Suburban Dangers

by Megan Whitson Lee

  She fell to her knees, holding on to the side of the bin. Another image. She had been holding a shovel when she was in the woods.

  “Dig!” Damien’s voice reverberated through her head.

  What had she been digging? Something deep—too deep. The ground had been too cold, too frozen. “I can’t.” She remembered that she was on her knees then too…sobbing. She was sobbing now.

  “Katherine?” An arm around her shoulders. Someone was crouching beside her. “Katherine, come on. Let’s get you to the clinic.”

  Kaki turned her head to look into Molly Wolf’s familiar face.

  She helped Katherine to her feet and down the hall. The whole way she talked to her, but her voice sounded far away. “When did you start feeling sick? The flu’s been going around…lie down in the clinic…they can call your mom…go home…”

  More flashes of memory. Cold, cold ground. Leaves, twigs. Damien’s hands on her. Someone else’s hands on her.

  She had to get out of here. She had to get something—take something—to stop this pain and the swirling thoughts in her head.

  She slumped onto the pleather bench in the clinic while Molly talked to the nurse. An instrument was rubbed across her forehead, taking her temperature. She heard words exchanged between Molly and the nurse as though she were listening under water.

  “…high fever.”

  “Call her mom…”

  Then Molly was standing in front of her. “Katherine, I have to get back to my class. The nurse is going to take care of you and call your mom, OK?”

  Kaki nodded. But her mom couldn’t help her. No one could help her but Damien. He had the little blue pills. She fumbled her cell phone in her hand, managing to type in a text with fingers that shook violently.

  I need pills. Blue ones. Please come.

  “OK,” the nurse said after a few minutes. “I haven’t reached your mom yet. But you can lie down in one of the back rooms and wait. I’ll send someone to get your things from the classroom.”

  But if her mom picked her up, she wouldn’t be able to get the pills from Damien. Her mom would take her to the doctor and then they would all know…

  While the nurse called for a student runner to go and gather Kaki’s things, Kaki slipped out of the clinic and down the hall, exiting the building through one of the back doors of the school. Collapsing against the brick wall of an alcove behind the school, she looked down at her phone. No message from Damien. She sent another text.

  Pls help me.

  She sank down the length of the wall, pulling her knees to her chest and shivering violently against the cold. Three kids walked past her. One of them did a double-take when he saw her form. He looked vaguely familiar, but she couldn’t remember his name.

  “Hey.”

  Another tidal wave of nausea lifted her to her hands and knees. She retched on the ground.

  “You OK?” one of the other kids asked.

  But the familiar-looking kid pulled him along. “Come on. Let’s go.” And they were gone.

  …there’s a body in the woods…Saturday, December the tenth…the date echoed in her mind as though it had been spoken aloud. December the tenth…

  Now she remembered.

  ~*~

  Gio George was shouting with a face full of panic. “Look, I didn’t do this. You get her out of here! My father’ll kill me if he finds out about this. You’ve got to get her out of here!”

  A lot of people were gathered around something on the floor, looking down, snapping photos and video footage with their phones.

  Kaki moved forward into the crowd.

  Sydney’s long, straight, black ponytail snaked down her back. She was face down on the floor, her black T-shirt was on backward. The motorcycle logo was visible on her back when it should have been on her front.

  “She just went down,” the spaced-out girl next to her said. “Like, she was standing one minute, and then all of a sudden she just fell like a tree. I mean, she’s dead.”

  “What?” Kaki shrieked, and then immediately covered her mouth. It was best not to call attention to herself. Not to cause a scene or any trouble.

  They all stood around Sydney, looking down at her as if she were a dead dog in the road. No one attempted CPR or called 9-1-1. No one turned her over. No one even touched her.

  Kaki’s tongue no longer worked. Her mind ran in slow motion. It was hard to feel anything. Even fear. She stared at Sydney’s lifeless body. A rivulet of blood streamed out from her head.

  In the background, Gio’s voice repeated, “You gotta get her out of here. She’s bleeding all over the floor! My dad’ll kill me. My dad’s on the town council, man. No one can find out about this.”

  The scene rolled as though it happened in a movie. Damien reached down and grabbed the back of Sydney’s T-shirt. As he pulled her from the ground, her arms fell in front of her, limp and swinging. Her head hung and her black ponytail dropped forward and swung in pendulum fashion.

  Kaki had never seen anything so horrible. A gasp escaped her throat, but she really wanted to scream. She wanted to yell at the top of her lungs, “Someone call 9-1-1!” But she didn’t. No one did.

  Someone was taking pictures with a phone.

  “Hey! Put that away!” Damien bellowed, pointing his finger at the guy. A struggle ensued as several others pounced in an attempt to get the phone from him.

  “No one can ever know about this!” Gio called out over and over again.

  Hubby and Damien carried Sydney’s body out of the room as they all stood around, and Gio screamed a bunch of curse words at them.

  “What happened?” Kaki heard herself ask.

  Mattie moved to stand next to her. Her voice was low, her words slurred. “I think she’d had a lot of drugs. And she was with several of the guys. I heard somebody say she came out of that room over there.” She pointed to an open door in the basement. “And then she just did a face-plant on the ground. Boom. Dead.”

  The drugs and shock mixed together and confused Kaki’s mind. She stood like a statue.

  Damien was back, his eyes wide and wild. Grabbing her arm, he dragged her across the room, his fingers biting into her skin as he growled, “You better never tell anyone about this.”

  Kaki’s next conscious memory involved sitting in the backseat of a truck while Hubby drove and Damien talked about where to drop Sydney’s body.

  “The high school,” Damien suggested. “They’ll just figure somebody did her in the woods and killed her there.”

  Kaki only wanted to live long enough to see her parents again. To go home. Her lips moved almost involuntarily. She prayed. Please God…don’t let them kill me, too.

  Hubby pulled the vehicle into the school parking lot without any headlights and drove all the way around to the back of the building. The lot had recently been cleared of snow, and Damien directed Hubby away from areas of slush that might leave tire tracks.

  “I’m just gonna pull up on the field right by the woods,” Hubby said.

  “Are you crazy, man? They’ll see your tire treads in the mud or something. No, you never pull through ice or snow or anything that leaves tire treads. Are you stupid or something?”

  Through drug fuzz in her mind, Kaki registered Damien’s words. He’d probably done this before. He’d probably killed women or disposed of their bodies. For all she knew, Damien may have killed Sydney.

  “Come on,” Damien said to her. “You’re gonna help.” She followed them, her hands numb with cold. Hubby and Damien carried Sydney’s limp, uncovered body into the woods. In a dream-like state, Kaki glanced over at the school—only the tip of the roof was visible from her viewpoint. Monday morning, she’d sit in Algebra and stare out a window to where they’d buried Sydney. And she’d never, ever be able to tell anyone.

  Once they’d reached a point in the middle of some pine trees, Hubby and Damien flopped Sydney’s body onto the ground with a thud. Damien stood over her and looked down. “Well, my best girl’s dead,” he s
aid with an almost nostalgic lilt to his voice. “Saturday, December the tenth. December the tenth and I lost my best girl.”

  “Come on.” Hubby slapped Damien in the arm. “Let’s go. It’s freezing out here.”

  Damien turned to Kaki. “Dig.” He handed her a shovel.

  The ground was frozen. It was like trying to dig through rock. The handle kept slipping against her bare hands, giving her painful splinters. “Harder!” Damien yelled. “Dig harder! Dig like you’re digging your own grave.”

  She started to cry. It was useless. She only chipped small pieces of dirt from the ground. A sharp pain radiated up the back of her right leg and she realized Damien had kicked her behind the knee, knocking her to her knees.

  He grabbed the shovel and started to hack at the ground angrily. “I outta just bury you with her. If you tell anyone about this, you and your whole family are dead.”

  ~*~

  Kaki’s phone buzzed with a text, startling her out of the memory.

  I’m out front of the school. Where r u?

  Damien.

  Relief flooded her even as she was wracked with another fit of retching. Scrambling to her feet, she made her way around the side of the school, barely able to remain upright as she spotted his car. He could have driven to meet her, but he didn’t. He made her walk, stagger all the way to the door of the car.

  Kaki fell into the passenger seat, and he sped away before she even had the chance to close the door. “Where are they?” she gasped. “Give ’em to me.”

  Damien’s eyes were hidden behind sunglasses. “Yeah, we gotta make a stop first.”

  “Please, Damien,” she begged. Her insides were blowing apart. “Please, I can’t stand it. I can’t stand it.” She slumped over her legs, sobs wrenching her body.

  “See what happens when you mess up?” he growled.

  “I didn’t mess up.” She spoke to the floor. If she hadn’t wanted to die from the pain, she would have been terrified that she had done something wrong. “What did I do?”

  Damien paused before he answered. “You told someone.”

  “No, I didn’t. I didn’t tell anyone.” Her heart pounded. She had just now remembered what happened, so how could she have told anyone?

  He was just finding a reason to toy with her head.

  “Now you gotta make it up to me. You got a lot of work to do today, baby. A lot of people to see.”

  Kaki sat up. She didn’t care anymore. Gritting her teeth and jutting out her jaw, she responded—barely recognizing her own voice. “I’ll do anything you say. Just give me the pills.”

  19

  Tyler

  Saturday, December 31

  New Year’s Eve, Josh and Molly came to Tyler and Lana’s for a pre-celebration, which was to be followed by dinner out at a local restaurant—some pre-fixe affair that Lana had organized.

  Lana was in rare form. She’d had a good bit to drink tonight—Tyler wasn’t sure exactly how much.

  “Good heavens, it was like a funeral parlor when I came home from the grocery,” Lana told Molly and Josh as they all sat in the living room, slipping chunks of cheese and ham into their mouths. “You should have seen it. All the shades were pulled and the lights were off. I was half expecting one of the kids to jump out of the shadows covered in a sheet, but no. Katherine had everyone down in the basement, hiding out like they were waiting for the apocalypse.”

  The living room was lit with candlelight, and light jazz music filled the room with a festive, relaxed mood.

  Tyler spotted Katherine hovering by the door, her face drawn and pale as she peered out of the windows on either side of it. What was wrong with her?

  “Katherine!” Lana called out to her. “What are you looking for? Who’s out there?”

  Katherine moved from the window. “No one.”

  “Why do you keep looking outside?” Tyler asked. “What’s going on?”

  “Nothing,” her voice echoed from the hallway.

  Tyler looked out. The street was lit with Christmas lights and decorations. “I don’t see anything. No one out there.”

  Lana whispered to Molly and Josh. “I don’t know what’s up with her. It’s like living with a ghost. She floats around the house silent as the grave, peering out of the windows all the time. Weird.”

  Tyler hated that Lana talked about his daughter as if she wasn’t standing right there. But it was true. Katherine only spoke when the Wolfs had arrived, when she’d talked to Molly about their dog and the puppies that had just been born. Otherwise, she was a zombie.

  “So, you’ve got a bunch of puppies in your house now, right?” Tyler prompted the change of subject as he returned to the living room.

  Molly beamed. “Yes. We have five of them. Katherine, you’ll have to come see them.”

  Katherine smiled. “Yeah, I’d love that.”

  “We are now experts at puppy delivery,” said Josh. “Space heater blaring to keep the room a toasty eighty-three degrees. We sat by her side all night until this bloody, membranous sac came out.”

  “Wow. That must have been amazing to watch,” Lana said.

  “It was,” Molly affirmed. “Trixie birthed each puppy one by one, and then she licked the little body until the sac was removed, chewed the umbilical cord to sever it. She knew instinctively what to do.”

  “They looked like little chipmunks,” Josh added. “We could have watched them for hours.”

  Molly turned to Katherine. “You’ll have to come over and pick one out. Or two if you want.”

  “Well, hold on.” Lana gurgled her drink. “Katherine, you’ll have to check with your mom about that. Especially if we’re moving.”

  Tyler’s neck muscles tensed.

  “So, is California still on the table?” Molly asked. She placed a block of cheese on the end of her tongue.

  Tyler stood and moved toward the wet bar. “Who needs a refill?”

  Josh held up his hand. “I’m good, thanks. I’ll get something else at the restaurant.”

  “Everyone has something to drink, Tyler. Come sit down,” Lana instructed.

  Tyler ignored her and wiped a cloth over the countertop.

  Lana turned back to Molly and Josh. “Well, I’m ready to go tomorrow. I’ve got the job, contacted the realtor.”

  Tyler carried a bowl of nuts back to the table. “It’s hard right now to think about going to California with Brandon and everything going on with him.” His eyes grazed Lana’s nervously. “I mean, we just started counseling at the church, and the kid really needs it. He’s really, really angry. And as you know, Josh, we may still have a court case pending.”

  “You haven’t received a summons or anything yet?” Josh asked.

  “No, nothing yet.”

  “So…you’ve definitely decided not to go?” Lana asked accusingly.

  “Maybe,” Tyler said. “But there’s also a little more to it,” he added, turning his gaze back to Molly and Josh. “I’ve been offered a really good position at work. One that could be hard to turn down.”

  “Oh?” Josh asked.

  “Yeah, it would be a lot more money and a more prestigious position. It’s an offer that…you know, suggests they really believe in me and my abilities as a manager. It could change our lives.” Part of him was speaking to Josh and Molly, the other part was directing his argument at Lana.

  “How?” she asked. “How is it going to change our lives? Is it going to change the weather? Is it going to change the traffic and the rat-race that we live through every day—that you live through every day? No. It’s not, Tyler. It massages your ego, that’s all.”

  “Lana.” Tyler cringed. “I think this is something you and I need to talk about one on one—not in front of our friends.” Embarrassment crept over him.

  Molly and Josh squirmed with discomfort.

  “It’s OK,” Josh said, shaking his head and smiling awkwardly. “Really, it’s fine. These are all big decisions you’re making.”

  “Yes,�
� Molly said, rising from her perch upon the couch and beginning to collect glasses. “Why don’t we head over to the restaurant? Maybe we can get seated early.”

  Lana’s eyes continued to shoot daggers at Tyler from across the room.

  ~*~

  It was a relief when dinner was finally over.

  It was evident Lana wasn’t enjoying any part of it. She’d ordered another drink once they arrived at the restaurant and barely ate any of the expensive four-course dinner.

  Tyler talked, laughed, ordered dessert and lingered over coffee.

  Lana remained silent, glaring at them.

  On the way home, Tyler tried to convince her how good their life would be with his new job. And he assured her he was going to change. “I’m not viewing porn anymore, Lana. I’ve come to realize how disrespectful to you that is. I’m starting counseling, too.”

  “Mm-hm,” Lana murmured, but otherwise, she didn’t respond.

  Whatever. Maybe she was tired or drunk or both. Anyway, he’d done his part. He’d committed to being a better husband. It might take a little time to prove himself, but he meant it. From here on out, things would change. They would be like a regular, suburban family.

  Maybe he’d even agree to let Katherine have one of those dogs she wanted so much.

  20

  Kaki

  Sunday, January 1

  Lana and her dad came home just after midnight. But then she’d heard Lana milling around downstairs for ages. She really needed to meet Damien, she had already texted him once that she wouldn’t be able to get out of the house until around 2:00 AM, but she was beginning to worry about that time frame, too. Lana never stayed up this late.

  When she felt pretty sure that everyone was asleep, Kaki moved down the stairs, her fingers trailing the banister for support. She still had a few minutes to kill before Damien would get there, so she went into the kitchen and felt around for Lana’s stash of vodka. She swilled deeply from the bottle, and then carried it to the island where she poured more into a glass. She sat on one of the stools and sipped at it.

  Her eye caught a slip of paper peeking out from under a coffee mug. Absently, she pulled it out.