The Girl In White

by Shannon Reber

  I narrowed my eyes. “What are you talking about?” I asked, surprised by the tone he’d used.

  He tipped his chin down and gave me an earnest stare. “Spencer is not a good guy. His sister, Adrian, was in my class. That whole family is trouble.”

  I scowled at him, irritated by his judgmental way of looking at people who didn’t follow the rules as stringently as he did. “Imogen is a big girl. She can decide who to hang out with without my help.”

  He scowled but his lips quirked up in a tiny excuse for a smile. “You’re as stubborn as ever, aren’t you?” he asked, setting the mug down on the tray before he pulled out a bottle of Italian soda and set it next to the coffee. “I’m guessing that’s still your favorite.”

  A lump again rose in my throat. So many memories. So many wonderful times. So much pain.

  I stared at that bottle, startled when Serena pried herself away from Dylan and slid her arm around my shoulders. “Come on, sweetie. Let’s go sit down,” she said as she began to tow me toward a table.

  The group of girls who had been in front of us in line all shot me death-glares like they thought I was competition for Ian’s attention. They muttered nasty things as Serena guided me into a chair not far from them. I ignored them all. My mind was so fixed on the past that nothing else mattered.

  The chair next to mine was pulled out and someone sat next to me. I didn’t look up. The depression which had reared its ugly head after Emma’s death felt like it wanted to bury me again.

  “You know that blog I made when you moved to Philadelphia?” Ian asked from right next to me.

  I glanced over, surprised that he was there. It surprised me more when he handed me his phone.

  “I’ve been messing with it again because of a class I took spring semester. I thought you might like this one,” he said, his elbows on the table.

  I looked at the screen of his phone, startled to see my face beaming out at the world. I looked to have been fourteen or fifteen, my face so alight with happiness even I was struck. I began to read what he had written and my eyes filled with tears.

  He described me like I had been as captivating as his sister had been. He obviously had a distorted view of me or a faulty memory.

  I began to fiddle with his phone when I’d read his article, my fingers downloading, deleting, and protecting without conscious thought.

  When I was done, I set the phone down on the table and took a drink of the soda in front of me. It was wonderful and I savored the flavor.

  “What’d you do?” Ian asked as he turned his phone around to look at it.

  “You had malware. I took care of it,” I said, my eyes fixed on the table.

  He narrowed his eyes, his head tipped to the side. “Uh, thanks,” he said and leaned closer to me. “I’m guessing you didn’t like my article.”

  I took a bite of the cheesecake to keep me from saying something that shouldn’t be said.

  One of the girls from the table across from ours stood up and walked over. She was an amazingly hot girl, with flawless olive skin, pin-straight dark hair, and a smile that had probably made her orthodontist rich. I recognized her immediately. She had gone to our school and had always disliked me.

  I had been in AP classes all through school and Infinity had hated being shown up by a girl a couple of years younger than her. Everything with her had always been a competition. It looked like she hadn’t grown out of that.

  She laid her hand boldly on Ian’s shoulder. “We need to talk about the party,” she said in the kind of voice that sounded purposefully breathy like she wanted to make herself sound sexy.

  Ian glanced at her, a single eyebrow cocked in confusion. “Sorry, what party?” he asked, his voice a little sharp like he was annoyed and about to say something nasty.

  Infinity gave him a besotted smile and squeezed his shoulder. “A party next weekend. It’s in our sorority and it’s going to be amazing.”

  Ian looked at me and gave a small smile. “I have to talk to another girl about a party next weekend. See, it’s her eighteenth birthday and her mom tends to ignore her birthdays. If I don’t take her somewhere, she’ll probably stay at home and hack into Google’s servers so no one will ever be able to find my weblog again. She doesn’t like my writing,” he said, utterly unbothered by that idea.

  I looked at Infinity and groaned internally as I saw she still wanted my head on a platter. I leaned closer to Ian and shot him a sneer. “First, you don’t have to hack Google to delete a blog. Second, I’m going out with Imogen and Serena on my birthday so you can go to whatever party you want. Third, you have told me so many times over the years how annoying you think I am that your post is nuttier than the average nut-loaf. I know what you thought of me as a kid and writing lies on a blog doesn’t change that.” I stood and turned away before he could say something to break me, which was a skill he had used twice a week most of my life.

  Dylan let out a loud laugh. “Ha! It’s not just me that needs to apologize. You big jerk. You made ‘Little Einstein’ mad,” he crowed, continuing to laugh in an obnoxious way as I exited the coffee shop.

  I hated that nickname. It was what all the kids at school had called me because I had been in high school classes while in middle school. It seemed that Dylan hadn’t forgotten like I’d hoped.

  Serena rushed after me and pulled me to a stop, her eyes damp with unshed tears. “I’m sorry, Madison. I thought it would help. I never meant to have all your sadness dragged up again.”

  I stared disconsolately up at the clouds which had begun to gather overhead. “It’s no one’s fault but mine. I keep trying to tell myself that the past is the past and agonizing over it isn’t going to change anything. Looks like I need to listen to myself,” I said, my brows raised in question. “Oh yeah and would you and Imogen mind going out with me on my birthday so I’m not a complete liar?”

  She threw back her head and laughed. “Sweetie, you’re on. We’re going to make this a birthday you will never forget.”

  And oh how right she turned out to be.

  SIX

  Since a little kid deleting the drivers on someone’s computer was such an easy thing to fix, there was way too much time left for despondency to wrap its arms around me. That was why I had arranged ten computer repair jobs and was suddenly a lot richer than I had been the week before.

  Okay, so rich was a stretch. I wasn’t going to go to the poor-house, though. It was nice to feel needed, to know that I had helped in some small way to make people’s lives a tiny bit easier.

  The problem was, I was done. There was nothing left to do other than either bathe in the cash I’d been given or immerse myself in the information I always found online. That was what I decided was the best plan.

  So, I changed from the shirt Serena had loaned me into my most comfortable pajama pants and a programmer t-shirt and sprawled out on my bed. That was when I began what I called fun. The more I read, the more it became clear to me that computers were better than people. If I was the last human on earth with an AI in control, I’d be the happiest girl ever.

  Or that had been true before I’d returned to Pittsburgh. Finally, it was like I had found my place. It wasn’t in Emma’s shadow either.

  As though that thought made the world around me flip upside down, my screen began to flicker. That was when the cold registered in my mind. Goosebumps rose on my arms and a chill worked its way up my spine. Something was wrong. I could feel it.

  My laptop, tablet, and phone all flickered at the same time until they came clear on a news site. I stared for a bit, baffled as I never was by anything with a computer. How had all three of them gone to the same site at the same time?

  I sat up and started to reboot all three. I hit the button to turn each of them off. Nothing happened. The screens remained fixed on a reporter’s face as she stood outside what looked like the house we’d been at for the party the night before.

  My mouth fell open as, without me hitting the button, the video be
gan to play. “Duquesne University is reeling after one of its students found the body of a young man. Twenty-one year old Manuel Brumoso attended Carnegie Mellon but came to a party at Duquesne with his girlfriend. The following morning, he was found hanging from a tree outside the house where that party had been held. From what we’ve been told, suicide is how they believe Manuel to have died.”

  A picture flashed across the screen of a handsome, cheerful Mexican guy . . . one I’d seen at the party. When Dylan began bellowing, that guy had taken a step in our direction. It was like he planned to come over and help if things got out of hand.

  I’d seen him dancing with a girl, both of them looking thrilled to be alive. Why would he have done such a thing right outside the party? Why would he make that choice?

  The reporter swallowed like the idea of it made her want to cry. “Manuel was a good student, well-liked, and mourned by his family.”

  That was when I saw her. Emma stood in front of me, her translucent face demented by rage. She had always been a girl who looked even more beautiful when she was mad. At that moment, she was horrifying.

  The white dress she wore shone like the sun. Her teeth were bared. The bruise on her neck where the rope had taken her life was a bold purple. That specter’s rage-filled eyes met mine and hatred for me was clear as day in them.

  I stared at her, unable to think a clear thought. Instinctively, I raised my hand with my little finger extended. I didn’t want my friend to be mad at me. I didn’t know what I had done. It didn’t matter, though.

  Emma and I had been friends since our first day of preschool. We had grown up together, learned to ride our bikes together, learned everything that was important while we were together. She was dead, yet she had come to me. I believed it. Emma really was there.

  Her eyes turned down to look at my finger before her lips curved up a tiny bit. Her little finger extended as involuntarily as my own had. Before we made contact, she vanished like she’d never been there before.

  I stared at that place, tears rising in my eyes. Why would she have killed herself? She was so confident, almost an arrogant girl. A girl like her was the last kind of person I would think of as someone to take her own life.

  The guy from the party had seemed so happy as well. Maybe happiness had nothing to do with it. Maybe confidence wasn’t something which kept a person from taking the easy way out of a problem. I had no idea and it made my heart ache.

  I blinked several times, startled to find that my laptop, tablet, and phone were all normal again. They looked like they always did. I would do a scan to be certain. Something told me that I wouldn’t find a thing. It had been Emma. I was sure.

  A knock sounded on my door after a few hours, bringing me out of my daze. I didn’t want to talk to anybody. All I wanted was to stay right there in my room for the rest of my life. If I never spoke to anyone, no one could leave me floundering and alone.

  I closed my eyes and let out a slow breath. Maybe I should hide under my bed to avoid having to see anybody. I rolled my eyes at myself and took the choice out of my own hands.

  “Yeah?” I called, my eyes still fixed on the laptop.

  The door behind me opened and a loud sigh met my ears. “Have you gotten out of bed at all today?”

  My body jerked in surprise. I turned slowly, finding my dad in the doorway. I hadn’t expected to see him at all. Mom had made it clear Dad wanted nothing to do with me.

  I stared at him for a few seconds. My brain had gone to the blue screen of death. I wanted to run over and throw my arms around his neck, pour out all the anxieties that had plagued me for so long. We didn’t have that kind of relationship, though. I actually hadn’t seen him since Emma’s funeral.

  He was in his sixties, with gray hair and the kind of face that was always better suited to a frown than a smile. The lines around his mouth and eyes gave him a dignity that was massively intimidating.

  I sat up, my hands clenched around the edge of the mattress. “If you’ve shown up to imply that I’m lazy, you’ve done that. You can leave now,” I groused, perfectly aware of what both he and my mom thought of me.

  Dad straightened up and walked into the room, looking around in an interested way. “How long have you been back here?” he asked, his eyes fixed on the equipment splayed out on my desk.

  I closed my eyes and let out a breath while counting to three in my head. “I’ve been here for two and a half months,” I said, waiting for the ax to fall.

  “May I ask why you didn’t call, or come by?”

  I tipped my head back, my eyes narrowed to slits. “Come by to see you? Why would I do that? You said you thought I was a slacker when Mom told you I wasn’t going to MIT. I’m not like you, which means I’m nothing.” The bitterness in my own voice made shame pass over me. I pushed it away. His opinion of me didn’t matter.

  Dad folded his arms and gave me the kind of look Mom had given me when she kicked me out. “Madison, you have been more intelligent, more driven, more gifted in every way than your mother and I could ever have dreamed of. What could possibly make you think I would ever accuse you of being a slacker? From what I learned this morning, you have the kind of reputation of being a miracle worker when it comes to anything electronic. You are no slacker. I have never thought it and certainly never said it.”

  I gaped at him, my mouth working silently. Was it possible Mom had lied? Could she have made up all the things that had always made me keep my distance from Dad? Why would she do that?

  Dad walked over and crouched down in front of me so our eyes were closer. “I can guess why you believe that and a lot of it is my fault. I should have been around more. I should have told you every time I saw you how proud I was of you. Your mom has her issues but I believe she really was trying to help you.” There was doubt in his eyes as much as there was in my own heart.

  We both knew that Mom’s ‘issues’ as he’d called them, were far deeper than either of us could even understand. I had spent my life striving to be as little like her as it was possible to be. That was the main reason I had refused to go to college.

  Since Mom and Dad were both professors, it had seemed to me that education was the issue. I had chosen to go a totally different route. Had I been wrong?

  A small sound by the door alerted me to the fact someone was there. I glanced over to find Imogen standing there, her mouth open in shock. “Professor Hopkins? How do you know Madison?” she asked like the foundation of her world had been eroded.

  I swallowed the lump in my throat and nudged my chin toward him. “Imogen, this is my dad. Dad, this is Imogen.” I waved my thumb at each of them, my mind still trying to understand everything.

  Mom hadn’t wanted me to stay with Dad, so she had made me think Dad wanted nothing to do with me. That was such a horrible thing to do to a kid. I had spent my entire life believing the only person who loved me was Emma.

  To find out that Dad was proud of me . . . the foundation of MY world had indeed crumbled. Error code 404 in my head.

  Imogen looked like she might pass out in shock. “Um . . . wow. I never knew that.” Like her memory had come back to her, she turned her lips up in a smile. “I was just coming to see where Serena and I should plan to take you for your birthday.”

  My birthday? Oh. I had forgotten. I turned eighteen on Friday.

  Dad turned his eyes to meet mine, his frown still in place. “I’ll let you get back to your friends. I want you to know you’re not alone. My house isn’t far from here if you want to come by . . . anytime.”

  I lowered my chin, not sure any words could fit past the lump which had expanded to what felt like a tennis ball in my throat. My heart fluttered when he rose, afraid it had all been a dream. Would I wake up to find it had all been in my head?

  “Dad,” I squeaked out as he moved toward the door.

  He glanced at me, no expression whatsoever on his face.

  “Did you know Manuel Brumoso?”

  Dad cleared his throat, his a
rms folded again. “He was my TA,” he said, his eyes full of sorrow.

  “Why would he do it, Dad?” I asked, desperate to know the answer.

  Dad shook his head. “I have no idea. Suicide was never something I would have thought Manuel to be capable of.” It was clear we both knew we were talking about Emma. It was written all over his face.

  My throat went dry as sand as I rubbed at my chin. “I . . . Dad, I . . . I want you to know—”

  Dad gave a small smile. “Me too, Madison,” and he turned to walk out of my room.

  I stared after him, bafflement and hope at war inside me. My dad loved me. I wasn’t alone. He had said it. I could make it through whatever happened around me all because of that fact.

  Imogen waited until the front door had closed behind Dad before she let out a primal cry and launched herself into my room. It was like she’d been possessed by a banshee. “I cannot believe this! The professor who has won the Marconi Prize five years in a row and will probably win it this year too, is your father and you never told us!” she bellowed as she bounced up and down on my bed. “Girl, you and your secrets are so annoying.”

  I didn’t speak. No words would form. My dad wasn’t the man Mom had always told me he was.

  I’d always known Mom lied when it suited her needs. I never imagined she’d tell that kind of lie to me. Wasn’t I supposed to be the one that made stupid decisions like that? Wasn’t it a parent’s job to correct their kid when they committed that kind of offense?

  I clenched my hands so tight on the edge of the mattress, my knuckles were white as bone. I had never understood Mom. She had never understood me. It had been the one constant in my life.

  Now there was another. I couldn’t trust my mom. I would never believe anything she said again. Never again.

  SEVEN

  Restocking shelves was one of my favorite parts of my job. It was similar to the repetitive work of being behind the register but was somehow less soul-sucking. Maybe it was the fact I wasn’t trapped behind the counter with a script all written out for me to say to people.