked here before?”

  “For the most part.” Except when Shauna and her crew gave me a hard time.

  “That’s cool.”

  What part of it was cool? Was she imagining herself walking in my shoes? Re-creating my life? I sure as hell hoped not. My hands were slippery and I dropped the grill brush, which slid partway under the stove. I squatted down and reached for it. As I stood back up, I noticed Ashley staring at my biceps.

  “Did you get those in prison?” she asked.

  “The tattoos?”

  She nodded. “What do they mean?”

  I paused, caught off guard by the question. She was the first person to ever ask. I studied the brush in my hand, wondered how much I should share.

  “Each bar is for every year I was locked up,” I said finally.

  “I’d love to get a tattoo but my mom would kill me. She already thinks I’m too…” She made quotation marks in the air. “Hard-looking.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “I’m not pretty enough—and she hates how I dress. She tells me I look like a pathetic vampire and she’s embarrassed by me.” She shrugged. “It wouldn’t matter what I wore. She just wishes I looked more like her, but I look like my dad.”

  I was shocked at her candor, the lack of hurt in her voice, like she was talking about the weather. This was obviously something she’d come to terms with a long time ago. Again I was struck by how adult she seemed.

  “My mom didn’t like how I dressed either,” I said. “She thought I was trying too hard to look tough. Maybe she was right.”

  “Was it a way for you to get back at her?”

  I wasn’t sure if she was still trying to get information for her documentary, but I got the feeling she was asking more for personal reasons.

  “I don’t know, maybe. She didn’t like my dating Ryan.”

  Now Ashley looked angry. “My mom can be a bitch about that too. I was supposed to have a date with this guy I like, but my mom hates him because he’s a mechanic and he’s gotten in trouble before, so we had this big fight. She wouldn’t listen to anything when I tried to tell her about him, just said she was looking out for me.” She laughed. “It’s not about me.”

  I didn’t want to get drawn into her life, her problems, but I was curious. “What’s your dad think?”

  “He’s always working, so he just lets my mom do whatever she wants.” The bitter tone again.

  I felt bad for the kid, but it was none of my business. The whole family sounded screwed up—and her mom sounded like a bully, who probably had no idea how her daughter really felt about her. I started scrubbing the grill again, but Ashley wasn’t ready to end the conversation.

  “What did your dad think of Ryan? Did he like him?”

  “I think so
. He was just scared about how reckless we…” I realized I was about to slip, about to let this kid into my world, into my memories where it was Ryan and me sitting in his truck, sharing a joint, him saying, “Don’t worry about your parents. They’ll see it’s real when we’ve been married for twenty years.” And me thinking I was so tough, such a rebel, I didn’t need them. I had no idea.

  Patty popped her head into the kitchen, saw us talking, and gave me a dirty look.

  I said to Ashley, “I really need to finish up here.”

  Ashley looked disappointed, seeing that a door had closed.

  * * *

  The next weekend she followed me out back again when I was on my break. I sat on one of the milk crates and tried to ignore her, focusing on my iced tea, the boats tied up at the dock, their lights glowing on the dark ocean.

  “So I went on a date with the guy from my school,” she said. “His name is Aiden.”

  I squinted up at her. “I thought you weren’t supposed to be seeing him.”

  “I snuck out. We went to a party but I was nervous that my mom would find out and couldn’t really relax and have fun.” She looked angry. “I can’t wait until I’m away at school and can do whatever I want.”

  I nodded, understanding. But I also wondered about this boy. Maybe he wasn’t any good for her. Maybe her mom was right. I thought back to my days with Ryan, trying to see it from my mother’s eyes. I probably would’ve worried too. Then I remembered Nicole at that party, sneaking out the back to meet up with a boy. I wondered where he was now, if he ever thought about her. After she died, I’d tried to find the necklace he’d given her, but it wasn’t in her room.

  “Was it like that for you?” she said. “When you just wanted to be with Ryan and your parents didn’t like him? I mean, you knew he was a good person, just because he got in a little trouble didn’t make him a bad guy.”