They Wish They Were Us

by Jessica Goodman

  “Pass me one?” she says, without taking her eyes off the road.

  I reach into the greasy paper bag in my lap and pull out a mini powdered donut, still slightly warm from when I picked them up from Diane’s. Rachel’s one request. Just like old times.

  She pinches one with two fingers and lets the sugar fall on her chest like snow. She makes no move to brush it off. “Ugh,” she moans with a mouthful of flour and butter. “Nothing like pow-do. ” She pops the rest into her mouth. “I miss that place.” Even though her voice sounds chipper, Rachel looks like shit. Her skin is pale and her thick wavy hair hangs in stringy ropes down her back. Her eyes are fixated, obsessed, and her sweater is baggier than anything I can ever remember her wearing. Little moth holes prick each sleeve.

  “Can I ask you something?” I say.

  “You already did.” Her mouth curls up into a smile. “Shoot.”

  “Why aren’t you at school?” It’s what I’ve been wanting to ask her since she invited me to her place in the city, so far from Cornell, where she was supposed to be in the middle of her junior year. “Don’t you have another year left?”

  “I graduated early. Stayed there every summer. Took six classes a semester. Worked myself into the ground. It was the only thing that made me feel better . . . like I was normal,” she says, shaking her head. “But everyone knew. They looked at me like I was the one who was accused of murder. I couldn’t escape this shit there.” Rachel sighs and props one elbow up on the window, leaning her head against her palm. “You know, you’re the only person I’ve talked to in three years, besides Graham, who really knew me before, who knew what we were like. But now, everyone I work with, my new friends, my girlfriend, Frida—to them I’m just Rachel. No one knows shit.” She smiles. “It’s so freeing.”

  “So, why?” I ask. “Why start all of this now?” I really want to ask, Is it worth it?

  “What would you do?” she asks. “If your entire hometown assumed you, too, were guilty of something, anything, just because of who your family is? If your whole life was turned upside down by the people you trusted most in this entire world? Because that’s what this is like.”

  “But everyone’s going to know,” I say. “All the new people in your life. You’re going to be in the news, probably.” The original article I saw didn’t mention her, but if this was real, if Graham was actually innocent, Rachel would be front row center.

  Rachel smiles again but her eyes mist over. “He’s my baby brother,” she says quietly. “Don’t you have a little brother?”

  I nod. “Yeah.”

  “Bryce’s age, right?”

  “Mm-hm.”

  “He’s a Player?” She asks like she already knows. I nod. “What if this were about him? If your brother was assumed to have killed someone, to have taken their life? And if the person who died was someone you knew so well, spent so much time with, you felt their loss every single day?”

  That person is lost to me. Shaila is gone. If Jared had done it . . . I can’t even bring myself to imagine what I would do. I shake my head.

  “If he says he didn’t do it, if the blood evidence doesn’t lie, then I want the truth. I want to know who’s responsible. And I want them to pay.” She grips the steering wheel hard and floors the gas. “We’re close,” she says.

  The final leg of the drive is all twisty-turny roads and poorly marked exits. We pass them in silence. Rachel makes a hard left and a gray wooden sign comes into view, nearly hidden behind a curtain of branches. I’m barely able to make out the dull white letters: DANBURY JUVENILE CENTER. I wonder who else is locked up here, kept so far from the rest of society. Not off the grid, but only just on.

  Gravel and salt crunch under the tires and about a half mile down the road, we approach a chain-link fence. It opens as if operated by a phantom guard and I scoot forward, craning to see what’s ahead. When we emerge from another narrow path, there sits a concrete expanse the size of a football field, marked neatly by white-painted lines. The lot is nearly full with BMWs, Mercedes, and Audis. Helpful, clear markers hang overhead.

  VISITORS LOUNGE THIS WAY, one reads in navy block lettering with an arrow underneath. PATIENCE IS A VIRTUE, another one says in cursive scrawl.

  “Knock, knock! Need a hand?” A middle-aged woman with saggy cheeks and graying hair appears, standing just outside my window in an all-khaki snowsuit and an eager grin. Her name badge says VERONICA, VISITOR HOST.

  I look to Rachel but she’s already out of the car, coming around my side. “Hi, V.”

  “Oh, it’s you, dear! Nice to see you.”

  “You too.” Rachel rubs her gloved hands together and motions to me through the door. “C’mon.”

  The air is sharp and icy. It burns my throat. I wonder what the hell I’ve gotten myself into.

  “This is Jill,” Rachel says when I step down from the passenger side. “She’s a frie—” but she stops herself and redirects. “She knew Graham.”

  Veronica nods, showing no emotion, no sign of recognition. “Welcome to Danbury, then,” she says. “Follow me.”

  We do, but I can barely keep up, shuffling my feet forward to try to catch Rachel. I should have asked her more about this place, about what Graham has been doing for the past three years. But instead I’m totally oblivious to everything around us. Veronica pulls open a metal door and leads us down a wide hallway decorated with collaged dream boards and ink drawings until we come to a pair of French doors and a brightly lit cube that looks more like a doctor’s waiting room than the jails I’ve seen on TV.

  “Come right this way. You’ll need to fill out some forms as a first-time guest.” She click-clacks on the keyboard and a ream of paper flies from the printer. “Here’s a pen, sweetie.”

  Rachel raps her knuckles against the Formica countertop and taps her foot impatiently on the floor. I speed up my work, checking boxes until I reach the final page, where I scribble my name.

  “Done,” I say.

  “Finally,” Rachel mumbles. But when I throw her a look, she immediately mouths “Sorry.” I guess I can’t blame her for being anxious, for wanting to see Graham as quickly as possible. I’d be the same way with Jared.

  A big, burly man in purple scrubs motions for us to follow him, and the next hallway is just as strange, cold and lined with tile, like a school. More hand-drawn artwork hangs on the walls.

  When we reach another door, metal and massive, the guy stops and turns to us. “Rachel, you know the rules, but just a reminder, you can only stay an hour. No touching. Be positive.”

  “Thanks, TJ,” Rachel says. “Go time?” She looks at me now.

  I swallow the lump in my throat and break my fingers apart. I hadn’t realized they were clasped together.

  TJ pushes open the door to what looks like a cafeteria and makes a sweeping motion with his hand like he’s a butler or a waiter at a fancy restaurant. My stomach does cartwheels and I scan the room frantically. I spot him before he sees me.

  There, just across the room. Graham.

  It’s almost too much to bear. But I make myself look, to take him in from afar. He’s dressed in light green scrubs, not handcuffed like I expected. He runs his fingers through his hair, a nervous tic that gives me déjà vu. He used to do that before major tests or Player pops. His chin has a faint sheen of stubble, making him look so much older than I remember, so much older than I feel right now. He stoops a bit, though it looks like he’s grown at least a few inches taller. He’s thin, too. Almost skinny, with sharper angles and darker shadows.

  His head turns toward us slowly and his eyes meet mine. They widen as we register each other for the first time in nearly three years. Rachel is already by his side and I force myself to walk, to close the gap between us.

  “Hi,” he says. It’s a mixture of shock and excitement. Curiosity, maybe.

  “Hi.”

 
Graham drops to a seat at a small circular table and I follow suit, mirroring his movements.

  He throws me a sheepish smile, as if we haven’t known each other since before puberty. As if I don’t know all of his secrets.

  “Um, how are you?” I ask because I don’t know what else to say.

  At first the words are sparse and he stumbles, as if he’s trying to remember how people are supposed to converse or make small talk. He chats about the weather and points out other people around the room, kids about our age, talking to older folks who look like their parents or siblings. He motions to an Asian American boy who sits in silence as his mom plays a recording off an iPhone. “That’s from his brother,” Graham says. “He refuses to come visit, but Andy misses him so much.” Rachel nods and purses her lips.

  He doesn’t say where these people came from or what they did to get here. He rambles on about the food, and how chicken tikka masala night is his favorite, but he used to look forward to spaghetti Bolognese night. He mentions how he’s learned to play cricket from some of the British counselors in his “cohort,” and that he’s taken an interest in architecture. “I’ve read just about everything we have about Norman Foster and Zaha Hadid. I can’t wait to visit the bridge she built in Abu Dhabi—it’s, like, legendary,” he says.

  “So, you actually think you’re getting out?” I say.

  Graham’s eyes dart to Rachel’s and she nods, giving him the go-ahead. It’s a ritual I’m not part of. A signal between them. Graham’s mouth gets small. He hunches lower in his seat and curls his limbs into his body.

  “I didn’t do it, Jill.” His voice is low and measured, deep and full, like he’s practiced this line over and over. He’s trying to be convincing. He runs a hand through his hair again.

  Rachel leans in and rests her arms on the table. “Why don’t you start from the beginning?” she says. Her eyes are wide and nurturing, motherly but urgent.

  Graham nods and takes a big breath. He squeezes his mouth shut. Then the words tumble out.

  “I don’t remember much about everything that happened after,” he says. “But I remember everything leading up to . . . that. Don’t you?” His dark eyes make direct contact with mine. It’s almost too intimate to bear.

  A lump forms in my throat.

  “You do, right?” he asks again. I nod once.

  I do. The light spring breeze coming in from Ocean Cliff. Air so salty it stung my pores. No bugs yet. It was too early for mosquitos. Relief when I realized what I had to do. How every sip felt like poison sliding down my throat. Then, complete darkness swallowing me, filling me with paralyzing fear. It was all so much worse than I thought it would be.

  I squeeze my eyes shut and try to make out Shaila in all of this. I picture her gnawing at her ragged nails when she realized what she had to do. The moment her face went from determined to terrified.

  “Yes,” I whisper.

  Graham’s face goes cold. “Do you remember my initiation pop?”

  How could I forget? Jake came up with all of them, we were told. “You were scared of spiders, right?”

  “Tarantulas,” Graham says. He shivers. “They brought out a dozen of ’em and I had to stand with them crawling all over me in that glass shower for hours.”

  “Four,” I say. “Four hours.” That’s how long mine was, too.

  “Huh,” he says. “Two. Mine was only two.”

  Rachel mutters something under her breath.

  “What?” I ask.

  “The boys’ were shorter. They were always shorter,” she says softly, her head down.

  Of course they were.

  Graham keeps talking, though. “I begged for something to drink. Anything to take my mind off it. Obviously, they complied.”

  An image of Graham standing in the shower creeps into my brain. I hadn’t seen it, of course. I was too busy trying to survive my own initiation. But I imagine they had sequestered him in another section of the pool house, dropping furry, creepy creatures on his head while feeding him cups of cheap tequila over the glass doorframe.

  I glance at Rachel, but her face is in her hands.

  “After that, I barely remember what came next,” Graham says. “One minute I was crying like a baby, the next I was somewhere down the beach covered in blood. Can you imagine what that felt like?”

  A little ball of anger begins to build inside me. “Can you imagine how Shaila felt?”

  Graham’s mouth forms a hard straight line. “No,” he says, firm. “You know I loved her, right? With everything I had. We were only fifteen. But I would have done anything for her. She was my entire world.”

  His face is puffy and red.

  “She was mine, too,” I say, fighting back the tears.

  “I know.” Graham’s voice is soft now. “Can I keep going?”

  I relent and nod.

  Graham inhales deeply. “I just remember commotion, everyone saying something happened to Shaila. Jake and Adam were running down the beach, calling for help. Derek Garry, too. I saw them coming toward me and I waved them down. Then there were cops. Those stupid Gold Coast traffic cops pulling up on their little sand buggies, whipping out handcuffs. They didn’t even know how to use them.”

  I was back at the house at this point, recovering, feeling sorry for myself, worried I had been ruined by something I had no control over. I had no idea what was coming.

  “They slapped them on me and drove me right to the station. And then that same night, they brought me here. I haven’t left in three years.”

  “What exactly is this place?” I whisper.

  Graham sighs and leans back in his chair. “A facility,” he says. “Like juvie, but fancy. We can get our GEDs and do activities like pottery and stuff.”

  I must look confused because he keeps trying to explain.

  “The criminal justice system is totally unfair. If you’re rich, it’s just easier.”

  Rachel snorts into her palms.

  “It’s the truth and it sucks,” Graham continues. “Most of us are loaded. The ones who aren’t are sponsored by some benefactor or nonprofit or something.”

  “What . . .”

  “I know,” he says. “But they’re going to transfer me to fed when I turn eighteen in June.”

  “That’s why . . .” I start. “This is your last shot.”

  Graham nods and his face flushes, like he’s embarrassed, almost.

  Rachel lifts her head out of her hands. “That’s why we went looking for more evidence,” she says. “The blood. The shirt. It was our last chance to test everything before they put him away for good.” Her teeth look fluorescent as she bites her bright red lip.

  “The police questioned me for hours,” Graham says. “It was such a long time. Mom and Dad were away in the Cayman Islands, and they wouldn’t let Rach in the room with me. Right?”

  Rachel nods and bites her lip. “I kept trying to call Dan Smothers. He’s our dad’s lawyer. But no one answered. Our parents got the first flight out, but by then it was too late.”

  “I just broke down being in that stupid police room so long without anyone. They fed me the story and I just nodded along after a while. Told them what they wanted to hear. I just wanted to make it all stop. I just wanted to go home. I thought I’d just go home.”

  “They didn’t even test anything,” Rachel says softly.

  “But your parents didn’t fight it?” I ask. I can’t imagine Mom and Dad letting me get shipped off to this place. They’d never believe that I did something like this. They’d do anything to protect me. That I’m sure of.

  “Dad just wanted to make it all go away,” Graham says. “He was getting ready for some big investor call. Smothers said it was easier that way. Thought a trial would make it worse. Too much publicity. Muffy didn’t want to deal with it. Too much drama.”

  “
They did some deal with the Arnolds,” Rachel says. “Money was exchanged.”

  A fleeting look passes between them.

  “A lot of money,” Graham says. “Our families have history. This is just how they deal with things, I guess.”

  “Such fucking bullshit,” Rachel says. “No one has the balls to even confront this. Of course the Sullivans stayed far away from everything.”

  “I guess you don’t talk to Kara much,” I say.

  Graham snorts. “Good one. She never reached out, ever.”

  I picture Graham’s and Shaila’s fathers growing up together, buying plots of land in the Hamptons with their other buddy Jonathan Sullivan. I imagine they were all so delighted when they had children at the same time. They must have been thrilled to dress Graham, Shaila, and Kara in those matching blue seersucker outfits on the beach, to snap photos of them rolling around on monogrammed beach blankets. This destroyed everything.

  “The ’rents don’t come visit,” Graham says. “Muffy says I’m insane, barely her son anymore. Dad’s busy.”

  “So busy,” Rachel says, rolling her eyes.

  “Do they know you’re using your trust to test the blood?” I ask her.

  Rachel nods. “But they don’t want to get involved.”

  We’re all quiet for a few seconds until Graham says softly, “You never gave up on me. You’re the only one.” He looks up and his eyes are glossy with tears.

  Rachel grabs his hand under the table, out of sight, and I can’t help but think of Jared and how I would do the exact same thing for him, no matter the cost, no matter how much he hates me in this moment. You don’t give up on your blood.

  “So what does this all mean?” I ask.

  “Someone else was there,” Graham says. “Someone blamed me. I thought I was a monster for three years, but . . . it wasn’t my fault. It wasn’t me.”