The voice was altered, so it could be anybody, even the cheerleaders. But it wouldn’t be them, since, one, they were part of the athletic department and, two, they were more mature than that. In every way.
Ten minutes later, he was still thinking about the maturity of the cheerleaders when his phone buzzed, no number showing up in the caller ID.
There was only one way to play it now. He had to keep his cool, act like he was in on the joke, that he found it sorta funny in an old-school kind of way, like watching Teletubbies at a keg party. The prank would fizzle out, and the calls would stop. And then he’d find out who was behind them and get his revenge. He swiped on his phone.
“Hey, stranger. I was hoping you’d call back.”
There was a long, static-filled pause that made Eric smile. “What’s the matter, lose your voice? I’m not surprised—you’ve been sounding a little hoarse. Try some tea with honey.”
“I have something you want.”
“A new car? A million dollars? I’d take either one.”
A deep breath, then the voice hissed. “It’s something you’ll want returned.”
Eric was ready with a comeback when it sank in, the smile melting off his face as he remembered the email and the picture of his room. He jumped up and flicked on a second light, his eyes racing over his desk, the shelves, looking for a gap, a space that shouldn’t be there. He pulled out his wallet. Driver’s license, school ID, pictures—nothing missing. He jerked open the top drawer of his desk and saw the cards April had given him, the pictures from the sophomore dance, the Dairy Queen gift card his aunt had sent him, his grandfather’s dog tags, some movie ticket stubs, an old lighter. He squeezed the phone as he gritted his teeth, the whole stay-cool plan burned away. “What did you take?”
“I didn’t take anything,” the caller said, confidence back in the artificial voice. “You took it.”
“I took it? I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about. You’re the one that broke into my—”
He jumped at three quick knocks on the door. “Eric? Everything okay?”
Phone against his leg, he took a deep, steadying breath. “Yeah, Mom, I’m fine. Just, uh . . . just on the phone is all.”
“Okay, well, hold it down,” his mother said, then, from down the hall, adding, “and make it quick. It’s a school night.”
“All right, I’m almost done,” Eric shouted back. He put the phone to his ear, expecting the line to be dead, but the wispy static was still there. Enough of this, he thought.
“Don’t call me again,” he said. “If you do, I’m calling the cops. I have proof that you broke into my house—”
“You’re forgetting something,” the caller said.
“Yeah? Like what?”
The static dropped out, making the whispered words loud and clear. “I know your secret.”
Eric laughed. “Oh that. Isn’t that a line from Scary Movie 3? You could at least try to be original. Bye-bye, asshole,” he said, his thumb swiping over to end the call, but not before hearing one last raspy line.
“Check your email.”
Eric stuffed the phone in his pocket and went down to the kitchen, grabbed a stack of Oreos and a glass of milk, then sat in front of the TV in the living room and pretended to care about the Monday Night Football pregame show. He held out until the end of the first quarter before heading up to his room, shutting the door, and powering up his iPad.
There were four new messages. One from a skateboard company, one from the Armed Forces Recruitment Center, one from Fandango, and one from an unknown sender at an EarthLink account. With two quick taps he trashed the message.
A minute later, he sent it back to the inbox and clicked it open.
The picture popped up, and Eric gasped, stumbling backwards, his hands numb, his legs shaking, as he collapsed on his bed, the iPad thumping onto the floor.
He looked again, but the picture was still there.
“Oh, shit,” he said, no one there to see the color drain from his face.
Three
SHELLY MEYER PULLED HER HAIR BACK BEHIND HER head, scrunching it up, holding it in place with her right hand, using her left to balance as she leaned over and puked into the sink.
Tried to, anyway.
The way her stomach had been acting—the noises, the rolling, the acid burn creeping up her throat—throwing up should have been easy. But no, it wasn’t happening. It wasn’t that kind of sick.
Someone knew.
Who it was and how they had found out she didn’t know.
Yet.
But someone knew. And she had to find them.
She ran the water in the sink, cupping her hands under the faucet, letting the cold wash over her fingers till they were numb. She lowered her face into her hands. Water trickled along the curve of her neck, disappearing down the front of her white cotton shirt. It was good, and for a moment she allowed herself to relax. And then it was time.
She looked at her reflection in the polished metal mirror.
Black eyeliner, thicker than she’d worn it in middle school.
Blue-black lipstick, fainter than she liked, but darker than the dress code allowed.
Coal black hair, straight from the bottle, the more unmanageable the longer it got.
Crazy goth chick cliché in a Catholic-school uniform, the whole look still a bit foreign.
She wiped a paper towel across her face, slung her backpack over her shoulder, and walked out of the third-floor bathroom, looking for her victim.
Classes had been over for an hour, and the only students left were out on the fields or down in the locker room. There were a few straggler teachers, but they wouldn’t be a problem. She’d only been at the school for three weeks, but by then it was obvious that the teachers who stuck around after the last bell were in no rush to get home. Nonna Lucia would have called them “ladies of a certain age and standing,” meaning over fifty and divorced. With cats. There were two male teachers at the school, and both of them could have fit in with that crowd if they didn’t bolt out faster than the students. The ones who did stay usually clustered around the librarian’s tiny office, eating grocery-store pastries and drinking instant cappuccinos. They were okay teachers, she guessed, entertaining and not too demanding, but none of them seemed like the kind you could talk to, not like Ms. Moothry or Mr. Becker. But that was another school and another life.
Shelly rounded the corner near the bio lab. The hall was empty.
Heather Herman: 72 Facebook friends, 0 in common. Likes Katy Perry, The Walking Dead, The Slayer Chronicles, American Idol, Women’s Premier Soccer League, Vancouver, and Moonlight Creamery double-chocolate fudge.
There was no place on Facebook to list the things she hated, but if there was, Shelly figured she’d be on it by now.
Down the west stairs, past the chapel and the room where Mrs. Holland tried to teach religion, the lessons always turning into class discussions about current events and “teen issues,” Catholic-school code for sex and drugs. There were the occasional Bible references, but Shelly knew them better than Mrs. Holland did—she’d even corrected Father Caudillo a couple of times when they’d talk after mass, him half joking about her one day becoming a priest.
But that had been before everything had gone wrong.
Shelly thumbed the metal button on the drinking fountain and swirled the warm water around her dry mouth. She spit it out and did it a second time, then started down the stairwell to the first floor and the side exit.
She knew how it would play out, how it had to go, and she could guess what would happen later.
Maybe not tomorrow, but soon.
There’d be the call to the principal’s office, a visit to the counselor, then a meeting with her father—good luck with that—then the psychiatrist, maybe a scared-straight talking-to by a priest or a cop or an attorney, a couple of days’ suspension, a week or two in detention, some mention about her Permanent Record, lots of strange looks and whispered comm
ents from students and teachers, social isolation through June, and eventually, somewhere late in her senior year, a grudging acceptance back into the fold as her classmates focused on the phony nostalgia that was required near graduation.
If it didn’t play out that way, if she didn’t do all the stupid things the caller told her to do, didn’t obey that mystery voice that knew her secret? She knew what that would be like too.
She paused at the bottom of the stairs, breathing in slow, then out slower, finding her focus, her game face, her thumbnail biting into the side of her finger, an old habit that explained the thin, curved scars.
That’s when she saw her.
Locker open, books stacked on the floor, her back to the stairwell.
Just get it over with, Shelly thought, then moved without thinking, slipping into the hallway, letting the door close slow and soft behind her. It was too late to run, too late to get help, too late for both of them.
Shelly drew in one last deep breath, gritted her teeth, and smiled.
“There you are, Heather.”
The girl jumped and spun around, her purse spilling open, the plastic case of her phone shattering as it hit the tile floor.
It didn’t take long.
Less than a minute.
The girl standing still, eyes wide, too scared to move.
Like the last time.
Shelly trying to get it all out in one go, knowing she couldn’t start it back up if she stopped, knowing that there was worse to come.
They were just words, she had told herself. No one gets hurt from words these days. She knew the truth but held on to the lie, the only way to get through it.
And then it was over, the girl’s sobs fading in the distance, Shelly pushing the crash bar on the exit, stepping out into the blinding afternoon sun.
Four
THE HOUSE WAS EMPTY, BUT THEN, IT USUALLY WAS.
Shelly locked the door behind her, dropping her backpack on the floor by the kitchen table. There was a note from her father on the counter. She didn’t have to read it, since she knew it would only be a variation of the same note he left every day. He’d start with an obligatory reminder about doing homework, then instructions on heating up whatever was in the fridge, the standard permission to order a pizza if that’s what she wanted, a line about doing the dishes or the laundry or running the vacuum, and a final bit about not bothering to wait up for him, signing it “Jeff,” or “J,” or not signing it at all.
It was the same note he had left her every day since she had moved in.
Her father was at work by the time school let out, and got home an hour after she had gone to bed. The B shift paid more, and the overtime was too good to pass up. At least, that’s what he told her.
In the bathroom, she washed off what was left of her makeup and brushed her teeth for the tenth time that day, the sour milk taste refusing to go away. She undressed and stepped into the shower, adjusting the temperature up as hot as she could take it. She stood there under the spray for twenty minutes, the hot water turning warm, then cool, then cold. Her teeth chattered between blue lips as she dried off. She put on a pair of sweats and wrapped her hair in a towel.
A week ago, she would have blasted some music—something scary, pounding, fast and loud—poured a glass of sweet tea, lit a few candles, and gotten her homework out of the way before crashing on the couch for a few sitcoms, then gone up to her room, where she would have read until she fell asleep. Now she sat curled up on the floor by the couch, backpack unopened, TV off, all the lights on, waiting for the phone to ring.
Her old friends—the few she had—had disappeared before she moved, and frankly, she couldn’t blame them.
They knew.
Even if they had her new phone number—and no one from that life did—they wouldn’t use it.
So no calls from them.
The friends she was this close to making—the ones who only saw her as the new girl in school, the ones who liked to sit with her in French class or hang out in the cafeteria or talk about music, the ones who made her laugh and forget—they would have texted, since that’s how she got in touch with them. That, and nobody called anybody anymore.
So when the first call came almost a week ago, she had assumed it was a wrong number. Why else would her phone ring?
It had been hard to hear through the pops and hiss of static, and after she had heard her name, she had to concentrate to make out what the shrill, high-pitched voice had said.
She knew as she heard them what the words had meant. And what they meant for the new life she was starting.
Was the call really only five days ago? It felt like forever.
After an hour of sitting motionless on the floor, thinking, planning, she went back into the kitchen. Her head was pounding. The Tylenols she had dry-swallowed on the walk home had done nothing. Her stomach growled, and while the thought of food made her sick, she hoped eating something would help. She made a slice of dry toast, then a second, this one with butter and strawberry preserves, then she scrambled an egg and poured a glass of skim milk, adding in a squeeze of chocolate syrup. It wasn’t a lot, but it was more than she’d eaten at one time in days.
Back on the floor, plate balanced on her knees, she tried to think about anything but school or Heather or the caller and the stupid tasks, and when she sensed her mind drifting back to her old life and that night, and the nights and days that had come after, she turned on the television, jacked the volume, and forced herself into a Two and a Half Men marathon.
The credits were rolling at the end of show number eight when her phone rang.
She let it ring a few times, then answered, knowing who’d be there.
“Three tasks down,” the caller said. “One to go. Then the big finish next week.”
Shelly stuck to her plan, not saying anything at first, letting the static-filled silence build. “How do I know you’ll keep your end of it?”
“I guess you don’t,” the caller said, and even through all the audio effects Shelly could hear the laugh in the voice.
“So why should I bother?”
“Because if you don’t, you know what I’ll do.”
There was another long pause, then Shelly said, “I’ll do it one more time, but I can’t do the last thing.”
“That’s the best part. And you don’t have a choice.”
“I don’t have a video camera.”
“Use your phone, stupid.”
“It’s an old phone. It doesn’t have video.”
“That’s your problem.”
“Even if it did, I can’t hold a phone and do it at the same time.”
“Then ask a friend to help.”
“I don’t have any friends. But you probably knew that already.”
“All I know,” the caller said, “is that if you don’t do the video next Thursday, everyone finds out your secret.”
Shelly took a deep breath, pushing down the rising panic. “I told you I’d do what you wanted, and I’m doing it, okay? But I don’t know how I’m supposed to get the video. And even if I get it, I don’t know how to do the rest. I’m not good with computers. If I could, if I had a decent phone and I knew how, believe me, I’d do it. But I can’t, so you’ll just have to come up with something else.”
The static was gone and so was the caller.
Shelly hit last-call return and got the same recording as last time, telling her that the phone feature she wanted was not available with her cheap-ass plan. She clicked the phone shut and waited for the stomach cramps to start, but after ten minutes she still felt fine, and after another fifteen she noticed she was hungry again.
Hungry and pissed.
She’d come too far, endured too much.
And she wasn’t going back.
Shelly nuked a bowl of ramen noodles and thought about Heather Herman. She was probably an okay person, friendly, fun to be around in her own mousy way. She liked The Walking Dead, so she couldn’t be that bad. Maybe if things had b
een different, they could have been friends. A lot different, yeah, and maybe not friends, but not this. Heather was in the Drama Club, and Shelly always got along with the artsy types, mostly stoners, but still. The soccer thing she didn’t get, and they definitely had different music tastes, but Heather was right about the double-chocolate fudge at Moonlight Creamery. Crack on a waffle cone.
It was the way she just stood there and took it, looking up at Shelly with those baby blue eyes and that trembling lower lip, the tears and the snot, letting some unknown transfer tenth-grader tear into her like that. It would be so much easier if Heather took a swing at her or kicked her or something. Especially since it was all bullshit anyway. Come on, a girl like Heather a slut? Yeah, right.
The microwave beeped, and Shelly ripped the rest of the lid off the plastic bowl. She stirred the steaming noodles with the chopsticks she had saved from the sushi place and mixed in a long splash of soy sauce. She knew she wouldn’t finish it all, but it was what she wanted, and besides, there wasn’t much these days that she wanted that she was likely to get.
Why just stand there? Why not do something? Anything. If this girl wasn’t going to hit her, she could at least scream. That would get noticed. The more Shelly thought about it, the more she realized how easy Heather had it. She got to see the person who was talking shit about her, got to hear it, face to face, not whispered behind her back or finding it written on her locker. And she didn’t have to wonder who it was who called her names from across the crowded lunchroom or who left her notes inside her backpack. Shelly could only guess what it would be like to be on the receiving end of what she was doing to Heather, but she knew whatever it was like, it had to be easier than the way the world had treated her when they found out what she had done.
She also knew it would only be a matter of time before Heather broke down and told A Concerned Adult like the posters said to do, and she’d be busted and that would be the end of it.
Cold Calls Page 2