All the Things We Do in the Dark

by Saundra Mitchell

  Her dad is a cop. Has been her whole life. She probably goes to barbecues with his cop friends. This is the very station where she used to have a job (the one she was so excited to escape), and nothing bad, nothing tragic, nothing world-destroying has ever happened to her.

  She has no reason to be afraid, she would never tremble at the prospect of talking to a detective.

  In her head, there are no hospital room memories, no strange men upon strange men hovering, invading, lingering. That thought feels like a revelation. For a second, I’m almost outside myself, in Hailey’s skin.

  Yeah, she probably has a healthy sense of personal danger. There’s no girl who walks through the world obliviously.

  Somebody’s told us to be careful, park under the lights, keep your keys between your fingers, carry pepper spray (but be careful because they can use pepper spray against you) or a stun gun (same) or a gun (nobody says watch out for the bad guy taking your gun, but that’s a whole nother political issue, isn’t it?) and cross the street if you have to but don’t be on the street after dark.

  Hailey moves through the world with a father who knows what kinds of bad things happen. She moves through the world aware of her surroundings, with ID when she leaves the house, and taking all necessary precautions because a girl in public is like a bag of gold. All kinds of people will do all kinds of things to get at treasure.

  But all her fear is theoretical. I’m happy for her because of that, so happy, because I never want her to be afraid for reasons. I want joy for her and peace for her and sweet dreams for her, always. I’m glad she doesn’t know. And at the same time, I am so jealous. It’s a pang, a physical hunger—I want to believe the way she believes.

  I just don’t. I can’t.

  That’s the thing the scar does. It’s the line in the sand, between women who might become statistics and women who already are. I frighten people because I’m proof that bad things happen to people no matter what.

  Already, I know people are going to say, “Well, look how Lark ended up.” (If they remember her name.) Murdered, stuffed in a tree: that’s what you get when you run away. (That’s probably going to become her name: That girl who was murdered in Maine, you know, the one they found stuffed inside a tree?) That’s what happens when you trust people you only know online.

  But who in their right mind thinks we should hand out the death penalty for running away? For meeting people you’ve talked to for years?

  I don’t deserve a life sentence because of what he did to me, but I’m gonna serve one. The whisper of his memory is there with me—always.

  If I’d never found Lark, I might have kept everything boxed forever. Worked around it. Gotten by. I might have spent my whole life hiding from myself and hating the scar that never let me hide completely.

  I will always be the Ava I became because that man left his mark on me. But at least now I know—I can admit—I need help. I’m too far down to climb up on my own.

  But let’s not talk about me. Let’s talk about you. (General you, not you in particular; I bet you’re great.) Let’s think about this. If you look at me and look at my scar and you shift uncomfortably in your seat—it’s because you can’t think of the reason why

  You

  will never be

  Me.

  DO YOU KNOW NICK CRENSHAW—

  When the lawyer Mom hired asks me that, that’s when I know things are about to change. I am half tremor and half puddle. He’s the cavalry; he showed up just in time.

  DO YOU KNOW LARK SUTTON—

  That’s her last name; she has a whole name: Lark Sutton. The girl with the Aquarius tattoo; the girl with the half-moon necklace. The girl; my Jane.

  DO YOU KNOW ZACH PELLETIER—

  Still don’t. Never met him. Never want to. I know what happens to girls who meet him.

  DO YOU RECOGNIZE THIS BACKPACK—

  Of course I do. And I recognize the tablet and the phones in it. I recognize my school iPad and my wallet in it. I recognize every scrap of digital evidence in it. I recognize that this is the backpack that probably sends me to jail for breaking and entering (turns out it can’t be burglary because I didn’t take anything but pictures) but also condemns Lark’s murderer to a cell for life. A life for a life; justice.

  DO YOU RECOGNIZE THE AUTHORITY OF THIS COURT AND YOUR MOTHER—

  I’m released to my mother’s custody. My lawyer says there’s a good chance they’ll drop the charges, and if they don’t, that we can plead down to a juvenile misdemeanor. Public sentiment, he says, will be on my side. I’ll be in the papers again.

  LOCAL TEENS DISCOVER, INVESTIGATE MURDER IN WALKER’S CORNER.

  LOCAL TEENS’ SLEUTHING LEADS TO ARREST IN SO-CALLED “DISCORD” MURDER

  LOCAL TEENS STILL FACING CHARGES AFTER SOLVING GRUESOME MURDER

  TEEN SLEUTH HAS A PAINFUL PAST; CONNECTION TO “DISCORD” MURDER VICTIM

  GOING BACK TO FINDING THE BODY—

  I cut Detective Pera off; I’m not trying to be rude but . . . “She has a name,” I say.

  “The day you found Miss Sutton,” Detective Pera corrects smoothly. “I’m still not clear why you didn’t call 911. Or Detective Cho’s daughter. Or why you didn’t tell anyone.”

  My mother’s hands are strong but softer now. “Does it matter why?”

  “If we take this case to trial, yeah. It’s gonna matter.”

  I’ve tried to be precise, my whole life, about what amount of truth I’m telling at any given moment. I’ve tried to be very explicit with you. But that assumes that I actually know. There are those times when I don’t realize I’m lying to myself.

  So I’m not sure what to tell the detective, but I try. Okay.

  Where do I start?

  I told you in the beginning that everything that happens next is both because and not because. I’m not a prism. That moment doesn’t flow into me, then separate out into a perfect rainbow. I’m a kaleidoscope, and there’s more going on than one light or one color. That man happened to me.

  But my father also left.

  And my mother let me hide.

  And I never tried to step outside.

  This scar happened to me.

  But I only told the story because I had to.

  One friend, my Syd, I chose her.

  Except I never tried to choose anyone else.

  Because choosing someone else

  Would mean exposing myself

  Again.

  And then I did. I let myself be open.

  And she was there. And she was glorious.

  Hailey is glorious, and I made myself

  Vulnerable.

  I am a kaleidoscope. Twist me, and a hundred patterns, a hundred shapes, a hundred lights all compete to make up the whole picture, and they’re still not whole. They’re glimpses. Slices. Excerpts of me, because I am the only thing that is the totality of me. And no one can possibly know everything.

  I cover Mom’s hand with mine. I hold on, and I know she can’t protect me, except sometimes she can. She can’t save me, except in the ways that she does. My mother is no more absolute than anything else; she contains multitudes. So do I. So do you. So did Lark.

  My chest aches when I draw a deep breath, but I speak anyway. “Because I was afraid. I had a bad experience when I was younger, and I’ve been afraid of . . . lots of things, ever since. Including the police.”

  The detective gestures at her face, along the same path my scar takes. She asks, without asking, if this is the bad thing.

  This isn’t the first time someone has gestured at their face. Drawn a line, as if they could wear my scar—as if speaking with hands is gentler than speaking with words. But this is the first time that I answer and I don’t feel the cut all over again. It’s the first time that I open the box on purpose.

  Unpack it. Deliberately.

  And say, “Yes. I was nine. He asked me if I wanted to see something that would make me feel good in the summer.”

  Detective Pera flinch
es.

  But finally, I do not.

  THAT NIGHT, AFTER MY SHOWER, I SETTLE ON MY bed with my mom’s laptop. (The cops took mine, even though I told them there was no evidence on it.) I have to install Skype because Mom never uses it. I hope that Syd still has it on her phone.

  I haven’t heard from her, but to be fair, she could have called, could have texted. My phone could be ringing right now in evidence lockup, and I’d never know about it. So, with a towel wrapped around my head and another wrapped around my body, I lean against my headboard and position the screen so the camera only catches me from the shoulders up.

  (I know what webcams can see now.)

  After signing in, I scroll the contact list. Double-click on Syd. Type, You around?

  I close my eyes. Leaning my head back, I let the laptop rest on my thighs. A bleep, a vibration: just come on already. I know she must be out there, somewhere. A chime sounds, and a message appears.

  Ava, what the hell, are you okay?!

  My hands hover over the keyboard. The answer is no or maybe even, No, but possibly I’m going to be, but I know that’s not what she wants to hear. Instead, I tell her, I’m okay. At home on Mom’s laptop.

  The screen shifts; the video stays dark but Syd’s trying to make a voice connection. I accept, and turn off my camera, too. I don’t need to stare at myself, and she doesn’t want to see me. Fair enough. Last time we talked, we screamed. It was ugly. I was ugly.

  Even though the camera’s off, I see Syd clearly in my mind. She’s wearing sleep shorts and her Rikers Island Swim Team T-shirt (an item that made her mother laugh and forbid her to wear it outside the house).

  Her fingers are splayed out, and she’s trying to type without screwing up the last coat of her fingernail polish. (She’ll fail. She always does. Syd doesn’t have accent fingers. She has do-overs.)

  Her room is cool—as in cold: she always has the window open a little—and chaotic. All of Syd’s phases remain, so there are tiny blown-glass horses on her dresser from third grade and old posters of Niall Horan from eighth on the walls.

  The incense burner appeared when we were thirteen. In Bollywood shades of teal and sea and sunshine, an Insta-ready canopy hangs above her bed—circa last summer, when I was at my dad’s and Syd’s stepdad started buying her affections.

  I could find my way through her house in the dark. She’s just as at home in mine. But something has changed, and we’re both pretending it hasn’t. Our shallow conversation keeps us from drowning in the deeper one we both know is coming.

  Because today is about reckoning, I go ahead and say, “Sooooo . . .”

  The dark screen flickers, and then there she is. Not as I imagined.

  She’s got her hair-dying turban on, and out of reflex, I start to ask her what color this time. But that’s just not the conversation we’re supposed to have right now.

  “Yeah, so,” she says. “I guess this means you’re not in jail. Which is good. I would have had to break you out, and then we’d have to go on the run or whatever. Dude, I don’t even know where to start. Um.”

  Her eyes flick away. It’s like she’s trying to find the right words. Like they’re there, behind her gaze but out of order. Or rude. Or just not exactly right. The video cuts abruptly. She’s giving herself a chance to think.

  Careful, I keep the camera angled up. It’s a nice up-the-nose shot, but one that doesn’t make it look like I’m nakedly video chatting my bff. I say, “Yeah, no, I’m not in jail, but I’m still sort of under arrest? I have a court date, anyway.”

  “For what, exactly?” she asks. “Everybody’s talking; nobody knows anything. I even spoke to Hailey.”

  Her name is an arrow in my flesh. I can absolutely believe that Syd would seek her out, but I know she hated doing it. A vague weight of guilt settles on me, but I can’t do anything about that.

  For the third time, for the fourth time—I’m not even sure anymore—I start at the beginning and just tell the story. I talk right up till this moment, and then I take a deep breath to exhale. “And, lucky me, I’m definitely going to a shrink. Mom’s making an appointment.”

  “I can’t believe you didn’t tell me any of this.”

  Shaking my head, I say, “I didn’t tell anybody. I couldn’t. And you’ve been so mad at me. . . .”

  There’s a pause. Then Syd looks into the camera—into me. She’s serious and earnest, two things she avoids as much as possible. “I love you.”

  “I know,” I say. “I love you, too.”

  Another long pause, and then she goes on. “No, I mean I love you. I’m in love with you. So, um, I’m glad you’re okay, and I’m like . . . I can’t even believe all this. And I don’t want to make things worse, but I think we have to friend break up for a while so I can get my head together.”

  I slide off the bed, cradling the laptop as I go. I wait for the “Gotcha,” the “Prank, biotch!” And they never come. The towel around my hair slips off. I look like a damp madwoman in my little thumbnail at the top of the screen. “Whoa, whoa, whoa, wait, though. What? You can’t just say that, and then say that, and . . . what?!”

  “It’s been a really long time,” Syd says. She looks small and soft, as if she peeled out of her shell armor. She is exposed, and this almost never happens. “It was a crush, and I thought it was going to go away, and it didn’t. And it was fine. Mostly because I thought you were ace. Like, panromantic, obviously, but also kind of not in play. You were never into anybody, and I was like, ‘Okay, I can just love her like this, and it’s fine.’ It just got harder, and I felt better when you were gone this summer. And then Hailey happened, and you were all about her, and I . . .”

  Syd puts her phone down for a second. All I see is her textured ceiling and the whirl of fan blades. When she raises the camera again, she says, “I always thought if you ever were going to fall for somebody, it would be me. And it wasn’t.”

  The video cuts off again, and I feel a bright, fresh pain in my chest. This is the secret she’s been keeping from me. From this springs unspoken breakups and unshared tattoos. This is where a silent summer was born; it’s what makes Syd bitter and jealous and hard to read. Shame on me; I should have realized it.

  This is exactly the way she was the last time her heart broke. I stroked her hair and scooped her ice cream and did all the things a best friend is supposed to do to make it all better. And this time, I can’t make it better. I’m the thing making her worse.

  Leaning closer to the screen, I say, “Syd. Oh my god. I don’t know what to say. I’m so, so sorry. I never meant to hurt you.”

  “You didn’t,” she says as she pops back into view. “I did. You were oblivious. Which sucked, by the way. And I suck for saying it sucked. Jeezus, it’s just stupid. It’s all stupid, Ava. I don’t know why everything has to be so hard. I swear, I’m not telling you this to make you feel bad. I just . . . it’s . . . I feel bad, and I have to change something. All I can really change is me.”

  Syd’s anguish and resolve unfold. There’s no hesitation. Something inside me breaks again. It wells over, spilling out pain because she’s practiced saying this, and I want to ask her how long. How long has she felt like this?

  But that doesn’t belong to me. It shouldn’t. And I can’t ask her to give me a chance, because I don’t feel that way about her.

  Rasping nails and grasping fingers dig down inside, turning over all my emotions, and it’s just not there, I love Syd, but I’m not in love with her. I’m not attracted. If I could make it happen, I would. I really would.

  Those things, I don’t say, either. My tears, I swipe away before I respond. For a brief moment, I hate the vanity of this app. That I see my own face imposed next to hers, that I’m not sitting across from Syd and holding her hands and trying to make this better.

  Instead, I’m trying to hide my blotchy skin and my red nose by shifting into shadow. I’m crafting my response so it sounds smarter than I am, braver than I am. More generous, more everything. Ju
st better—better than I am, than I really am, because right now, I just hurt, and I know it’s not about me, but it feels like it’s about me.

  “Is there anything I can do? Besides leave you alone, I mean. Because I’ll do that. For as long as you want me to or need me to. God, I don’t know how to not be your friend, Syd.”

  “We’re still friends,” Syd answers immediately. She’s shifted into shadow, too. She’s still beautiful in silhouette, still bright like the moon, still shooting stars and distant lightning. Her voice is thicker; she’s stuffy. “We just have to be friends who don’t talk to each other for a while. I’m not giving you up. It’s just a break.”

  Junior year has barely started, so that gives me hope. It’s not like we’re flowing into college this spring, currents drifting in two different directions.

  There’s still time. Time for Syd to heal, and time for us to go ranging again. Time to make more memories to go with the decade (plus!) that we already have. I’m going to believe in time, because I already miss her.

  “I can do a break.” Not that it’s up to me. I have to; to keep my best friend, I have to give her up for a while. I force a smile because I do want her to feel better. I just wish leaving wasn’t the cure. “But if you need me . . . you know where to find me.”

  “Jail, right?” she asks, and her joke is choked with tears.

  My reply is, too. “Yep. The last cell on the block, that’s me.”

  Syd turns off the camera again. She hates it when people see her cry, even me. I guess now especially me. I hear her breathing, but she says nothing. My heart squeezes tighter and tighter, in hard, ugly anticipation of a goodbye. Fear that that was our goodbye.

  The chat window pops up again. She types, XOXO, then signs off. That’s our break. That’s how we say goodbye.

  For now.

  It’s not so much that they bury her twice, but this is her second grave. The stone is grey, which, good. She was afraid they’d go with pink granite and carven hearts and one of those stupid picture inserts that turn green and strange. It’s simple and it’s right, and it says: