by Mindy Mejia
“What’s your take on this curse nonsense?” I asked as we pulled out of the parking lot. I could sense his whole body relaxing as he heard the question.
“Bullshit.”
I laughed once and he eased up a bit more.
“The legend part of it, anyway, is a load of superstitious paranoia. The real curse is dealing with actors—or in my case, kids—who believe in the bullshit and make the director’s life a living hell. You saw how Portia Nguyen got everybody scared on Sunday?”
I nodded.
“She’s been like that the whole play, feeding this curse crap to anyone who’ll listen.”
“Did Hattie listen? She and Portia were mighty close.”
“No.” His voice quieted down. “No, Hattie was one of the only ones who didn’t buy it. She . . . she was different from most teenagers. She understood the space between reality and illusion.”
He started to say something else and then seemed to think better of it.
When we pulled up to the station I had Jake take him into the back while I got a cup of coffee and waited for it to cool. Two news vans drove by the front window and I could hear Brian bugging Nancy out on the sidewalk to set up another press conference. I took a drink and headed to the interrogation room.
Jake, who was playing bodyguard by the door, handed me a folder when I walked in. Lund looked a lot more uncomfortable than he had a few minutes ago. I sat down and flipped the folder open, reading the emails and sipping my coffee. After a moment, Lund leaned in and saw enough to drop his head into his hands.
“So, LitGeek, huh?” I tapped the name on one of the pages.
“God. I . . . I didn’t know who she was. It was all anonymous.”
“Anonymous, like strangers?”
“Yes.” He lifted his head while I kept drinking and flipping pages. “Yes, exactly.”
I picked up a paper and leaned back until I could read it clearly. “ ‘I’m running my hand up the inside of your thigh and into the crease of your leg. My fingers are a whisper on your skin, a suggestion you can’t ignore.’ ”
Jake snickered. I read the crap same as I’d read my breakfast order at Sally’s. I glanced up at Lund. He’d gone beet-red.
“You make . . . suggestions like that . . . to complete strangers?”
“No, I knew her. I mean, I didn’t know her identity but I knew who she was, I thought. We’d been chatting for weeks. We’d become close.”
“Mmm-hmm. Appears that way.”
“What did she print? God, did she just print the sex stuff? As soon as I found out who she was, I ended it. I mean immediately. Doesn’t she have that in there, too?”
He’d worked himself into a pretty good sweat and tried to see what I was reading. Jake was trying for all the world to look tough and disinterested again after the snicker.
“Matter of fact, she does.”
He heaved a sigh out, deflating like a balloon. “So you can see. It was over. It was nothing.”
“Don’t suspect your wife would think this was nothing. Don’t suspect Hattie did. She seemed pretty bent on you here.” I shook my head. “For some reason.”
“Hattie did try to talk to me after we realized . . . the situation. I even met with her once, to end it face-to-face, because she wanted to . . . to continue the relationship.”
“And you weren’t the least bit tempted? Pretty, young girl like that. Smart, just like you. Liked all those books and big cities.”
“No. No.” He shook his head, looking between me and Jake. “She was a student, a . . . a child. I could have gone to jail, for Christ’s sake. Not to mention losing my job and my marriage.”
“You still can, Lund. We can arrange all those things for you.”
“But nothing happened. I told her she had to drop it, that I would never return her feelings, and she moved on. She started dating Tommy Kinakis. That’s when I finally felt like the whole nightmare was behind me, when I began seeing them in the halls. It seemed like they were together for the rest of the year, but I have no idea why. He’s a big, hulking idiot. Have you even talked to Tommy yet? He acted like she was his property, always draping an arm over her and steering her through crowds in the halls like she couldn’t walk by herself.”
“You must have been watching her pretty close to know all that.”
“With the rest of the students, I couldn’t care less. But yes—I watched Hattie.” He slumped a bit as he said it, maybe ashamed, maybe relieved to get it off his chest. “How could I not? I was paranoid that she’d decide to turn me in.”
“Well, then, this all worked out pretty nice for you. Can’t hurt you now, can she?”
“No! How can you even say that?” He snapped back up, indignant as hell. “I fucked up, okay? I know it. I’m an asshole and a lousy husband.”
“No arguments here.”
“But that doesn’t have anything to do with the fact that Hattie was the brightest and most promising student in that entire school. She . . . understood people, she could peg you with a glance. It was unsettling sometimes, like she could see right through you. She was going to New York in the fall and I knew that she would fit right in with that fast-paced East Coast mentality. I knew she would do something amazing with her life. And I was relieved, too, okay? That she would be gone and I could move on with my life.”
“Maybe next fall wasn’t fast enough for you. Or maybe Hattie decided she needed some cash for her trip to New York or a little bump in her GPA.” It grated, having to talk about Hattie like that, heaping ugliness on her, but I couldn’t spare her from it. I had to bare all her secrets, and just hope I could keep some of it from Bud and Mona.
“The only time I spoke to Hattie in the last few months was in class or at the play. She wasn’t blackmailing me. She wouldn’t do that. You need to talk to Tommy. Hattie was going places and Tommy wasn’t. If she tried to break up with him . . . these last few days . . . it’s the only thing I can think of.”
I nodded and shuffled the emails back together in the folder, flipping it shut. He was working up a good sweat trying to put the knife in Tommy’s hands.
“Where were you on Friday night after the play, Lund?”
“I had to wait until everyone left and then lock up the school. Carl helped me. Then we went over to his place for a drink.”
“Carl Jacobs?”
He nodded.
“Okay, let’s go.” I stood up and handed the folder to Jake.
“To Carl’s? He’s still at school.”
I led him out the door, practically cuffing him on his sweaty collar. “We’re going to Mayo. I’m gonna give you a chance to clear your name, Lund. Or clean it up some, anyway.”
I put him in the front seat again, in case any of those news vans happened to be watching, and walked Jake back to the station door, talking low.
“You think he was the one that had sex with her?” Jake asked.
“Lab’ll tell us one way or the other. He wanted to, that’s for damn sure. Comes down to whether he was more horny or scared, I guess.”
“I’d go with scared. That guy reeks of chicken shit. You want me to pull Carl Jacobs in?”
“Just do a phone interview. The less people we parade into the station, the better. Corroborate the alibi. I want to know when they left the school, what they drank, what they talked about, and when Lund left Carl’s house. I’ll get the same from Lund on the way to Rochester. Call me as soon as you know.”
“You’ll pick up this time?” He was too excited to put much sarcasm behind it.
“I might at that. And Jake?”
“Yeah?”
“Not one word of this to anyone outside this conversation, you understand? Not dispatch, not Nancy or any of the boys, not even your mother. The press would have a field day.” I passed a hand over my face. “And I’d have to arrest Bud for murdering this sorry excuse here.”
“What do I say if someone asks about Lund?”
“You tell them to keep their big nose
s out of an ongoing investigation.”
Jake seemed to like that idea and I left him to it, walking over to the cruiser. Lund was sunk into the seat, his head turned away from the window like the whole damn town didn’t already know where he was. LitGeek liked to hide. Now the question was, how much was he hiding?
HATTIE / Wednesday, November 7, 2007
“COME ON, Hattie. You know you’re going to.”
Portia took a bite of her hamburger, made a face, and set it back down. “Didn’t I say no pickles?”
Maggie leaned across the Dairy Queen booth and picked off Portia’s pickles, popping them in her mouth. “I don’t know. She’s a big, fat community theater star now. Probably too good for our spring play.”
“Shut up, both of you. I said I hadn’t decided.” I squirted some ketchup in my basket.
“It still tastes like pickle,” Portia complained.
“Then give it to me.” Maggie grabbed the burger.
“It’s only November,” I pointed out and offered Portia some of my onion rings. “I’ll decide when they post what play it’s going to be. I’m not auditioning for a musical. I can’t sing.”
“I heard Mr. Lund’s directing it this year. There’s no way he would pick a musical.”
My stomach lurched at his name and the onion rings turned to concrete in my mouth. Luckily a group of football players barged into the restaurant and started horsing around by the registers.
“Maggie, did you ask Derek to Sadie’s yet?” I changed the subject.
She shot a coy look over her shoulder at the testosterone display. “Yep. We’re going to double with Molly and Trenton.”
Derek had someone in a headlock by the Dilly Bar case, but he paused to shoot Maggie a grin with a licking motion. Charming.
“What about you, Porsche? Did you ask Matt or Tommy?”
“Matt’s going with Stephanie.”
“Well, Tommy’s right there. Go ask him.” I waved an onion ring at him, but Tommy startled like he’d been watching me and walked over to our booth, hands shoved in his letterman jacket.
“Hey, Hattie.”
“Hey, Portia had something she wanted—” I got violently kicked under the table.
“—to go do,” she finished, smiling at Tommy. “You can have my seat.”
“Mine, too. I’m going to grab a Blizzard.” They exchanged a look and suddenly they were both gone. I got the uncomfortable feeling that I’d missed a conversation.
“Er—d’you mind?” Tommy flapped his jacket at the empty booth and I shrugged. He sat down, cleared his throat, and started playing with the napkin dispenser. Gerald always said hands were a shortcut to the character. Ignore the words, he said. Pay attention to what the hands were doing. Tommy had thick hands and dirty fingernails and he clubbed the dispenser around like a hyped-up hockey player. He was nervous as hell.
“So, what’s up?” I finally asked.
“Nothing. Just got home from hunting with my dad. Bagged a twelve-pointer at two hundred feet.”
“Killer,” I deadpanned, nodding.
It seemed like most of the restaurant was watching us, with Tommy’s football buddies in the front row, elbowing each other and shoving fries in their mouths.
“What’s up with you?” he asked.
“Just grabbing a bite before work.”
“Oh. Cool.” He scratched his hair, which wasn’t exactly curly. It looked more like he’d just gotten out of bed.
I took a drink and my straw made that slurping noise when you get to the bottom. Tommy eyed the cup hopefully.
“Do . . . do you want me to grab you a refill?”
“Sure.” I handed it to him. “Half orange, half Sprite, three ice cubes.”
I watched him go to the soda fountain and fill my ridiculous order exactly. He even dumped out a little orange to make sure it only filled half the cup. When Derek walked over and punched him in the arm, Tommy shoved him mercilessly into the condiments counter and came back to the booth without spilling a drop. Amazing. It was like a social experiment. I took a sip and tried experimenting some more.
“So what do you think of Portia?”
“Portia Nguyen?” he asked, and I tried not to roll my eyes. There were no other Portias in the entire town.
“Yeah.”
“I don’t know. She’s nice, I guess.”
“What would you say if she asked you to Sadie’s?”
“Oh.” He flushed bright red and started playing with the napkins again. “I, um, I didn’t think . . . she was gonna ask me.”
Then he swallowed and met my eyes. Funny, I’d never noticed his were a perfect blue, like the kind of sky that made you forget there was anything behind it.
“I thought maybe you might ask me,” he blurted out.
I offered him an onion ring while I considered. There was a lot to consider all of a sudden.
“Why do you want me to ask you instead of Portia?”
“I don’t know. She’s just kind of loud. She’s always talking about people. I know she’s your friend and all, but . . .” He let the sentence hang, looking completely uncomfortable, and shoved the onion ring in his mouth.
“She is pretty loud,” I agreed with a smile. He smiled back, a half grin that made his baby face cute and crooked. So he wanted a quiet girl.
“Are you going to ask me then?”
“I don’t know.” I leaned forward and let my hair fall in my face. “I think I need to see you dance first.”
“What? Right here?” He seemed confused.
Okay—a quiet, simple girl. I offered him another onion ring and watched his face light up. He liked being fed. The list of characteristics grew. And just like that, Tommy Kinakis’s girlfriend started to form.
For our first date, we went to see No Country for Old Men. He picked me up in a gigantic truck that he clearly worshipped. He pointed out the new seat covers, the sound system, and even showed me how he’d built a secret cubbyhole in the driver’s side door that held a flask of whiskey, which he tipped my way in the theater’s parking lot. I declined. We shared a monster-size popcorn during the movie although it was gone before I’d had more than a few bites; I was too engrossed in the performances.
“I love the Coen brothers,” I sighed on the way home.
“Was one of them the hit man?” Tommy asked. “He was awesome.”
We didn’t talk again until he pulled into my driveway and then he fiddled with the radio and mumbled for me to hang on.
“For what?” I asked, but he was already out of the truck and walking around to my side.
As he opened my door he held out his hand awkwardly. I took it to jump down and would have let go if he hadn’t closed his fingers around mine and put his other hand gently on my shoulder.
“You . . . said you wanted to see me dance.”
And then it registered—the country music he’d turned up and the bashful expression on his face.
“Oh.” I flushed and dropped my gaze, thrown off balance by the gesture.
He drew my hand in to his chest and turned me in a few circles until the song ended and I backed up.
“So will I do?”
I smiled. “I think so.”
The next weekend we went to Sadie Hawkins and a postseason football party afterwards, where Tommy kissed me next to Derek’s dad’s beer fridge. Yells went up all around and after that everyone started talking about us like a couple. It even sounded right. Tommy and Hattie, high school sweethearts.
By Thanksgiving we’d established a routine. We went out on Saturday nights, and since we didn’t have any classes together—I took all advanced subjects and he was mostly on the remedial track—we only saw each other during lunches at school. I sat with him at the football table and let him eat most of my lunch while I played on my phone. On the days with chocolate chip cookies, though, he always gave me his.
Tommy obviously liked me—all I had to do was smile at him and he lit up—although it wasn’t me he liked so mu
ch as just having a girlfriend. He gave me bone-crunching squeezes whenever the other jocks corralled their girlfriends and we usually spent Saturday nights double- or triple-dating with some of them. I think he felt like he truly belonged, now that he had his own plus-one, and even though he was dumb as a box of rocks, he was still a sweetheart. I was glad I could give him that kind of acceptance from his friends.
Mom and Dad were happy, too. I think they thought having a boyfriend grounded me here, like maybe I would change my mind about New York. They invited Tommy over for Sunday dinner and he and Dad watched the football game afterwards, just like Greg and Dad used to do.
For me it was all learning. I’d never dated anyone before and had no idea how to be a girlfriend. It turned out to be easy—mostly physical, no-brainer stuff. It was more about leaning in to listen than actually listening, or putting a hand on his arm instead of telling him to stop. I watched the other girls on our double dates and saw how they teased and giggled. They looked so happy and I wondered whether, if I looked happy enough, I would belong, too.
One day after lunch I walked him to English class. We meandered down the hall with Tommy draping an arm over my shoulders and my book bag slapping lightly against his thigh, seemingly in no hurry, but inside my body started to hum. The football players called their usual shout-outs to each other as the warning bell rang and then we got to Peter’s door. I looked up and smiled that hinting smile at Tommy, leaning toward his huge dinner-plate face. He took the bait, smashing his mouth down on mine and tightening his squeeze where he had tucked me under his shoulder.
“Have fun in English,” I teased after he let me go, running a fingernail up his biceps.
“Yeah, right.” He rolled his eyes and walked into the classroom.
At the teacher’s desk, Peter stared at me, completely frozen. His eyes darted back and forth between me and Tommy and I could tell he was in total shock. He did cafeteria duty with Mr. Jacobs and could have watched me with Tommy for weeks now, but he’d refused to even glance in my direction since that night in the barn. I ignored him and blew Tommy a kiss before waltzing down the hallway. It was beautiful.