Over Her Head

by Shelley Bates

  “Mom already told you,” Anna said, glancing at her mother and back at Nick. Her blue eyes were huge, and she was pale. “I was right here. We watched The Planet’s Funniest Animals and then I went to bed.”

  “And you can corroborate that?” Nick looked from Laurie to Colin.

  Laurie sucked in a breath. “Of course I can. For heaven’s sake, Nick, you almost sound like you doubt her word.” She waited for him to laugh and say of course he didn’t, but he was writing in his notebook and didn’t look up.

  “So. One down, two hundred to go. Do you guys want a hot chocolate or coffee?” She felt compelled to hint that they were on the cops’ side. The good guys. They were family, too. This was just a formality so it wouldn’t look as though Nick was playing favorites as he went around town doing his interviews.

  Nick and Gil got to their feet. “No thanks, Mrs. Hale,” Gil said. “We just had about a gallon of coffee at the station, and we have a pretty long list of kids to talk to yet tonight.”

  Colin saw them to the door and closed it behind them. Anna jumped to her feet.

  “Hang on, sweetie.” He put an arm around her shoulders and guided her back to the couch. “I want to make sure you’re okay.”

  “Sure, I’m okay.” She wriggled out from under his arm, scooted over into the corner of the couch, and grabbed one of the matching pillows. She hugged it to her chest the way she did when they watched The Princess Diaries. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

  “It’s not every day the cops come by asking where you were on the night of a crime,” Laurie said in a voice that wobbled a little, as if she were about to either giggle or weep with relief now that it was over. “Fortunately, it was just a fact-finding mission. Not . . . anything else.”

  “I didn’t do anything. I don’t know anything.”

  “I know, honey. But it’s Nick’s job to make sure they cover everything—especially if they think it might be murder.”

  “Who’s being murdered? What did I miss?” Tim slid down the banister and landed in the foyer with a thump. “Was that Nick?”

  “Timothy Lucas Hale, how many times have I told you not to do that?”

  “I was in a hurry, Mom. How come you didn’t call me? Sometimes he lets me turn the siren on in the cop car.”

  “He didn’t want to see you, loser.”

  “Anna, don’t call your brother that.”

  “I s’pose he wanted to see you, Anna Banana Breath. Did Brendan O’Day or Kyle Edgar finally call the cops on you for stalking them?”

  Laurie opened her mouth to lay down the law, but before she could say a word, Anna leaped to her feet. She swung the couch cushion at Tim with killing force and knocked him to his knees on the carpet.

  “Ow! Mom!”

  “Anna!”

  Their daughter ignored their simultaneous exclamations, stormed up the stairs, and slammed herself into her room.

  Laurie turned to Colin, her eyes wide with disbelief. “My turn to talk to her.” Teenage irritability was one thing, but they weren’t a family of hitters. Anna needed to get that clear and apologize to her brother.

  She marched upstairs and didn’t wait for a response to her knock. The soft glow of the lamp on the bedside table fell across the carpet and illuminated Anna as she lay on the bed with her back to the door, sketching furiously on a pad.

  “Anna.”

  “I’m not going to apologize.” The words were sullen, and she didn’t even turn to speak over her shoulder.

  Laurie let it pass. She also swallowed the urge to rain down her fear and anger on her daughter’s head, and spoke quietly instead. “I’m worried about you. Why would you hit your brother like that? You’re not four years old anymore.”

  “He needs it.”

  “Nobody needs to be knocked off their feet with a couch cushion.” She sat on the edge of the mattress and began to rub soothing circles on Anna’s back. The flannel shirt was fuzzy and warm, her daughter’s shoulder blades sharp and defensive under her palm. “Want to talk about what’s wrong?”

  “Nothing’s wrong.” On the pad of drawing paper, a fairylike creature with huge eyes, a tiny waist, and gossamer wings was taking shape. Another of Anna’s manga people.

  “I think there is. We all go through stuff when we’re teen-agers. School stuff, family stuff. It makes it better to talk about it. Get some perspective, you know?”

  “I have lots of perspective.”

  In the soft light, Laurie made a face, but didn’t let the wryness reach her tone. “I know. I’m proud of you for the way you usually handle things. But this thing with Randi Peizer . . . it might be more than you can handle.”

  “What thing?” Anna blacked in the pupils of the fairy’s eyes with fierce concentration.

  “Her death, sweetie. Losing a classmate, even one you didn’t know very well, can be hard. People are supposed to die when they’re old, not when they’re fourteen and haven’t even started to live yet.”

  Silence, except for the swoop of the pen. Laurie kept up the slow rhythm of her palm. As a baby, Anna had loved to have her back rubbed.

  “When I was a teenager,” she began in a once-upon-a-time tone, “I had a best friend named Sharon. We had the same classes, did ballet together, got part-time jobs delivering papers together. Then she got sick.”

  “What with?”

  “Just an infection. A simple staph infection, like when Tim had strep throat last winter. But Sharon’s system didn’t handle it well, and she was staying with relatives because her parents had split up. They didn’t catch it in time with antibiotics, and Sharon died.”

  “Your best friend?” Anna abandoned the pen in mid-stroke, turned over, and looked into her mother’s face, her brow wrinkling with distress. “She died? Really?”

  Laurie nodded. “The rest of that school year I had to do everything alone. No partner for biology lab. No one to walk to the ballet studio with. No one to deliver papers with. We had done everything together, you see, which meant that practically every minute of the day, I missed her.”

  “Wow.”

  “It was like there was this big space beside me all the time where she used to be. And even after she’d been gone a long time, the space didn’t go away. It just traveled around with me, reminding me of her.”

  “What did you do?”

  “I went to church, went to school, hung out with the cousins and my youth group. That space beside me began to shrink after a while, until finally it was small enough for me to put it in my heart and tuck it away for good.”

  “You still miss her?”

  Laurie nodded. “As you guys would say, we were tight.”

  Anna’s eyes clouded. “But I wasn’t tight with Randi. I hardly knew who she was.”

  “I know. But her empty space will still be felt at school, won’t it? Traveling around from class to class?”

  “But nobody’s going to put her in their heart. She didn’t have any friends.”

  “It would be pretty sad to have only one person in the world—like her mom—left to remember her, wouldn’t it? It would be nice if there was a little place in your heart for her, too.”

  “Maybe,” Anna conceded and picked up the pen.

  “So if you can do that, maybe you can say sorry to your brother. Because I know he has a big place in your heart, no matter how much you guys complain and argue with each other.”

  Anna glanced over her shoulder. “You’re grasping now, Mom.”

  Laurie leaned over and kissed her. “You’d miss him if he was gone.”

  “Yeah, like zits.”

  If her sense of humor was reestablishing itself, maybe it was time to go a little deeper. “Getting back to what I said about Sharon, you see that it’s okay to grieve, and okay to move on as well, don’t you?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Sometimes our emotions can scare us, maybe make us feel as if we can’t handle them. Then we lie awake at night thinking all kinds of things that maybe aren’t even real. Are you s
truggling with that?”

  “No.” Anna turned a page and began a fresh drawing. “I was up late studying, that’s all. Math is really hard this year.”

  “So things at school are all right, then. You’ve got lots of friends, right?” The pen faltered for a split second, and Anna turned the page again and started over. “Anna? Is everything okay with you and your girlfriends?”

  “Sure.”

  “Then how come you just messed up that drawing?”

  With a sigh, Anna put the pen down and rolled over. “Because I can’t concentrate with you hovering over me.”

  “We were having a talk.”

  “You were talking, you mean. You’re always talking. You hardly ever give me a chance to say anything.”

  Laurie sat back and stared at her. What had she just spent the last ten minutes doing, if it wasn’t encouraging her to talk? “I’m giving you the chance now, sweetie. I honestly want to know how it’s going at school. About your friends. How you’re feeling about Randi. All of it.”

  “Why? Why now, all of a sudden?”

  “Because you’re not sleeping, that’s why, and you whacked your brother with a pillow, and Nick was here on official business. These things are not normal. That’s why I’m concerned.”

  Anna’s eyes closed briefly, as if she were marshaling her resources. When she opened them again, Laurie realized her little girl wasn’t so little anymore. There was a reticence, an adult sense of reserve seeping into her gaze that Laurie hadn’t seen before. The gaze of a young woman who wasn’t going to spill everything to her mother the way a child would, with complete confidence that Mommy would know how to solve any problem she brought to her.

  “Everything’s fine at school, Mom. Math is kind of a pain, but I’ll sweat it out. My friends are cool. You know them. Kelci, Michelle, Jaimi.”

  “Are they the popular girls?”

  Anna pulled her chin in and frowned. “Popular? What does that have to do with anything?”

  “Well, you know.” Laurie shrugged. “We all want to have lots of friends.”

  “Mom,” Anna sighed, “just because you were homecoming queen in nineteen eighty-whatever, doesn’t mean I want to be like that.”

  “What’s wrong with being homecoming queen? It was fun. And you might not care now, but when you’re seventeen I bet you will.”

  “I doubt it. I don’t care about being popular. Popular girls are—” She stopped.

  “What? They’re what?” Anna shrugged and went back to her drawing. Laurie sensed that she’d been on the edge of saying something important. “Anna?”

  “They’re not who I want to be.”

  How could any normal girl not want to be popular and well-liked and join all kinds of clubs and activities? High school had been the most fun years of Laurie’s life. She couldn’t imagine a young girl having that kind of opportunity and turning it down. But then, as Anna had pointed out, she was not Laurie, and never had been.

  “What do you want to be? How can I help?”

  “That’s just the thing, Mom. You can’t help. If you do, you’ll just take over and make me do stuff I don’t want to do.”

  Laurie blinked at the sudden needle of pain that pricked her heart. “When did I ever do that?”

  “You always do it. You pushed me to be in the choir at church even though I can’t really sing. You talked me into being a counselor last year at Camp Victory when all I wanted to do was go swimming and canoeing and stuff.”

  “Being a counselor is a great way to learn leadership, Anna. You aren’t going to do that falling out of a canoe.”

  “Mom, you just don’t get it. What if I don’t want to be a leader? What if I just want to be a kid and fall out of a stupid canoe if I feel like it? At least it would be my own decision.”

  How could a fourteen-year-old make the kinds of decisions that would set her on the right track for the future? Anna didn’t have the tools yet. That’s what parents were for, wasn’t it? To guide their children in the way they should go, as the Bible said.

  Frankly, it hurt that Anna could lie here and coldheartedly reject the things that Laurie had been trying to teach her. Leadership and the ability to get along with others were fine qualities. Necessary qualities. As she’d proven herself.

  “Mom? Do you hear what I’m saying?”

  “I hear you,” she said around the hurt. “We should talk about this some more.”

  “That always means you still want me to agree with you.”

  “For heaven’s sake, Anna, what’s wrong with agreeing with me?” she exploded, then lowered her voice. “You’re saying that learning to be a leader and having everyone like you are bad things.”

  “I’m not saying that, Mom,” Anna said with exaggerated patience. “I’m saying that you need to let me decide what I want to do and how I want to handle things. I’m fourteen.”

  And that was it, wasn’t it? Fourteen. No longer a child, and adulthood a long way off.

  “You can trust me,” Anna persisted.

  “Of course I can,” Laurie said automatically. And she did. But sometimes you needed more than trust to hang on to.

  She kissed Anna good night and heard the scratch and swoop of the pen begin again as she closed the door behind her.

  Then she went into her bedroom and dropped to her knees next to the bed.

  Help me with Anna, Lord. We talked, but I still don’t know what’s bothering her. It can’t be just math. Please give Anna an open heart and give me the ability to listen. Is she right, Lord? Do I talk and push too much? You’ve helped me to be a good mother, Lord, and you’ve given me good kids. Help me now that Anna’s getting more independent. Give me wisdom.

  And trust, Lord. Give me trust.

  To group: Budz

  From: JohnnysGrrl

  Here comes 5-0. Be EZ. Stay cool.

  SUSQUANNY COUNTY SHERIFF’S OFFICE

  CASE NUMBER: 07-201

  REPORTING OFFICER: N. Tremore, badge #78512

  DATE: November 12, 2007

  TIME: 21:46

  SUMMARY: Investigating officers Tremore and Schwartz followed up on information given by Harim Saur, employee at the Stop-N-Go convenience store located at the west end of the Susquanny River Bridge. Saur reports that around 10:30 p.m. on Wednesday, November 7, he saw a “large gang of kids” hanging around the bridge. Because of the time of night and the distance from the store, he could not see clearly, but he had the impression that “something was going on.”

  To rule out or include this activity in the death of Miranda Peizer, officers canvassed the students at Lincoln High School. Most deny being out on the night of November 7 and can be vouched for by their parents. Some were working at part-time jobs; these were verified. The individuals who cannot verify their movements or who have given an alibi that was subsequently contradicted by verbal statements are as follows:

  Kate Parsons

  Michelle Gibson

  Anna Hale

  Kelci Platt

  Morgan Williams

  Kyle Edgar

  Brendan O’Day

  Rose Silverstein

  Jaimi Silverstein

  Keisha Jones

  ACTION:The above subjects will be interviewed again. Victim’s mother, Tanya Peizer, should also be interviewed but is unavailable at this time due to her state of mind in bereavement. Report to follow.

  Chapter Five

  Nick Tremore stood at the front door of the apartment and checked his notebook. Number 202, the home of the victim’s mother.

  This wasn’t going to be easy.

  He knocked, and when no one answered after a few seconds, knocked again. Through his boots, he felt a small vibration, as though something heavy had fallen somewhere at the back of the unit, and his instincts kicked in. He tried the door and to his surprise, the knob turned under his hand.

  “Mrs. Peizer?” he called. “It’s Deputy Tremore from the sheriff’s office. I left a couple of messages on your phone. Can I come in?
”

  A sound that might have been a reply came from a bedroom. He stepped in and closed the door behind him.

  “Mrs. Peizer? Are you okay?”

  A small woman with hair halfway between blonde and red appeared in the hallway, holding what looked to be a rope of some kind in her hands.

  “They had runs in them,” she said, and looked down at what he now realized were a pair of stockings. “I sent her to school with runs in her hose.”

  Aw, man. Nick had plenty of experience with women—the kind he was related to and the kind he chose for himself—but he’d never gone one-on-one with a grieving mother before.

  “Maybe she put holes in them on purpose,” he offered. “Like the kids do with their jeans.”

  The tears that had been swimming in her eyes overflowed and streaked her cheeks. “Not Randi.” She made a gulping sound. “They were a statement for her. These were her favorites.”

  “Uh, maybe I should come back another time.” He glanced around the tiny apartment. “Isn’t there supposed to be someone with you?” Hadn’t Laurie said that she and her church ladies were watching out for her?

  Tanya twisted the black hose between her fingers, and Nick had a sudden flash of what exactly a person in despair could do with something like that. He resisted the urge to pull them out of her hands and put them somewhere safe.

  “Cammie left a while ago.” Thin shoulders drooped. “She told me not to think about cleaning up Randi’s room yet, but I had to.” She looked up at him as though he were about to haul her in for it.

  Inside him, something twisted, hard.

  “Mrs. Peizer, please, sit down.”

  She let him lead her over to the couch, where she sat and wrung the hose between her hands, over and over. “Not Mrs.,” she finally said. “I never married Randi’s dad.” A quick glance sideways at him. “That was before I became a Christian.”

  He didn’t want to hear about ex-husbands or Christians. He was surrounded by them—Christians, not ex-husbands. His mother and aunts never lost an opportunity to parade yet another prospective wife in front of him, and she was invariably a member of some church or another. His brothers had done the right thing and married fine, upstanding girls, producing fine, upstanding families. He supposed he was the black sheep, although going into law enforcement like his uncle probably wasn’t the best rebellion he could have come up with.