The Kill Club

by Wendy Heard

  The phone is a venomous snake in my hand. I bring it slowly to my ear. “What did you say?”

  “We’ve done our research, Jasmine. We know he’s your son.”

  I set my mug down with a clunk. “How?”

  “I saw the paperwork. It looks like you gave him up without a fight.”

  “Fuck you!” I cry. “What the fuck do you know?”

  “I know a lot, Jazz. I know your biggest fear is to be like your biological mother, and yet here you are, not living with Joaquin, not taking care of him, his life at the mercy of DCFS. How are you so different from her after all? How is his life any better than your own?”

  The words slice and burn their way through me. I feel the phone drop from my hand. I press my face into my palms, dry sobs choked behind my teeth. How do they know all this? Who are they? I’m so scared, my chest gritty like my heart has been ground up into pieces.

  I wish I had been smarter, stronger for Joaquin. When he was born, I was only fifteen. DCFS said it would be best if they placed him in foster care with Carol so we could stay together, so I signed the paper. But then Carol said she’d kick me out if I didn’t let her adopt him—she’d always dreamed of having a baby of her own. I would have done anything to stay in the same house with Joaquin, sign any paper, and without even realizing it, I signed my life away.

  I pull myself together. I have to think straight. I pick the phone up. “Are you still there?”

  “Still here.” The voice is patient and warm. “I’m so sorry to say those things, Jazz, but sometimes we have to be cruel to be kind. I can’t watch another child die at the hands of someone like Carol. She won’t do a day in prison. You know that, don’t you? Not a single day. After he’s dead, she’ll say she followed the advice of her church, and the law protects parents whose children die this way.”

  I press my hand to my mouth so I won’t cry out loud.

  “So are you ready? Shall we get to work?” they ask gently.

  I remember what they called it: a permanent solution. Are they some sort of hit-man service? They find out all this personal information about you and then blackmail you into doing something illegal? What’s next—will they record me agreeing to hire them and then I’ll go to jail for the rest of my life? Fat lot of good I’m going to do Joaquin behind bars.

  I snap the phone shut.

  It stays silent for a minute, and then it starts buzzing again.

  I grab my keys off the table. I take the phone outside and, barefoot, walk it down the street to the storm gutter. I crouch down and throw it between the grates into the cavern where the raccoons and rats live, down into the sludge where no one can reach it. I hear it plop into the muck, and for a moment I want to get it back, but I can’t. It’s gone.

  12

  SOFIA

  SOFIA OPENS HER mouth to interrupt Anahit’s quiet reading of the documents, and then she restrains herself; she must be calm and collected. She must be taken seriously. She brushes a speck of lint off the knee of her slacks and straightens the seam of her shirtsleeve.

  At last, Anahit pushes the stack of paperwork aside and folds her hands on the glossy mahogany desk. Sofia meets the brown eyes and wonders how old this woman is. Forty-five, perhaps, but the Botox makes guessing harder. Through the window behind Anahit, the hills of Encino glow orange in the late afternoon light. The sky is clear, the smoky haze swept away like it never existed.

  Anahit retrieves a heavy-looking gold pen and pulls a legal pad toward her. “I see you attempted to get restraining orders a number of times. Were you ever successful?” Her voice is lightly accented, the syllables soft and round.

  Sofia shakes her head. “They said he needed to explicitly threaten me.”

  “And he didn’t?”

  “He was always hurting me. I thought that was enough.” Sofia’s voice is bitter.

  “When you say ‘hurting,’ what do you mean?”

  It’s shameful and painful to say the things out loud. “He’d grab me. Push me. Slap me.”

  “Were you ever hospitalized?”

  “No.”

  Anahit makes a note on her legal pad. “When you were married, did you report the abuse?”

  “No.” Sofia forces herself to maintain eye contact. Her body is vibrating with shame.

  “Why not?” Anahit’s eyes feel judgmental, and Sofia has to look away, out the window at the view of the hills.

  “I was embarrassed and afraid,” she says at last.

  Anahit flips through the papers again. “Help me understand what I’m seeing here. Are you an alcoholic?”

  Sofia grips the carved wood arms of the chair she occupies. “I’m not. That was something Charles invented for court.”

  Scribbling. Face averted. “But he had witnesses corroborate that you had a habit of drinking when your daughter was with you. Is that not what happened?”

  “No, it isn’t. I never have more than a glass of wine when I have Olive. Those witnesses were his buddies. They just said what he told them to say.” She prays the truth shines clear in her voice, silently begs Anahit to intuit the authenticity of her words.

  Anahit frowns. “You didn’t bring witnesses of your own to testify on your behalf? Couldn’t you have asked your own friends to rebut his claims?”

  This hurts, a spike through her stomach. “No,” Sofia says. “He sent all our friends those photos. Said they happened while we were married, that I was cheating on him. All our friends...they were really all his friends. I wasn’t allowed to make friends he didn’t approve. The ones I had before we got married were a ‘bad influence.’” She does air quotes. “I haven’t spoken to any of my college friends since Charles and I started dating.”

  When Anahit gets to the envelope with the photographs, Sofia holds out a hand. “Please don’t look at those. There’s no need.”

  Anahit sits back. “So let me make sure I understand. You fired your lawyer because of the outcome of this case.” She gestures to the stacks of paperwork on her desk.

  “Yes.”

  “Your ex-husband, Charles, is a family law attorney? In Los Angeles?”

  “His office is in Woodland Hills, yes.”

  “And he hired a private investigator to follow you to prove you weren’t properly caring for your daughter. The PI provided photographic evidence of, um...” She clears her throat. “Sexual activity, and evidence that you were living...”

  “A wild, promiscuous lifestyle,” Sofia finishes. “It was crap. None of those photos were taken when I had Olive. They were all taken on Charles’s weekends.”

  “And there was evidence of chronic alcoholism, and prescription drug abuse.”

  Sofia’s heart pumps harder. “I’ve never even heard of those drugs he mentioned in court.”

  “So the judge said, what? You should test yourself with the Breathalyzer every day, get drug tested weekly? Take parenting classes? And then you can get some visitation back after six months or so? That seems reasonable. Perhaps we can discuss a visitation schedule you’d be happy with.”

  Anger cracks like a whip. “I hold two master’s degrees, one in early childhood education and one in educational administration. I am a good mother. I don’t need parenting classes. I was never promiscuous. I slept with three people while I was separated, over a period of six months. Does that sound promiscuous to you?” Anahit drops her eyes to her own wedding ring and doesn’t answer. Sofia contemplates the averted face. “Let me ask you a question, Anahit. How many partners would be appropriate for a woman in my situation? Since three is obviously too many.” Underneath the forced calm, her voice is tight.

  “I don’t believe that’s for me to say.”

  “Just say what you think. How many? Two? One?”

  Anahit sighs heavily. “Well, if you’re in the middle of a contentious divorce with an ex-husband who has the resource
s to create problems—”

  “How many?”

  “If you were my client then, I’d have advised you to abstain from dating until after the divorce was finalized. Until after we were done in court.”

  “So zero. I should have slept with zero people.”

  Anahit shrugs.

  “Do you think Charles’s lawyer would tell him the same thing? That he should go a year or two without sex so it doesn’t make him look slutty in court?”

  “I’m not able to speak to that.”

  Fury and rage sweep through Sofia’s intestines, hot enough to burn her alive. She wants to scream like an animal, throw all these papers in Anahit’s face, trash this office, beat Anahit into a bloody pulp. She wants to torch it all, burn this building to the fucking ground.

  And then she realizes.

  This is a farce. She’s been fooling herself.

  She’s wasted enough time and money on Charles. She doesn’t want to expend another minute on this rigged game.

  Maybe that’s why she came here. She needed to know she was finished before she does something she can’t take back. She doesn’t just want justice.

  She wants revenge.

  13

  JAZZ

  I GET UP and approach the DCFS reception counter. My butt is sore from the plastic chair I’ve been in for the last two hours. I fix my bangs, straightening them so they cover the Band-Aid that hides my stitches. I wait behind a girl with a baby on her hip, and finally the woman at the counter beckons me forward.

  “I’ve been waiting for two hours,” I tell the receptionist, a middle-aged lady with gray roots.

  “Name?”

  “Jasmine Benavides.”

  She types it into her computer. “There are three people ahead of you. Is there anything else I can help you with?” This means I need to sit down and shut up.

  I hesitate; I don’t want to piss her off. “I’m sorry. I know you’re busy. But my brother needs someone to go check on him. He’s not getting his insulin. It’s—”

  She holds a hand up. “Ma’am. I am not a social worker. You do not need to give me this information. When you get called, you can tell the social worker all of this.” She looks behind me at the line. “Next, please.”

  I return to my seat. It’s like the DMV in here, but everyone looks nervous and alone, especially the women surrounded by children.

  The last time I was here, I came in with a black eye and my arm in a cast to beg them to give me my parental rights back. I got a big fat no on that one. I should have reported Carol much earlier, when the ink wasn’t so dry on all the paperwork. By the time I was nineteen, I had a string of offenses on my record starting in middle school. Carol was a nice, sweet, unassuming foster mom. Looking at the two of us, I don’t know if I’d have believed me, either.

  Before Joaquin came along, it was always slaps in the face and evenings in my room without dinner, which was nothing compared to the shit I saw in other foster homes. But when Joaquin came and Carol claimed him as hers, having me around seemed to drive her into rages of increasing intensity. It infuriated her to see me with Joaquin, to see the bond we shared, the similarities between us. She hated to let me hold him, to let me feed him. One night when I was sixteen, she caught me curled up next to him in his crib, sleeping with his little body nestled against mine, and that was the first time she lost it and I ended up with a broken collarbone. She said if I reported her, she’d send me to a different foster home and I’d lose Joaquin forever.

  Now I think she was bluffing. I should have told DCFS everything. I should have begged on the street, sold my body, anything to get enough money for a lawyer. I might have still had a chance back then.

  But then the first time turned into the third time, which turned into the fifth time, and then I was throwing Joaquin in my car and crossing state lines, and any chances I ever had to get him back from her were gone.

  My iPhone buzzes, and I pull it out. It’s Andre, wanting to know if I’m coming to rehearsal.

  I reply, Probably not, but I will if I can. Working on some family stuff.

  We have a show coming up, don’t forget, he says, and I scowl at the screen.

  “Jasmine Benavides?” a voice calls. I snap my head up. A grandmotherly woman is scanning the crowded room.

  I stand, nervous, and raise a hand.

  * * *

  An hour later finds me slamming out of the glass door onto the sidewalk. My chest heaves unevenly. I think I’m having a panic attack. I have to get away from this looming tower of oppression. I turn my feet toward the street and walk so fast I’m almost running.

  I fumble my keys out of my purse and shove one of them into the door of my truck, and then I hop in. I pull the door shut behind me, and I’m safe in a hot little cocoon that smells like cherry air freshener and old leather seats. I turn on the engine, crank the A/C, and sit staring out the window at the packed sidewalks and colorful restaurants of Koreatown. I feel like people can see me in here. I don’t like it.

  I lie down sideways on the bench seat and pull my knees up to my nose. I wrap my arms around my legs and lace my fingers together, which always makes me feel calm, like an orphaned baby elephant holding on to its own tail.

  In the darkness against my knees, I breathe.

  The grandmotherly social worker had taken my report and then closed the folder. She said they already sent a social worker to see Joaquin, and he was perfectly healthy. His doctor confirmed his prescription had been picked up, and he isn’t due for a checkup for four more months, so everything is in order. She doesn’t have an army of social workers to do daily checks on kids when everything looks fine.

  “I picked the prescription up,” I cried, pounding a fist to my own chest. “I did. She won’t give it to him.”

  “Where is the medication now?”

  “At Carol’s house. But—”

  “That’s good, then! So he has his insulin, and I’ll keep my eyes on this. We’ll let you know if we need anything else from you.”

  Why am I surprised? Why had I thought it would be any different this time?

  Eventually I sit up. I feel dirty with emotion. I slap myself in the face, hard. My cheek bristles.

  Better. Again, with the other hand this time. It stings, but now I’m back in the present.

  Cheeks burning, I turn the car on. Fine, then. If DCFS won’t check on Joaquin, I’ll do it. I’ll go there every goddamn day.

  * * *

  Carol’s house is dark. Even though it’s dusk and the palm trees are fading into black silhouettes against the purple sky, the windows show not a hint of light. In the median strip in front of her house, a pair of abandoned shopping carts lean into each other like drunk girls leaving a club.

  I frown at the house for a moment, and then I cross the street, march right up to the metal front screen door and bang on it. I pound and pound with my fist, but nothing happens except the neighbors’ dogs start barking.

  My eyes land on the rusty mailbox, which is attached crookedly to the porch railing. It’s overflowing with mail and catalogs.

  That’s weird. Carol is super paranoid about identity thieves—why, I don’t know; she has a net worth of, like, four dollars—and she collects the mail the moment it arrives, which is always around ten o’clock in the morning.

  Hmm.

  If it were Sunday, I’d say they could be at church, but her church is too small to have midweek services; it’s a one-room schoolhouse type of place. I know she’s not going to a new church because Joaquin specifically told me “she’s back at that snake charmer church,” the little church in the row of warehouses near his old elementary school.

  I step off the porch and make my way around the house. The ladder is still here, leaning against the back wall. I bang on the back door. Nothing.

  I push the ladder back up to the vent, whi
ch is still open and probably will be forever until I close it. I climb up and topple into the attic, coating my clothes in dusty rat shit. I don’t even try to be quiet. I tromp straight to the trapdoor, release it and jump down to the hallway with a crash. The house is dark, silent and stale.

  “Hello?” I yell.

  Nothing.

  My heart stutters as I imagine dead bodies and cults and murder-suicides and victims of poisoning. I cross the hall and push through the door into Joaquin’s room.

  At first glance, it looks normal. Messy. I switch on the overhead light. My black backpack is still crumpled into a pile on the floor. I squat down and open it. The white CVS bag is gone.

  That’s good, right? That means he took the insulin with him wherever he went.

  The dresser drawers are partway open. I pull one open all the way, and then my chest freezes.

  It’s almost empty.

  I pull open drawer after drawer. Underwear, almost all gone but for a few old pairs. Socks, only a handful of mismatched, holey black ones left at the bottom. All his favorite T-shirts are gone, leaving only the ones he hates—the school T-shirts they make them wear for spirit day, the dorky polo shirt Carol bought him for church.

  I leave his room and hurry down the hallway toward Carol’s room. I flick the light on.

  The drawers are like Joaquin’s: ajar and pretty much empty, her favorite shirts gone, most of the underwear and jeans cleaned out.

  I check the tiny en suite bathroom that adjoins Carol’s room. I open the medicine cabinet. The toothbrush is gone.

  A white bag is crumpled on the floor by the toilet. I kneel down and pick it up. It’s the CVS bag, Joaquin’s prescription label stapled onto the side. On the floor are little piles of shattered glass—the insulin bottles, violently crushed, their silver caps bent and scattered. My eyes travel to a pair of Carol’s ancient sneakers that lie nearby. I pick one up. Glass shards are embedded in the thinning rubber sole. I flip the shoe over and see blood inside. She cut her foot. That’s how hard she stomped on the insulin vials.