You’re Next

by Kylie Schachte

  I don’t like disappointing her, but it’s better this way. Safer.

  “I’m sorry,” I tell her. “I can’t.”

  The coffee maker trills. Upstairs, I can hear Olive slamming around in her room. She’s pissed, and she has a right to be. I know I overreacted. I should apologize, but my heart is still racing and I can’t get the image of Ava’s lifeless face out of my mind.

  I watch fresh coffee stream into the pot below. In the front hall, our mail slot grinds open. Something drops into the house with a soft thwack, and I pause.

  Our mail usually comes around eleven in the morning. It’s almost four now.

  I leave the kitchen to investigate. There’s an unmarked manila envelope lying on the floor in the hall, illuminated by a square patch of sunlight. I pick it up. Nothing on the other side, either. No stamp, no address, no name.

  It has to be for me. Sketchy, anonymous manila envelopes are standard accessories for the Flora Calhoun action figure.

  I slip my finger along the front flap of the envelope, loosening the glue, and slide the contents out. Photos.

  The first one is of me leaving school yesterday. I’m leaning against the stone wall out front, waiting for Cass. I can just make out Elle Dorsey’s shoulder at the right edge of the frame.

  The next was taken today. I’m standing in the mouth of the alleyway where Ava died. VT’s leaning against the wall to my left, but he’s slightly out of focus, like the camera lens was locked in right on me.

  The last one is a shot through my bedroom window. I’m putting my hair up before I go to bed.

  There’s a buzzing in my ears. Something hot and tight winds around my throat.

  Someone is watching me.

  I throw open the door. I look up and down the street, but of course there’s no one around.

  I keep inhaling but I can’t get any air. My chest expands and contracts but I’m drowning. I’m still standing in the open doorway. Someone could be watching me from the house across the street, or that blue car parked down the block. I step back inside, slamming the door and locking it behind me. I clutch the photos to my chest hard enough that they start to crumple.

  They’re just pictures. If some asshole from school can write a threat on my locker just to mess with my head, couldn’t they also have taken these? This feels different, though.

  Three long, slow breaths. I have to pull myself together. Olive is still moving around upstairs. She could come down at any moment. I don’t want her to find me like this, wild with terror, collapsed against the front door.

  I flick through the photos again, trying to see them more objectively this time.

  The one from the alley is taken at a slight angle. The photographer was behind me and a little to the right. I close my eyes and try to re-create the street in my mind. I don’t remember seeing any other people, but there were a few cars parked on that road. Three, maybe four. It’s not like I was writing down license plates or anything, though.

  I flip to the one through my bedroom window. It must have been taken last night. I’m wearing the sweatshirt I changed into after I got home from the Basement. It was nearly five in the morning. The angle is down low, like the photographer was shooting from a parked car on the street.

  The doorbell rings, and my heart stops. I straighten and, slowly, every inch of me shaking, peer through the peephole.

  Cass is standing on my front steps. I choke out something halfway between a laugh and a sob, my nervous system shot to shit. Her overnight bag is slung over her shoulder. She’s fighting to contain a small, secret smile, like she had an impossibly good afternoon.

  I reach for the doorknob, but the photos are still in my hand.

  She probably came over to tell me all about her audition. If I show these photos to her, the terror I am barely holding back right now will swallow me completely, and Cass will get sucked in, too. Isn’t that what she said yesterday? If you’re going through hell, I’m coming with you.

  Through the peephole, I watch as she tucks a loose strand of hair behind her ear, that giddy smile still playing at the corners of her mouth, her cheeks flushed and rosy with happiness.

  She rings the doorbell again.

  Olive yells down, “Are you going to get that or not?” Footsteps. She’s walking out of her room and into the hall.

  “It’s for me!” My backpack is still lying where I dropped it under the coatrack. I grab it, shove the photos inside, take one last deep breath, and open the door.

  “Hey!” It comes out a little breathless.

  Cass frowns. “You okay?”

  “Yeah, sorry, just woke up from a nap.” I yawn for effect. Cass only looks more suspicious. “You want coffee? I just made some.” I leave the door open and walk into the kitchen.

  Cass follows me. I can feel the questions radiating off her, but I make myself busy grabbing two mugs out of the cabinet. I pull milk and that disgusting vanilla creamer we only keep around for Cass out of the fridge. I stir and hand her the mug. Her worried gaze is heavy on my back as we tromp up the stairs to my room.

  The coffee is already working its magic, calming me down as I take the first sips. We sit on my bed, backs against the wall. Cass watches me over the rim of her mug the whole time.

  She starts, “Are you—”

  I cut her off. “Haven’t been sleeping much.” She nods, full of understanding that makes me feel sick about lying to her. But if I think about the photos again—the totally at ease, safe-in-my-own-home look on my face as I pulled my hair into a ponytail before bed—I might come apart at the seams.

  And I really do want to hear about her audition. It’s one of, like, two things in our lives that aren’t completely terrible at the moment. Olive’s right. I am self-centered, but I don’t want to be.

  “I’m okay,” I say again, and this time it sounds more real. “Please, I’ve been waiting all day to hear how it went.”

  “I think I got it,” she whispers after a second. Her voice is tight with nervous pride and excitement. It fills me with a sudden burst of warmth, and sappy tears prick my eyes.

  God, my emotions are all kinds of fucked today.

  I lean my head against her shoulder. “Tell me about it. I want the whole story, and if you leave out any of the parts with Elliot Graham, I’ll kick you.”

  She squirms in her seat. “We got to play together, a little bit at the end, after I’d gone through the stuff I prepared.” She sighs, long and sweet. “He’s so… you know? We were playing together, and he kept looking at me, and sweet baby Jesus, Flora, have you seen how long his fingers are?”

  “Now you’re making me blush.” I laugh, and she does, too. Already, my pulse has slowed. I can deal with those creepy photos later.

  Cass hesitates. “Are you sure this is what you want to talk about right now?”

  I smile at her, and it’s not forced at all. “I’m sure.”

  My spoon chimes against the side of the mug as I stir my morning coffee. Once again, I barely slept last night. Three separate times, I almost woke Cass up to tell her about the photos, but I never did. Still, every time I closed my eyes I saw the picture taken through my bedroom window, my face relaxed like I had no idea I was being watched.

  Gramps is sitting at the kitchen table. His newspaper rustles as he turns the page. I could tell him now. He’s not like Mom. He won’t freak out first and ask questions later. But this investigation is only a few days old, and I’m already getting threats. Serious ones. What if this time it’s too much for him?

  Without looking up from his paper, he says, “You missed three classes yesterday. Your chemistry teacher called. She’s concerned.”

  I bet. “I had a lead to follow up. It was important.”

  “Be that as it may, let’s not make a habit out of it. I know this is important to you, but you need to apply to college next year. I don’t want you to lose sight of the future.” He turns the page with a shade too much deliberation.

  What is it with everyone and
college? When did this become the thing we have to worry about all the time, no matter what else is going on? Kind of hard to think about my future when someone’s leaving death threats on my doorstep.

  I try to keep my voice light and easy. “I get it. It’s not like I blew off school to get high and play video games.”

  “Well, then, what did you find that was more important than your STEM education?”

  Talking about case stuff is way less scary than worrying about college, or those photos.

  I grab a mug for Cass and go back to making coffee. “Ava’s wallet, filled with cash. Doesn’t exactly spell mugging, does it?”

  Long pause. “You found Ava McQueen’s wallet?”

  “In the dumpster by Congressman Dorsey’s campaign office.” I hesitate. I’m not even totally sold on this idea myself, at least not yet, and Gramps was less than convinced yesterday when I told him my theories about who’s running the Basement. I keep my tone casual. “Might explain why the police are so eager to believe it’s a robbery, if someone as powerful as Dorsey is involved.”

  He takes his time carefully folding his newspaper. “You took the wallet with you?”

  “Yeah…” I know the Dorsey theory is still kind of a stretch, but is he really not going to react at all?

  His paper now folded into a perfect square, he turns his full attention to me. “You have it here?”

  Too late, I get the feeling this might be a trap. “Yes.”

  He nods several times. My pulse picks up again.

  Gramps looks over my shoulder. “Cassidy, you should go to school. Flora will meet you there.”

  I look back. Cass is standing in the doorway. Her eyes dart to mine, but I have no idea what’s going on, either.

  “Why?” I ask him.

  He runs a hand over his close-cropped beard. “You and I are going to the police station to turn over Ava’s wallet.”

  Sweat breaks out all over my body. “What? No!”

  He stands and buttons his suit jacket. “Flora, you found evidence. It belongs to the police.”

  I can’t breathe. What is happening? I’ve done way sketchier shit than this, and he’s turned a blind eye or even helped in the past.

  Gramps retrieves his wallet from the kitchen island, his demeanor as cool and efficient as always, but it’s like he’s a totally different person right now. Like he’s Mom.

  “They’ll never believe me.” I follow him around the room as he searches for his keys. “Richmond said the cops are already suspicious of me, and it’s not like they’re going to do anything with the wallet anyway, not when it totally debunks their mugging theory. It’s just going to—”

  He turns to me abruptly. “Flora, the adult thing to do is to bring the wallet to the police. If you cannot make that choice yourself, I will have to make it for you. Now, kindly go retrieve the wallet from the safe you think I don’t know about in your room, and we can all proceed with our day.”

  As predicted, Richmond flips her shit. She parks us in an unused conference room that smells like mildewy socks—I think if my grandfather weren’t here, she would put me in an interrogation room just for fun—and yells at me for a solid fifteen minutes. There’s a lot of “What were you thinking?” and “No respect for the law!” getting thrown around.

  Everything she says washes right over me. I keep looking at my grandfather. I don’t know how we got here.

  He looks everywhere but at me. I’m on my own for this one.

  “I mean seriously, Calhoun!” Richmond concludes. “I told you to stay far away from this investigation. Was I not clear about the consequences?”

  “I don’t see how I can stay out of it when you guys are barely even trying. Someone killed Ava to rob her, then threw all of her credit cards and a thousand bucks in a dumpster? You’re right, makes perfect sense.”

  “Maybe they got spooked. It happens. The guy gets nervous, pulls the trigger, and then they want to throw it all away like it never happened.” She catches herself. “Why am I even debating this with you? All of that’s irrelevant, because I told you to stay out of it.”

  “Why are you so desperate to make the mugging thing work?” My voice is rising, and I fight to keep it under control. It makes me furious to hear her talk about Ava’s death like it was some random accident, but I don’t want to prove to Richmond, once again, that I’m nothing but an overemotional teenager.

  “Flora, I’m not messing around,” Richmond says. “Some of the other detectives think you planted the wallet. It certainly wouldn’t be the first time you made something up to suit your story.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” I ask at the same time that Gramps says, “Excuse me?”

  Richmond addresses him like I’m not in the room. “Your granddaughter here called in a tip yesterday about some teen fight club in Whitley. I sent a bunch of patrol officers down there last night, but all they did was wander around a rat-infested basement for two hours. There was nothing there.”

  It takes all of my willpower not to bash my head repeatedly against the table in frustration. I can’t believe I didn’t take pictures the other night. So stupid.

  Richmond laughs bitterly. “Should have known better than to go chasing after another wild Flora Calhoun theory. You know my sergeant nearly took me off the case? Trust me, Flora. Another detective gets assigned to this, you’re going to need a lawyer.”

  “You’re just pissed you looked bad in front of your boss,” I say. “You always do this. You care more about your precious career than solving murders.”

  This is how Richmond was with Lucy, too. She’s not a bad cop. She knew Matt Caine did it. But when she got the order to drop the case, she did as she was told.

  So who would be powerful enough to keep the police from looking too closely this time around? Obviously Dorsey, but he’s not the only rich white dude with the police commissioner’s number, either.

  For a second, Richmond looks like she’s going to lose it. She reels herself in and turns sharply to look at my grandfather. “Listen, Mr. Calhoun. I could have her arrested right now for tampering with evidence or obstruction of justice, and that’s just off the top of my head. But I’ve had my fill of dealing with your granddaughter, so I’m going to give you guys one last chance to settle this within the family. Am I clear?”

  I open my mouth to defend myself, but Gramps beats me to it. “Flora found this wallet yesterday, and she brought it here within twenty-four hours. She discovered this fight club, and she shared that information with you. I don’t appreciate you speaking to her as though she’s hampering your efforts, when Flora is, in essence, doing your job for you.”

  Richmond rocks back on her heels. Her eyebrows nearly touch her hairline. Honestly, I’m a little taken aback, too. Everything he just said is what I’d expect the usual Gramps to say. So are we back to normal now?

  He stands. “I need to take Flora to school. If you have any further questions, I must insist that we have legal counsel present. Come along, Flora.”

  I follow him out of the room. He doesn’t look back at me.

  Somehow my grandfather defending me after our fight has only made me feel worse. I’m so used to being able to predict exactly how he’ll react. Now I don’t know where we stand.

  “I know you’re upset,” he says on the drive to school. We’re nearly there. Most of the ride has passed in tense silence. “If they already consider you a person of interest, imagine what kind of trouble you would have been in had they found the wallet in your room. It was too great a risk to keep it in the house.”

  I keep my eyes trained out the passenger-side window. It’s starting to rain.

  We pull up in front of the school, but I don’t move. For a moment, the only sound is the rain and the swish of windshield wipers. I count cars in the parking lot so I don’t have to look at him. A green station wagon. A black sedan. A white utility van.

  Gramps continues. “I want you to understand something. Flora, I am so proud of you.
”

  That makes me turn around.

  He keeps his hands on the steering wheel as he speaks. “I have the utmost respect for you and your desire to help people, even when it costs you personally. It frightens me at times, but I would rather be scared than see you become a less courageous person.”

  All morning, I’ve been remembering the way Mom and I used to fight when she would get scared. But he’s not Mom. Mom would never say anything like this to me.

  Now that I’m looking at him, though, I see all the signs. The tightness around his mouth. The corners of his eyes creased with exhaustion and fear. One of his shirt buttons has only been pushed halfway through its hole.

  He chose me, but all I’ve ever done is make his life harder.

  Gramps breathes a heavy sigh. “With your mother gone, I have to make decisions for you and Olive. Decisions you might not always agree with. Please do not take it to mean that I do not believe in you.”

  I look at him sideways and nod.

  As I walk into school, I think again about the photos, still hidden in my backpack. It meant something to me, what he said, but I know for sure now that I can’t tell him how much danger I’m in.

  We’re not there yet, but I can see it in the distance: the breaking point between us, where I’ve finally pushed him too far.

  Cass is pacing in front of my locker when I arrive. The ache in my chest eases. She pulls me into a hug. Doesn’t bother asking if I’m all right, and I love her for that.

  Her arms still tight around me, she says, “I got you a present. Damian Rivera is ready to talk.”

  She fills me in as we make our way to the art room, where Damian has class now. She cornered him during morning break and leaned on him a little.

  “He cracked in, like, two seconds.” She matches me stride for stride as we speed walk through the halls. I’m ready to forget everything that just happened at the police precinct, and there’s nothing like intel to help with that. Cass continues. “I told him we already knew about the Basement, and he got really nervous. He claims he doesn’t know much, but between the two of us I bet we can drag something out of him.”