All the Things We Do in the Dark
Page 20
LARK LORRAINE SUTTON
JANUARY 15, 2002 - OCTOBER 15, 2019
TAKEN TOO SOON
Her father chose the sentiment; her mother chose the clothes she wore in the closed casket. That’s silver aluminum, by the way. When the funeral director showed her parents the wood-grained ones, her mother cried and her father stood there awkwardly, next to a woman he divorced years ago.
The weather cooperates with the funeral. There’s no light in the sky and no golden beams to contradict the occasion. The little garden cemetery is close to the city but pastoral. Trees, ordinarily tended, stretch out leafless limbs and shade nothing.
To her surprise, a lot of people come. A bunch of people from the school she dropped out of, including two teachers. English and algebra. She doesn’t even remember liking their classes that much. But they’re there, with black umbrellas that they share with their students.
Her internet peeps are here. Some she already met, and some who would have been next on her list. They stand out because most of them wear jeans and T-shirts, shirts with game logos on them. Rust is there, and so is Minecraft. Overwatch is represented, and Fortnite, too.
The girl who found her isn’t there. That stranger who kept her and helped Nick, and made sure Zach Pelletier (so hard to think of him that way; he’s still OhWeeOh to her, will be for eternity) got what was coming to him. Her presence would be strange, so not missed.
Nick is missed.
She has so many regrets, and one of them is Nick, wearing an ankle monitor. Nick, who can’t leave the state to see her buried properly, who would have given her a place to stay forever. Who knew forever might never come.
It’s not right. It’s not fair. Life isn’t fair. It begins unexpectedly, and the end is either eons away or two seconds after the first breath. Life is chaos, and living is making a path through it. Making a better path, hopefully. Leaving signposts for the people who follow.
The preacher droned on. And where did they find a preacher? she wondered. They never went to church. But there was this small bald Black man, reading from the Bible over her second grave.
The words were fluid and beautiful, written in a language that was meant to be plain and clear. But history is written by the present, and Shakespeare isn’t bawdy anymore. King James’ plain-word translation is now traditional and melodic and foreign.
But the preacher spoke the truth, and that was comforting.
“Whereas ye know not what shall be on the morrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapour, that appeareth for a little time, and then vanisheth away.”
For a few days, she was a vapor, the rattle in the night, the face in the mirror. She was the shape in the shadows, and the girl in the woods. She was Jane Doe—no one and everyone. She watched Ava Parkhurst and loved her a little and led her to grace.
So all that is left is to vanish away. To be no thing on the earth and ash deep inside it. It’s a last lingering thought that it might have been better if someone had put her ashes in a rocket and shot it toward the moon. Or spilled her out on the ocean to become part of the sea.
But what is best is that it’s done. She is done, and she is light, and nothing hurts. It matters less, matters most.
All is quiet.
All is good.
WINTER WENT AWAY AFTER THEY TOOK LARK HOME.
It got so warm that the trees stopped changing colors. The newspaper was full of people complaining about the Fall Color Festival being a Fall Brown Festival. They just replaced the complaints that the early winter had ruined things first.
Personally, I think that means there was never supposed to be a festival this year. But I’m not the one selling driftwood signs and autumn wreaths to tourists, either.
It’s almost too warm for the coffee I bought at Wescott’s. Curling the cup against my chest, I walk with my shoulders straight and my head down. I am, after all, “Teen sleuth with a painful past; connection to ‘Discord’ Murder Victim.” They didn’t run my school picture with that article, but they ran it with all the others.
And Walker’s Corner is a small town. Not crazy small, but people talk. People who already knew me know me all over again. I’m still the girl with the scar, but mostly, I’m the girl who found the body. This time, people don’t avoid me. They don’t whisper about me. They walk right up and ask.
What was it like?
What did you do?
Were you scared?
So again, I tell the story because I feel like I have to. But this time, I also want to. I want people to know that Lark Sutton was here. That she’s not the body, the dead girl, the murder victim.
She’s a girl who loved video games and hated her house and went on a grand adventure. She was brave and foolish, and out of all the people she met, only one had a dark heart.
The statistics are in the favor of goodness. If there was a .25 percent chance of rain, you’d leave the house without an umbrella. And if it rained anyway, it’s not like you made it happen.
It’s not Lark’s fault that Zach Pelletier murdered her. It’s not my fault that the Summer Man lured me away with lies. It’s not your fault, that terrible thing that happened to you—it’s not your fault.
I believe that more completely, more fully, than I ever did before. I believe it now into my soul and my bones.
And I believe what my new therapist tells me. That people are more than the things they do in the dark. That they do in shame. That they hide from and hide inside.
I can’t say I enjoy therapy, because I don’t. Honestly, I hate that Dr. Hernandez makes me do affirmations
(I am not broken, I am healing.
I am not bad, I am complicated.
I am not a basket case, I have PTSD.
There is nothing wrong with me, and a lot right with me.
I am more than my trauma.)
and checks to make sure I’m keeping my journal and wants me to talk to myself more than I already do. I’m supposed to reassure myself when I’m upset, and congratulate myself when I do well, and, of course, talk down those unwanted thoughts that come unexpectedly. I hate all of it, but I do it.
And when I do it, I feel stupid, but when I feel better . . . well, I keep going. I can open my boxes and sort through them like cataloging terrible souvenirs from nightmare vacations. But then I can close those boxes again, gently. I can settle them so they don’t rattle and explode so much.
I still don’t like trees close to buildings or holding hands with my pinkies trapped inside. But the nice thing is Dr. Hernandez says I don’t have to. I don’t have to like tapioca pudding, and I don’t have to like things that make me uncomfortable. I have permission to be what history made me.
But I have permission to interpret history as a victor. I survived. I get to decide what it means.
And sometimes, it’s terrible. Walking through school and seeing Syd with a new SO, and I don’t get to ask about them: terrible. Knowing she’s on the same lunch block and sitting tables away from me: terrible.
All the quiet that is left in her wake, it’s terrible. But it’s better for her, and I tell myself (affirmation!) that loving somebody is doing what’s best for them, not you.
And I love her. And I want her to be happy. So I keep my distance.
I keep my distance from Nick, too. I’m not supposed to talk to him—we’re both witnesses, but we’re also co-criminals.
My lawyer and his lawyer want to keep us apart as much as possible, so it doesn’t screw up our chances to get charges dropped. He’s not my friend, but I do think about him. A lot. We shared something that no one else can ever understand. I hope he’s okay.
I walk downtown and don’t look in windows. I drink coffee by myself and enjoy the unseasonable weather. It will be seasonable again soon enough. We’ll be buried in snow and dark and inside our houses and inside our heads soon enough.
I stop outside Strickland’s Gym, and this window, I do look into. There are guys in there, in various stages of lean to buff. I can’t h
ear them, but I can imagine the sweated weight of the air in there and hear their grunts as they press their bodies harder, harder, harder.
My coffee cools, and I drink it anyway. I look at the empty space where I first saw Hailey in beast mode. Those weights rest in their racks, lusciously organized by weight and size. I like the way they all belong. It’s beauty in a place we’re not supposed to see it.
Probably for too long, I look inside. Those weight lifters probably think I’m creeping. After a bitter swallow of lukewarm coffee, I turn to throw the cup away.
“You ruined it!” Hailey says, her smile like bronze in sunshine. “I was sneaking up on you!”
“Shoulda sneaked faster,” I say, and we fall into each other. It’s a hug, a kiss, a captured moment of belonging. And when we shift, we’re still arm in arm, hip to hip. Her warmth bathes my skin, and her smile lifts my feet from the ground.
“Are we still going?” she asks.
Already, we’re walking toward the candle store. We fit together like we were made to, but we also work on it. Her parents don’t love me. Big surprise. And she had a moment after she found out what I’d been hiding. Can you blame her? I don’t blame her. I didn’t say anything about a body.
But she’s giving me a chance. And I’m being as honest as I can about everything. That meant telling her that I need our hands to fit together another way because of Him. And sometimes, I have to stop, even though she’s soft and beautiful and her mouth flows like honey, because I have to get the thoughts out of my head. I am complicated, but she’s complicated, too.
Everyone is complicated. We all have our labyrinths and locked doors.
I steal a look at her and tease, “You’re not going to narc on me, are you?”
She squinches her face and growls, and it’s honestly the cutest thing I’ve ever seen. Fierce kitten with sweater paws. I look at her and I go dazed and glazed and stupid. I hug her closer and press a kiss behind her ear. We haven’t said LOVE yet, but I think we’re getting there.
The alley isn’t as frightening with Hailey on my arm. And the warehouse is just as fascinating to me with her in it. When I introduce her to Amber, Hailey gushes over her art (on the walls) and her craft (on my skin), and for the first time ever, I see Amber blush.
Hailey sits with me as I settle into the chair. She squeezes my hand and watches Amber build the machine with me. Her eyes go wide when it’s time to put needle to skin, and she whispers in my ear, “Does it hurt?”
“Yes,” I tell her. “But I can take it.”
And with smooth, stark lines, Amber traces a new shape into my flesh, on the inside of my wrist. It’s the first tattoo I’ll have that other people will be able to see. And this time, I didn’t pluck it from celebrity skin.
This tattoo is mine, only mine. I am stronger. I am braver. And this will remind me that I can come back from anything. It will remind me that I’m never alone.
When I look up, I don’t see her in the mirror. But I know that she’s there.
There, above the faint blue lines that trace my heartbeat, Amber paints three snowflakes, the long reach of a bare branch, and balanced on its tip, a lark.
Author’s Note
This book was incredibly hard to write. Ava’s rape is my rape; I’ve told the story before. The only part fabricated is the scar—my Summer Man only left the invisible kind.
I tell this story because I can, and because it forces people to confront the facts instead of the loopholes. I tell it for my siblings in this terrible trauma who can’t. And I used it in this book so I wouldn’t be adding one more fictional rape to a world that uses it far too often for entertainment.
My heart breaks for every survivor of sexual abuse and assault, and there are far too many of us. Thirty-five percent of heterosexual women; 44 percent of lesbians, 61 percent of bisexual women. Twenty-nine percent of heterosexual men; 26 percent of gay men, 37 percent of bisexual men. Forty-seven percent of transgender people.
Those of us who can speak up must continue to fight for better laws and better trials for survivors. We must fight to end the backlog of rape kits that have yet to be tested.
We must fight the idea that rape is a moment that ends. That may be true for the predators, but it’s not true for survivors. We live with this for the rest of our lives; that moment lives on in our flesh.
We must fight for parity, because rape disproportionately affects the lives of queer people and people of color. We must fight for better rape education, and we must be clear when we discuss consent.
We must love, and support, and uplift each other. We are members of a monstrous association, but we can use that connection for good.
Most important, remember that you must take care of yourself and your mental health first. You don’t have to tell your story; you don’t have to call your representatives. With time, you may want to, but you never, ever have to.
Your story belongs to you, and I tell mine so you don’t have to.
Yours always,
Saundra
Helplines
If you are a sexual-abuse or assault survivor and you need help, please reach out. You do not have to do this alone. You do not have to try to get by. Help is available if you need it.
United States
RAINN
www.rainn.org
24/7 National Sexual Assault Hotline: 800-656-HOPE (4673)
Canada
SACHA
www.sacha.ca
24/7 Sexual Assault Helpline: 905-525-4162
England and Wales
Rape Crisis England & Wales
www.rapecrisis.org.uk
Support Line, Open Daily: 0808-802-9999
Scotland
Rape Crisis Scotland
www.rapecrisisscotland.org.uk
Support Line, Open Daily: 0808 801 0302
Ireland
RCC The Dublin Rape Crisis Centre
www.drcc.ie
24/7 Helpline: 1800-77-8888
Australia
1800RESPECT: National Sexual Assault, Domestic Family Violence Counselling Service
www.1800respect.org.au
24/7 Support Line: 1800-737-732
New Zealand
Safe to Talk/He pai ki te kōtero
www.safetotalk.nz
24/7 Helpline: 0800-044-334
About the Author
Photo by Jared Hagan
SAUNDRA MITCHELL has been a phone psychic, a car salesperson, a denture deliverer, and a layout waxer. She’s dodged trains, endured basic training, and hitchhiked from Montana to California. The author of fifteen books for tweens and teens, her work includes Shadowed Summer, the Vespertine series, the nonfiction They Did What? series, and two anthologies for teens, Defy the Dark and All Out. She always picks truth; dares are too easy.
Discover great authors, exclusive offers, and more at hc.com.
Books by Saundra Mitchell
Defy the Dark
All the Things We Do in the Dark
Camp Murderface
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Copyright
HarperTeen is an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers.
ALL THE THINGS WE DO IN THE DARK. Copyright © 2019 by Saundra Mitchell. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the exp
ress written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
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Cover art © 2019 by Connie Gabbert
Photo by Shutterstock
Cover design by Alison Klapthor
* * *
Library of Congress Control Number: 2019937377
Digital Edition OCTOBER 2019 ISBN: 978-0-06-285261-8
Print ISBN: 978-0-06-285259-5
* * *
1920212223PC/LSCH10987654321
FIRST EDITION
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