by Nancy Holder
“Yeah, I wonder what she wants,” he muttered. Then he shook himself and cleared his throat, as if he hadn’t meant to speak aloud. “Anyway.” He took my hand again. I let him again.
Was I a boyfriend thief?
Maybe I’d wonder about that tomorrow.
Or maybe not.
Because that night I was certain I saw the face in the bathroom mirror, and I ran out of the bathroom without drying my face. Water streamed down my face like tears.
Mandy came back the very next day. I didn’t know why. Maybe someone had told her Troy’s loyalty was in jeopardy. She swept back into our lives like a viral infection, and Troy must have gotten the memo, because he didn’t make any badly timed voyages across the lake to see me.
I don’t know if he came to see her, because Mandy didn’t hang out with us. Dr. Ehrlenbach let her stay in Jessel alone, without her housemother. Rose and I were silently freaking out but we kept it together. We wondered what she was doing.
So one morning, I followed her down to the beach, and I so wished I hadn’t. Troy was rowing across the lake to see her. I stayed crouched behind the boulders, my face burning as they greeted each other as if they both had been gone for a year. I was humiliated. It was Riley times two. And even though it should have hurt less—Troy and I were not a couple—it didn’t hurt less; it hurt more.
She tied up the rowboat like an old hand and took his gray backpack in a single, easy motion. Then they disappeared for hours.
It was dumb to cry, but I couldn’t help it.
And I stayed up until dawn, keeping the nightmares at bay.
Then the break was over, and everyone else came back. Julie rushed into my arms and told me she’d brought me some presents—another skirt, this one dark purple shot with silver threads, and a pair of jet earrings. She said she’d done hardly anything except talk to Spider and/or text him.
“What about riding?” I asked, sounding disingenuous even to myself.
“Oh, except for riding. It was sick! I saw Pippin five times,” she said, her eyes shining. “Mandy is the best.”
“Oh.” I wasn’t totally petty; I could be happy for her even if Mandy was the one who made her happy. Could I get there with Troy?
No.
twenty-four
December 2
Mandy’s birthday. She invited all of Grose to her party. Midnight, off-campus, and nowhere near the operating theater.
“At an old lake house.” Julie lifted her hair up and turned her face left and right as she checked herself out in the bathroom mirror—the same one I had stopped being friends with. “Spider’s going. We’ve got to show.”
And Troy, too, I figured. I didn’t want to go—
—who was I kidding? Of course I wanted to go. I had no shame. Maybe when he saw me again, the magic would happen. He would realize she was a psychobitch and dump her. On her birthday.
The eight of us Grosians kept the whole thing under the radar, drumming our nails waiting for Ms. Krige to go to bed.
Julie and I went to bed fully dressed, me in my new purple skirt, and a black sweater, with a couple of streaks of purple eye shadow, lip gloss, and ballerina flats in a bag. I wore my hiking boots for the mucky trip through the woods. Julie was all grown up in a light blue-and-gray cashmere sweater and matching wool trousers. She carried a pair of heels in a little Neiman Marcus bag. Julie put the birthday card and wrapped journal that we had bought for Mandy in the student store in her purse, plus a brush and her lip gloss. I took my cell phone. It probably wouldn’t work, but no harm in trying.
Then we climbed out the bathroom window and took the blacktop path down to the shore behind Jessel. The other six of us swarmed from behind trees and hopped silently over the horse-head chain link. My heart tugged as we passed the NO TRESPASSING sign. He would be there. He would see me semi-dressed up.
The moon hung low, full, and strangely red. The lake rippled. Frogs croaked, then fell eerily silent as we passed.
“Are you sure this is the right way?” Ida asked Julie.
“Hey.” Julie stopped and stared. “Did you see that?”
“What?” April, Marica, and I spoke at once.
“There was something . . . ” She gestured with her hand toward a thick stand of pines. “I thought I saw something white moving through the trees.”
I squinted, aware of how far away from the campus proper we had gone.
“I think we should go back,” I said. “This doesn’t feel right.”
“No,” everyone else said in a chorus, followed by a lot of shushing.
“Mandy wants you there,” Julie whispered as she picked up her pace, like a toddler zooming away from her mother so as not to be denied her fun. “She asked me about six times if you were coming.”
That did nothing to make me feel better.
“Serious, Julie,” I said. “I’m getting a bad vibe.”
“Well, guess what, we’re here,” Julie announced.
Julie shined her flashlight on a dilapidated structure hanging over the lake. It was a tumbled-down foursquare wooden house with gables on each of the sides of what remained of the slanted roof. Tarps covered up holes and rock music played over the water. It was a slow dirge, something very metal-goth, like the music from the party at the operating theater.
“I don’t see any lights,” I grumbled.
“They’re in the basement. Once we go inside, we’ll see the stairs. Come on.”
Julie hurried on ahead. Her ankle was definitely healed. The others zoomed after her.
The ground was damp, then soggy; my boots sank into mud, creating suction, and I grimaced as I lifted my feet. Julie trotted through the muck like a little Pippin mare.
Julie reached one of three rotted steps leading to an angular rectangle of planks—what was left of a porch. She climbed up and extended her hand to Ida.
“It’s safe,” she said.
Famous last words, I thought.
I tested the shredded planks of the lake-house porch before I followed Julie and the others onto the porch. The wood was spongy and stinky. A heavy beat pulsed through it from the music inside.
There was no door, only a rectangle of black; when Julie’s flashlight played over it, roaches skittered away. Gross. Something squeaked, and Julie pulled her shoulders in tight as she stepped across the threshold.
I was right behind her.
Julie paused and ran her flashlight around bulges and shapes in the room—furniture, some of it covered with rotted sheets. There was a skeletal sofa coated with slimy bits of stuffing. A disintegrating carpet stretched in tatters against the floor.
There were pictures on the wall in cracked frames—faded photographs of girls in lacy white dresses, their hair twisted into little topknots or hidden in bonnets. A blackened mirror threw our reflections back at us.
“Oh my God,” Ida whispered. “More weird stuff.”
“Yeah, no kidding,” I said. I wondered just how many dilapidated buildings weren’t mentioned in the Marlwood Brochure, and what Ehrlenbach was smoking, promising parents that this campus was safe.
“Look. The way down.” Julie aimed the yellow beam of light at a square hole in the floor. She began to cross the room, and I caught my breath, afraid that she’d crash through it and really hurt herself. I caught up with her, and she looked at me so sweetly and with so much excitement that I gave her a quick hug.
We peered down into the square. Stairs led downward, but there was no railing. In two lines at the bottom, oil lamps like the ones on the Jessel mantel flickered a welcome. Someone had hand-lettered a sign on a piece of copy paper that read PRIVATE PARTY HAPPY BDAY MANZ!
“Here goes nothing,” Julie said. She smiled at me, and then the rest of the group, and opened her Neiman Marcus bag, dropping three-inch shimmery heels to the floor and unlacing her boots. “We are gonna have a blast!”
It became a group ritual as we all sat down and changed our shoes. Then we got up and clattered down the stairs. As we rea
ched the bottom, the lamps flickered; a door opened, and Troy appeared. The light played over his face and put highlights in his tousled hair. He was wearing tight jeans and a dark sweater that clung to his chest. The sleeves were pushed up to his forearms and he was wearing a silver ID bracelet with big links that gleamed against his hand. He had a five o’clock shadow, and he was so sexy that my heart broke a little.
No. Don’t even go there, I told myself.
He saw Julie first and smiled pleasantly at her; but when he caught sight of me, his smile disappeared.
Nice, I thought, humiliated. So there was no hope after all. I wanted to run back up and leave.
“Hi, Troy,” Julie said. “We’re here.”
“Go on in,” he told her, keeping his gaze fixed on me. “Spider’s been moping, afraid you wouldn’t show.”
“Really?” She turned to me, making no attempt to hide her joy. “Meet you inside?”
I nodded. The other girls crowded her, eager to go in, and Troy smiled at them as they walked passed him, showing all his teeth, as if he were a golf pro or a politician. A fresh crack ran through my heart, because I knew I had misread our times together so completely. He thought we were just friends, nothing more. I could tell.
“Hey,” he said.
“Yeah.” Whatever.
“Lindsay,” he began, but I walked steadily into party central: a low, semi-dark room flickering with light and crammed with girls and guys, presumably from Lakewood. Fluttery white Happy Birthday streamers swagged the ceiling. The low room was furnished with small tables covered with lacy white tablecloths and wooden folding chairs. There were black and white vases of white roses on the tables. I found the gift table and some cards that had been opened and set out for display. There was a very large, ornate card bordered with black lace.
To my sweet Amandy,
Love always,
Miles
There were Lara and Alis, holding beer bottles; Kiyoko clutched a wineglass in both her bony hands, so wraith-thin it probably took all her strength. She looked even worse than before break—dark shadows haunted her usually golden skin. Kiyoko was the real ghost of Marlwood.
I marveled briefly that they’d managed to cart real wine-glasses and so many other supplies from campus. And people. The room was bursting with beautiful Marlwood girls and hot Lakewood guys. I hadn’t seen this many boys at once in over a month, not since I’d left San Diego.
The birthday girl was seated on a white stuffed pillow on the floor, bitchy-sexy in tight black leather pants and clean, unmuddied Catwoman boots. Julie balanced on another white pillow across from her, with Spider looking indulgently on with a Jell-O shot in each fist. Julie and Mandy’s fingers rested on a triangle of plastic on a game board covered with letters laid across Mandy’s lap. Her Ouija board.
And then I heard a blood-curdling scream, and leaped backward, crashing into a tall redheaded guy I didn’t know.
Rose barreled through the doorway, sopping wet in a black wool dress and coat, chased by a guy in a hockey mask waving a chainsaw—not on—over his head.
“You suck!” she shouted at Mandy, and then she burst out laughing.
Mandy and all those around her started laughing and hooting. All those except for Julie, who was looking at Mandy as if she were wondering why she hadn’t been in on the joke.
The guy whipped off his hockey mask and turned in a little circle to hoots and claps. Then he bowed to Rose.
“You’re evil,” she informed him, making as if to grab the chainsaw from him. “He chased me half the way here.”
“Someone give that girl a drink,” Mandy ordered. “She totally deserves it.”
Sangeeta handed her a lime Jell-O shot, and Rose flashed me a you-know-I-love-you look as she slurped it down.
Mandy and Julie smiled up at me as I walked over.
“Linz. Wonderful of you for showing,” Mandy said over the music. Troy, get her something. The best we have.” I hadn’t realized he was still right behind me.
“On it.” He wasn’t smiling. He looked . . . wary. Afraid. Did he think I was going to blow his cover? Tell Mandy I wanted her boyfriend? Then she’d sic her crazy brother on him?
That was crazy. Too much even for Mandy.
“Hi, Mandy,” I said. “Happy birthday.”
“We bought you a present,” Julie said.
“You’re both wonderful,” she cooed. “Oh! It’s moving!”
Mandy and Julie dropped their gazes to the plastic triangle. It whirled and slid under their fingertips, then shot across the board and pointed to the number seven. I felt strange, as if I should know what that meant.
“Hmm.” Mandy cocked her head. “Number seven.” She lifted her chin and narrowed her eyes at Julie, as if waiting for a response. Julie jerked slightly, looking puzzled. Then both of them stared up at me.
Troy returned with two shot glasses filled to the brim with clear liquid. Kiyoko was with him.
He handed me a shot. “Vodka. My contribution. Grey Goose.” His smile was detached, pleasant, as if he were speaking to someone he didn’t know very well.
Which was true.
“Because it’s my favorite,” Mandy announced. “It’s moving again. M-E-M-M.”
I jerked. Tried to remember if I had told Julie about my mom’s nickname. No, I hadn’t. I hadn’t shared it with anyone here.
“Wow, I can feel it,” Julie said. “It’s going crazy! M-E-M-MY-M-E-M-M-Y. Memmy-Meemy? Eenie meenie?”
I sucked in my breath as the room fuzzed out.
“Memmy Memmy,” Mandy corrected. “Does that name mean something to you?” She sounded truly innocent as she looked up at me.
“Are you okay?” Julie asked me. “Lindsay?” She kept her fingertips on the triangle, obviously torn about whether to continue their “game.”
“Sure,” I said, reaching for Troy’s vodka shot. He gave it up and I threw it back. Beside him, Kiyoko’s skeletal face was bone-white, her forehead wrinkled.
I pushed my way past a couple of jocks talking to Ida and Claire. Claire smiled and handed me a lime-green Jell-O shot as I passed her, as if we were in a relay race. I slurped it down.
“Go, woman,” said one of the jocks, handing me another. I took it.
By the time I was halfway up the stairs, I realized I was massively wasted. I staggered outside onto the porch, trying to catch my breath.
Tears welled; I felt myself shaking and eased myself off the porch, stepping into the mud just as I remembered that it was there . . . and that I was wearing my flats.
If they were using her nickname to tease me, prank me . . . it was underhanded. It was . . .
“I miss you,” I whispered to the darkness. “I need you. I don’t know how to do any of this.” My throat burned, trying to keep fresh tears at bay.
I heard someone coming up behind me and slid in the mud for the shelter of the trees. Just as when I had eavesdropped on Mandy behind boulders, I slunk behind two pines growing closely together. I slid down until I was sitting in mud, my whole body trembling, the tears finally forcing their way out.
twenty-five
I don’t know how long I sat in the darkness, out of it, crying.
“It’s just another trick, a mean trick,” I whispered. But I knew I had never, ever spoken that name aloud.
But in my dreams, during my nightmares . . . maybe Julie heard me. They’d spent the break together, riding. Mandy had charisma. All queen bees did. She could be mean as hell to someone, then turn around and convince them she was their best friend. I’d even caught myself responding to her artificial sunshine.
So if she asked a few questions, now and then . . . collecting ammunition in the form of personal information and secrets . . . Julie might not have even realized it . . .
I hiccupped with tears. I felt stupid for hiding, but I cowered behind the tree trunks, embarrassed and angry and out of control.
Then someone called my name from the porch of the lake house. “Lindsay?” It w
as Kiyoko. “Lindsay, are you here?”
I peered around the tree. Kiyoko was alone. She was staring into the darkness, obviously unable to see me, as she navigated down the stairs and started heading toward the water.
I was just about to step into her field of vision when a wave of dizziness hit me and I closed my eyes. When I opened them again, I couldn’t see her.
I scanned the shadows, the shimmering blackness of the water. An owl hooted; the lake rippled. But I didn’t see Kiyoko anywhere.
After a few seconds, Mandy appeared in the doorway, the moon bleaching her face skull-white. Her eyes were black.
Alis and Lara sauntered from behind her, slipping their arms around her waist. And their eyes were black, too.
“Sweet bees,” she cooed in that schizo Southern accent I’d heard before, leaning over and kissing each one on the cheek.
“Is anyone here?” Mandy sang out in her Southern accent.
“Dios, we were so wrong about Kiyoko.” Alis’s accent was Hispanic. “She’s just fine.”
“Then where is she? We don’t have much time,” Lara said. Her accent sounded vaguely New-Yorkish, not normal for her.
I rested my chin against the tree, dizzy, sick, and bewildered. Was it a game? Were they on something?
Like whatever drug I must have been on in the attic?
“Don’t you fret. She won’t get away. We’ll find her,” Mandy said.
“That’s impossible,” Lara said. “There are too many of them.”
“Don’t be silly, sugar.” Mandy chucked her under the chin. “We’re doing very well. After all, we’re all here. That sweet little girl has my undying gratitude.”
Are they talking about Kiyoko? I couldn’t make sense of it.
“Oh my Lord, it’s been so long,” Alis said.
Then Mandy turned. “Child,” she said, “you are a sight for sore eyes.”
“It took forever, didn’t it?” said a familiar voice. “This one was very strong-headed.”