Starved for Attention

by Jen Carter

  Dang it, I wrote. You were right. That woman is a thorn in my side. How could she twist my words like that? I’m never speaking to her again.

  Three dots appeared below my message, indicating that he was writing back.

  You and me both sister. Don’t worry. What goes around comes around. She’s going to get hers one day.

  I hoped he was right. Well, no. I didn’t want anything bad to happen to her. I didn’t want anyone to treat her the way she treated us.

  But actually, I kind of did.

  A pox upon her house, I wrote back to Fitts, referencing the Romeo and Juliet curse written in the girls’ scripts. Fitts would probably tell me to knock off the nerdiness, but sometimes Shakespeare really did capture what I was feeling.

  Chicken pox and small pox upon her house, Fitts wrote back. And let’s throw in measles for good measure.

  I almost chuckled. The detective was being clever, wow. It might have even made me feel half-a-percent better.

  The plague, too, I added. I’m seriously never talking to her again.

  ***

  My phone rang. It was nine-thirty, and I was in the middle of doing the kind of cleaning that only happened during school breaks: baseboards, door frames, window blinds, and fan blades. Who had time to do those things on a regular basis? Not me. And while I didn’t mind cleaning, when the phone rang, I was happy to take a break.

  “Hey, Livy,” I said after checking the caller ID and connecting the call.

  “Hey, Jill. I have a favor to ask. I’d do it myself, but Hunter and I are at the store trying to sort through an issue in the stockroom, and I can’t get away.”

  “No problem. What do you need?”

  “Esther the drama assistant just called me. She’s frantic. She said she found something I needed to see, but she was too spooked to talk about it on the phone. She’s in the middle of teaching and can’t leave campus. I’m sure it has to do with Fleming’s death since she’s so upset. Do you have time to run over to the high school and get whatever it is she wants me to see? She won’t even take a picture and text it to me, so I have no idea what’s going on. And now she’s got me freaked out, so I don’t want to wait until play practice after school.”

  “Understood. I just need to jump in the shower. Then I’ll head over there.”

  We hung up, and I did just what I told her. After a quick shower, I said goodbye to Uni who couldn’t believe that I was leaving without her, and drove to Temecula Hills High School.

  The last time I was at that school, I was trying to dig up information about the woman who died at my family’s winery. It hadn’t gone well. I hoped this trip would go quickly and smoothly.

  As I got out of my car in the visitor parking lot, I realized that I was standing in front of the school where I wanted to teach next year. How strange it would be to call Temecula Hills my school after teaching in Carlsbad for so many years. The chances of getting a job here were probably pretty small, but still. It might be possible.

  Walking through the rows of cars in the parking lot, I sensed movement somewhere behind me to the left. Before I could turn, I heard my name.

  “D’Angelo, what are you doing here?”

  I stopped. And turned. Detective Fitts was two rows back, maneuvering between the cars toward me. I waited for him to reach me before responding.

  “My friend Livy is putting on a play with the high school kids. She’s swamped at work right now and asked me to swing by here and pick up something from the drama assistant.”

  Fitts squinted at the front office. “Esther Bellows?”

  I nodded. It crossed my mind that if Livy was right—if whatever Esther wanted to show her did have to do with Fleming—then Fitts would want to know about it. I debated whether to share that with him, ultimately deciding to keep it to myself for the time being.

  “What are you doing here?” I asked.

  We walked through another row of cars toward the front office.

  “I need to talk to that Victor kid again. The one who left the three girls after finding Fleming.”

  Before I could ask why, the front office door opened, and the last person I wanted to see walked out.

  Dr. Stevens.

  What was he doing here?

  I gasped and scampered behind the car we just passed. As I crouched down to hide, Fitts called after me.

  “What the heck are you doing? Where’d you go?”

  Okay, I’d admit that my impulse to hide from my boss was juvenile. Completely immature.

  But in my defense, I didn’t like him.

  Two seconds later, I saw Fitts’ black shoes rounding the car. He stopped a couple feet away from me.

  “Seriously, D’Angelo?”

  “That’s my boss walking out of the office,” I hissed. “He hates me, and I don’t want to talk to him. Quick, which way is he going? Is he coming in our direction?”

  “No, he’s going to a different part of the parking lot.” Fitts let out a low whistle. “I never thought I’d see the day when you’d avoid talking to someone. You’re normally such a busybody.”

  “He really, really doesn’t like me,” I said. “And I really, really don’t want to talk to him.”

  Fitts was quiet for a moment. Then he said, “You’re in the clear. He’s gone.”

  I rose slowly, peeking over the car, just to make sure that Fitts wasn’t tricking me about where Stevens was.

  “Thanks,” I said, straightening up upon spotting Stevens on the other side of the parking lot.

  As Fitts and I resumed walking toward the front office, I mused, “I wonder what Stevens was doing here. I’m pretty sure he was an administrator here before coming to my school. Why would he come back?”

  “If you weren’t hiding, you could have asked,” Fitts said. He pulled open the front office door and motioned for me to walk through first. “Listen, D’Angelo. If this Esther lady has something I ought to see, let me know. Got it?”

  I nodded as I walked to the front desk where visitors signed in. No doubt, I’d absolutely hand over anything that Fitts ought to know about. I’d take tons of pictures from every angle first, but then I would hand it over.

  NINE

  The last time I came snooping around Temecula Hills, I slipped right by the front office staff because they were busy at the copy machine. This time, Fitts flashed his badge at the two women at the desk and told them he needed to speak with Victor Zapata. The women went flying in two directions—one probably off to page Victor and the other off to tell the principal that Fitts was here. That meant I could just sign in, grab a visitor’s badge, and slip through the office without explaining myself.

  It was either break time or passing period because there were students everywhere. Good. That made me look less conspicuous. I checked my texts from Livy as I walked across the high school campus. She had sent a message telling me where to find Esther: room three in the B Building.

  A line of familiar-looking girls were filing out of the room when I arrived. I recognized some of them from play practice yesterday. At the end of the line were Sophia and Ashlyn.

  “Jill! What are you doing here?” Sophia said when she saw me. She let the classroom door slam behind her and Ashlyn.

  “Oh, just swinging by to see Miss Bellows,” I said. “Is she your teacher?”

  The girls shook their heads.

  “We were dropping off our backpacks,” Ashlyn said. “We have P.E. next, and Miss Bellows lets a bunch of us leave our backpacks in here so we don’t have to shove them into the tiny locker room lockers.”

  Ah. That sounded familiar. Back when I coached soccer, my classroom was always full of girls’ soccer gear. Classrooms often doubled as storage areas.

  I smiled at the girls. “Have fun in P.E.,” I said.

  They both rolled their eyes at me, obviously not excited about the physical activity to come, and disappeared into the sea of students.

  I pulled open the door and realized I wasn’t in the school’s the
ater. It was a classroom. In fact, it looked a little like my classroom. There were posters of great writers on the walls. Instructions for an in-class assignment on To Kill a Mockingbird were neatly printed on the white board. And of course, a pile of backpacks belonging to students currently on their way to P.E. sat in a back corner.

  Esther was at the teacher’s desk in the otherwise empty room and looked up when I stepped inside. Her expression was fragile, like she was just seconds away from dissolving into sobs.

  “Hey Esther,” I said. I smiled, hoping to keep this visit easy and light. I didn’t want her falling apart while I was there. I didn’t want her falling apart at all. It was the middle of the school day, and the kids would need her at one hundred percent pretty soon. “Livy sent me over to pick up something from you.”

  But no such luck. The moment I mentioned Livy, Esther burst into tears.

  This couldn’t be good. I walked through a row of student desks toward her, fumbling with words in my mind, not knowing what to say. Asking if she was okay was silly—I knew she wasn’t okay. But asking what was wrong could open a can of worms, possibly just moments before kids came flooding in. I stopped at the student desk closest to hers, still awkwardly silent, just as she opened a drawer and spoke through sobs.

  “I think Livy and I are being threatened,” she said, pulling out two envelopes. “I found these on my car’s windshield this morning.” She handed the envelopes to me. On the outside of one were the initials E.B., which I assumed stood for Esther Bellows. On the other were the initials L.G.

  Livy Green.

  Each had already been opened. As I lifted the flap of the first, Esther continued.

  “I didn’t know what they were, and I opened both before it occurred to me that L.G. could have meant Livy. It wasn’t until I read both that I began putting it all together. Between the notes written in the girls’ scripts yesterday and this,” she paused to let out a sob, “I think we’re in trouble.”

  Inside each envelope was a three-by-five notecard. The writing on the notecards didn’t match the writing on the girls’ scripts. The scripts had blocky lettering on them, but this lettering was tiny, tight, swirly, and slightly unsteady. To me, it had the distinct look of someone trying to disguise handwriting—like a kid forging a note to get out of a school activity.

  The card inside L.G.’s envelope said, You juggler, you canker-blossom, you thief of love. The other said, I am sick when I do look on thee.

  I held up the first card and looked at Esther. “This one about the canker-blossom is a line from A Midsummer Night’s Dream.” The word canker-blossom immediately rang a bell. It was such a peculiar word. I held up the other. “What’s this one from? The one about being sick?” That one didn’t ring a bell. It was definitely Shakespeare, but it was too generic for me to place off the top of my head.

  “Also A Midsummer Night’s Dream,” Esther said. She grabbed a tissue from the box on her desk and dabbed her eyes. “Why is someone writing lines from Shakespeare and leaving them for people working on the spring play?”

  I didn’t have an answer.

  “This is probably nothing,” I said, staring at the blue writing on each card. “Maybe sour grapes? Did anyone get cut from the play or not get a role they really wanted? Maybe someone just wants to shake you up. Or see if they can get a reaction out of you.”

  The theory sounded ridiculous as it came out of my mouth. Kids didn’t quote Shakespeare to mess with people. What kind of teenager did that? But it was all I could come up with.

  She nodded. “You’re probably right. Just a kid messing with us.”

  “Plus,” I added, holding up the cards. “These aren’t threats, technically. Just insults.”

  I didn’t know how that was supposed to make anyone feel better. Renaissance threats or Renaissance insults—what did it matter? It was all upsetting.

  “Detective Fitts is here right now,” I said. “We should take these to him, just in case.” I placed the cards on a student desk and snapped a couple pictures with my phone. Replacing them in their envelopes, I said, “Do you have time to come to the front office with me?”

  Just then the bell rang. Esther pursed her lips before answering. “Sorry, break just ended. My next English class is about to come in.”

  “Oh, English?” I said. So I had been correct that I was not standing in a drama classroom.

  “Yes. Mr. Fleming taught two periods of English and three periods of drama. I’ve taken all his classes since he disappeared.”

  I nodded. “I’ll get these to the detective.” I held up the envelopes and tried to smile reassuringly. “I bet everything is fine. It’s probably nothing, really. Are you going to be okay?”

  Esther forced a smile and nodded. She dabbed her eyes again and took a deep breath.

  As I turned to leave, a student swung open the door with a bit too much force and schlepped through, slightly hunched over from the weight of books in his backpack. He was so short—he must have been in ninth or tenth grade. I’d been teaching eleventh and twelfth graders all year and had become accustomed to their size. I missed the kids who were shorter than me. The stories they were required to read like Romeo and Juliet were pretty depressing, but the kids themselves were always fun to teach.

  I exited the classroom. On my way to the front office, I texted Fitts.

  I have something for you, I wrote. Are you still in the office?

  He wrote back, Yes. Will meet you by the front desk.

  When I got to the office, Fitts was right where he said he would be. The two women behind the desk eyed me, but Fitts didn’t give them a chance to ask what I was doing there.

  “C’mon, we’re going to try something,” he said. He tilted his head toward a closed door behind him and then walked toward it.

  I followed him, halfway expecting the women at the front desk to object. Luckily, they didn’t.

  “What’s going on?” he asked, stopping just outside the door.

  I recounted everything that Esther had told me and handed over the Shakespeare insults. Fitts studied the envelopes before dropping them to his side. When I finished my story, he shook his head.

  “I don’t like this at all.” He pursed his lips, thinking. “Okay, we’ll deal with this Shakespeare stuff later. Right now, we’ve got another issue. Victor isn’t being cooperative. Are you good with kids? Being a teacher and all? How’s your good cop, bad cop routine?”

  “I’m a great good cop.”

  “I have to be the good cop,” Fitts said. “I need him to trust me and tell me what’s going on.”

  “I’ve never been the bad cop, but I can try.” I pointed to the envelopes in Fitts’ hand. “Can I use these as a launching point?”

  “Sure.” Fitts shrugged.

  “Can I be dramatic? I always wanted to be an actress.”

  That might not have been entirely true, but in that very moment, the idea of being the bad cop was taking over my imagination.

  “No,” Fitts said.

  “Just a little bit? Just to startle him?”

  “Okay, just a little.”

  I held out my hand to take back the envelopes. He passed them over and then reached for the doorknob. Before he could push the door open, I did—and I barreled through like a woman on a mission.

  Victor sat at the desk looking bored. I couldn’t tell if we were in a counselor’s office or an administrator’s office, and there wasn’t time to observe the bookcases and awards on the walls to make that determination. I was a woman on a mission.

  Victor’s eyes flicked to me immediately.

  “What the hell, Victor?” I said, striding across the office and slamming the envelopes down on the desk. “Why are you insulting my friend? Livy’s doing everything she can to help you put on this play. And this is how you repay her? Who do you think you are?”

  Fitts stepped inside the office and closed the door behind him. In a quiet voice, he said, “Jill, that’s not helping. Calm down.”

&n
bsp; I wasn’t sure if he really meant it or if he was acting, but I was already on a roll, so I was going to assume that Fitts was acting. If he really wanted me to stop, he’d push me out of the office. It wouldn’t be the first time he pushed me out of the way. Literally.

  “I will not calm down,” I said, whirling first to Fitts and then back to Victor. “Seriously, dude, tell me just who you think you are!”

  Victor looked at the envelopes on the table. With his eyes still cast down, he said, “What are those?”

  “Don’t pretend. You know exactly what they are. They’re insults from A Midsummer Night’s Dream that you wrote down to scare Esther and Livy. Why would you do that? What are you trying to hide?”

  “Jill, he’s just a kid,” Fitts said. “Do you really think he’d use Shakespeare insults to scare off Miss Bellows and your friend?”

  “Why wouldn’t he?” I spat. “I mean, he ran off the night that Mr. Fleming was found. He totally left the girls to deal with the situation.” I placed both hands on the desk and leaned on them, just as I had seen television investigators do a thousand times. I narrowed my eyes at Victor. “Why are you hiding behind three girls who’re younger than you? And what would possess you to hide behind Shakespeare quotes? Ex. Plain. Now.”

  Victor’s expression hadn’t changed throughout my rampage—not one twitch of a change.

  Dang. I thought I was killing this bad cop thing. Maybe I needed to pour it on a little thicker.

  I straightened up again, crossed my arms, and started pacing. “Oh, and don’t get me started on the curse that was written in the girls’ scripts. You thought that would be funny, right? How dare you. How—”

  I felt a hand on my shoulder. Not so gently, it was turning me around and guiding me to the door.

  “Jill, I think that’s enough,” Fitts said. Still firmly holding my shoulder with one hand, he opened the door with his other. With one solid push, I was outside the office. I stepped over to the wall right next to the door and smiled.

  “Hey, I was pretty good, huh?” I whispered. “That was fun. Can I do it again sometime?”