Never Missing, Never Found

by Amanda Panitch

  I soften, just slightly. “Good. Because I didn’t do it. I would never do it. Melody thinks Katharina was lying too. And they’re friends.” The fact of Katharina’s disappearance hangs heavy in the air. “Well, they were. I don’t know about…now.”

  He clears his throat, then blinks and runs his hand over his face. “Yeah,” he says. I’ve gone and made things more awkward than they already were. I can’t even believe that’s possible. I’m the champion of awkwardness. “Well, I just wanted to tell you that.”

  That strikes me as a funny thing to say. I laugh, and my laugh holds a tinge of hysteria. Probably not the best thing at this moment, when I want to look calm and cool and collected and definitively not crazy, but it spills out of me anyway. I can’t stop. “I don’t care what you think of me,” I lie.

  “I care what you think of me.” Connor sounds genuinely wounded. I wish he were genuinely wounded. It would give me an excuse to rush over, to run my hands over his freckles in examination of whatever force tore them apart. “Scarlett…”

  He looks at me, and inside I curse as I realize I’m caught up in the thrall of those half-golden eyes. My whole body tingles with the effort it takes not to touch him, to kiss him, to grind his belt buckle deep into the skin of my belly. “Don’t,” I say, tearing my eyes away, looking at the floor, the counter, anywhere but at him.

  He doesn’t say anything else, and I shift. “I really want to go home,” I say. “Cady’s probably looking for you anyway.”

  His hands, moving toward the cash drawer, stop when I say his ex’s name. “Cady’s furious with me,” he says. “She’s not looking for me.”

  I have to bite my tongue to keep from saying, Good. My body tingles harder; I cough to try to shake it out of me. “My register?”

  He coughs back, like we’re speaking in a secret language. I wish I could understand it. “Sorry. I’m working on it.”

  “Work faster,” I say. My cash drawer finally pops free of my register with a beep.

  “Voilà.” He sounds strangled. “Hey, I almost forgot….” He reaches under the counter for the button that turns the speakers on and off, and clicks. The hellspawn cut off midscreech, and the silence rings in my ears.

  I just need time. A little bit of time.

  I’m still hopped up on nerves when I head to work the next morning, and the nerves only jump more when I see the men in suits stationed throughout the park. It’s a long walk today, to the north side, and so I see at least four of them. Men in suits, and cars, too. I’ve never seen a car in the park. A black car. So much black.

  I make a note to ask the assistant manager what’s up. But when I enter Dolphin Discovery—the north-side headquarters—I find Cady on her knees, folding shirts, her hair sticking up in little spikes all over her head. I stop short, and my heart plummets to my feet. She doesn’t hear it; she’s folding shirts as viciously as it’s possible to fold shirts, snapping them out and shoving their sides together, then slamming them onto shelves. Her face is red and she’s breathing heavy as a bull.

  I stand there and watch. I’m afraid her head might explode if I speak. I’m not sure if it would explode into shrapnel or tears. I’m not sure which would be worse.

  Maybe I should turn around and leave. If I miss another day, I’ll be terminated, but that’s the least of my worries right now.

  Cady looks over as I’m trying to decide. “Oh, it’s you,” she says, her voice flat. “What do you want?”

  I clear my throat. There’s no blockage or rustiness to clear, but it just seems like something I should do. “They sent me here,” I say. “For the day. Sorry.” No, I tell myself, don’t apologize. You have nothing to apologize for. It’s too late to take it back, though, and it hangs in the air like smog. I might choke on it.

  She rolls her eyes up at the ceiling, like she’s expecting help from above—maybe a massive icicle that’ll suddenly appear and detach and spear me through the brain—and then turns back to me with a heavy sigh. “I wish they hadn’t.”

  My stomach clenches. I wish they hadn’t too. “I swear I didn’t push you,” I say. “I wouldn’t do that. I swear.”

  She stares at me for a second before brushing her hands off on her khakis and standing. “How about kissing my…Connor?” she says acidly. “Do you swear you didn’t do that, too?”

  I wish I had some tea I could offer her. Offering someone tea is a very Melody thing to do, which means it’s the right thing to do. “No.” I figure now isn’t the best time to go into how Connor is actually her ex-boyfriend. “Connor and I did kiss.”

  She makes a scoffing noise deep in her throat, like she’s choking, or like she’s going to throw up. “What happened?” she says, and she’s looking at the floor.

  I really wish I had some tea. “I should probably go on register. It’s already almost nine.”

  She looks at me again, eyes blazing. “What happened? Tell me how it happened.”

  Should I hug her? Probably not. “I don’t think that’s a good idea,” I say.

  Her eyes blaze so hot and hard my polo might actually go up in flames. It’s probably not flame-retardant. “No,” she says, crossing her arms so hard the tips of her elbows go white. “I want to hear exactly how it happened. I want you to tell me every single thing that—”

  The door opens, making us both jump. “Cade.” It’s Rob, staring at her with soft eyes. It hits me then: he loves her. She’s not just his friend; he loves her, but she’s his best friend’s girl—well, kind of—and therefore off-limits.

  It hurts, then, to realize how good he is. He’s no morally ambiguous Blade, he’s Wonderman through and through. He must want Cady and Connor to break up and stay broken up, yet he’s been doing everything in his power to keep the breakup from becoming completely final. He’s been doing everything in his power to give her happiness at the expense of his own.

  He doesn’t hate me because he hates me. He hates me because he’s conflicted, because a part of him wants me to succeed in breaking them up and making Connor happy enough where he’d be fine with Rob swooping in on his ex.

  I want to hug him. I wonder how it feels to hug such a good person. I wonder if goodness is warm or cold or soft or hard. Goodness has piercings and tattoos and tiny, tiny teeth.

  “Cade,” Rob says again, breaking me out of my reverie. “Cynthia switched us. She wants you in the south today.”

  Cady takes a deep breath. “But I was just—”

  “She needs you right now,” Rob says, his voice unfathomably gentle. I think I might love him. Not in a physical way—I’m certainly not attracted to him—but in a way you’d love your grandfather or a beloved pet dog. I want to cuddle him and treasure him and never let him go.

  Cady’s shoulders slump. “Okay,” she says, her resolve clearly weakening. “But—”

  “You should go now,” Rob says. “Okay?”

  She nods, sniffing hard. “Okay,” she says, still avoiding my eyes, and darts out the door without looking back.

  Rob watches her until she disappears behind a hedge. “I’m going to send you to Hormones,” he says. Hormones is the park’s supposed store for teens, full of hip clothes and groovy accessories and sticky massage chairs crusted in potato chip crumbs. “Let me get your cash drawer.”

  I wonder if Cynthia really switched the two of them of her own free will, or if Rob asked for the change when he saw the assignment lists for the day. Probably the latter, martyr that he is. I wonder if he’d throw himself on a plush sword for her. “Okay.”

  We set out. Hormones is a short walk away, but we still pass a few of the black cars and people in suits. Maybe they’re here for me. The thought doesn’t scare me as much as it should. In jail, not only would I be safe from Katharina and Melody. I’d be safe from myself. “What’s with all of this?” I ask, trying my best to sound unconcerned.

  “They’re finally fixing all the cameras,” Rob says, and gives a short laugh. “Two girls gone missing from the park isn’t exactly
good for publicity.”

  Cameras. Of course. I breathe a little bit easier. “Any word on who took Monica?” I ask.

  Rob grimaces and shakes his head. “Rumors say they think it was someone inside the park,” he says. “That’s the only way somebody could have gotten her out without crossing in front of any of the working cameras or witnesses. Same with…Katharina. I hear they’re going to start talking to all of us over the next few days.”

  My heart slows, then stops. Somehow I don’t die. “All of us?”

  “Yeah,” he says. “I hope they find her. And not like they found Monica.”

  My heart hasn’t restarted. I should really be dead. “Yeah,” I say, and swallow air. “Me too.”

  —

  I didn’t sleep at all the night I gave Pixie the knife back. I closed my eyes, sure, and pretended, but I was too afraid I’d wake up to her poised above me, about to stab. Or worse, that I wouldn’t wake up at all.

  In the morning, I was still alive. I opened my eyes and yawned widely, pretending to wake up, and found Pixie on her side, staring at me. “Morning,” I said. “Did you sleep well?”

  “Sure,” she said flatly. She was already dressed. I didn’t ask, and I couldn’t see, but I would’ve bet my breakfast that she had that knife clamped tight against her side.

  I wondered why she needed it. What she planned to do with it.

  My unease grew.

  Was she going to stab Stepmother? Aside from Pixie, Stepmother was all I had. She fed me and clothed me and had taken care of me since my parents decided they didn’t want me anymore. I made her think of her daughter. What would she do without me? What would I do without her?

  And Stepmother’s words from long ago still nagged at me. If Pixie escaped without my knowing, I didn’t think Stepmother would take it out on me. But if I knew about the knife—and Stepmother would know I knew, she knew everything—and didn’t tell her, she would kill me. I knew that.

  Pixie and I chewed our sandwiches in silence over the sink. Stepmother sat at the kitchen table behind us, her reading glasses on as she combed through stacks of paper. Pixie took small, quick bites and chewed with a rabbity sort of concentration; she stood stiffly, and I knew she didn’t want to move lest the knife shift position. “Don’t,” I whispered. Pixie glared at me. I heard the papers shift behind me as Stepmother looked up, then the papers shifted again as she looked down.

  Pixie set her sandwich on the counter and turned around, reaching for her side. I turned to follow her. She’d taken one step toward Stepmother when I shouted, “She’s got a knife.”

  Time stopped, and it was as if the world around me crawled in slow motion. Stepmother’s eyes narrowing as she hopped to her feet, her chair skittering over the linoleum behind her. Pixie’s gasp of surprise, long and drawn out, as she reached for the knife. The knife itself, glittering in the kitchen light.

  But in reality it all happened in a second. Stepmother’s jump, Pixie’s lunge, the knife cutting through empty air.

  All I could do was stand and watch. I couldn’t move.

  Pixie, on the other hand, was nothing but movement. She let out a wounded cry when she saw she’d missed, but regrouped quickly and darted for the kitchen door. It was locked, as always, and the precious few seconds it took for Pixie to open both locks was enough time for Stepmother to catch up to her and yell for the girls to come help.

  But Pixie wasn’t having it. She snarled and swung the knife viciously just as the lock clicked open; Stepmother gasped and stumbled backward to avoid the knife slicing through her stomach. Pixie stood there in front of the unlocked door, panting, the knife held before her with both hands like a prayer. The girls stopped in the doorway and inhaled all at once. Stepmother eyed her warily, her hands on her belly. I saw a line of red drip to the floor, and it was my turn to gasp. She’d been cut.

  Pixie’s eyes flickered to me for a second, just for a second. I couldn’t read her expression; she could’ve been pleading for me to come along, or angry that I’d betrayed her, or excited to burst out that door, or all three at once, I still don’t know. I looked at the floor, and when I looked up again, she was gone.

  Stepmother and the girls gave chase. I waited for them in the kitchen. I finished my sandwich and then finished Pixie’s sandwich too, because why not? Even if she came back, she wouldn’t be needing it anymore.

  Stepmother came back empty-handed, breathing hard, her eyes slits.

  It was good I’d eaten that extra half sandwich, because she stuck me back in the basement and didn’t let me out for three days. It was okay. I hadn’t told her about the knife beforehand. I deserved it.

  When she did let me out, she was calmer, her eyes flat and placid. “I found your friend,” she said in greeting. I stopped breathing. “I caught her and she cried and asked for forgiveness. I do not forgive. First I cut off her fingers, one by one, then her toes, and then I cut her throat and threw her in an unmarked grave. Let this be a lesson to you, Jane, if you ever should think to betray me.”

  I tried to curl around myself that night, tried to wish away my thoughts of Pixie, but my tears soaked the mattress, and I was cold, cold, cold.

  —

  I don’t go home after work. I drive immediately to the dirt road in the woods, then walk from there to my cabin. My heart hasn’t restarted. I am a zombie shambling in search of brains. A zombie carrying a Tupperware container full of bran muffins and three bottles of water.

  I’m shaking as I unlock the cabin door. I worry for a moment that Katharina won’t be there—not that she will have escaped, but that she was never there in the first place, that her entire existence was just a concoction of a fraying mind—but she’s still there, slumped in the corner, hair hanging in dusty ropes over her face. She glares through it as I come in. “What?” she spits, voice rusty.

  I’m shaking so hard she must be able to hear my bones clattering against each other as I set the muffins and water down in front of her and then jump back before she can grab an ankle. “I came because I had to say I’m sorry,” I say. “I never said it, but I hurt you, and I’m sorry for that.” I expect I’ll feel better as the words leave my lips, that they’ll become balloons and lift me off the ground, but I don’t. If anything, I feel worse. Because I can only give her these words; I can’t go back in time and stop myself from doing what I did.

  Worse, I don’t think I’d do that even if I could.

  Katharina snorts and rolls her eyes. “You’re not sorry,” she says. Her eyes stop midroll and zero in on the fireplace, at the far side of the cabin. “What’s that?” she says slowly, like each word sticks to the inside of her mouth.

  I look. To my surprise, a laugh jumps from my throat. It’s my knife. The same size and shape as the one we found under Violetta’s mattress. “I bought it a few years ago,” I say, and wander over to pick it up. It’s hard and cold and feels like sadness made solid. It hasn’t always felt that way. “That knife saved my life. I felt naked without one, especially out here. You never know what might happen out here.” I’ve always felt relatively safe in the woods, but that doesn’t mean totally safe. Pepper spray only slows someone down; it doesn’t stop them forever. And out here, where it’s at least a mile to civilization, slowing someone down might not be enough.

  “I just want my life back.” Katharina sounds like she’s crying, too, like the words stuck so fast they clogged her throat all the way up to her tear ducts. “You took everything from me. You owe me this, at least.” She’s been shackled to the wall by a girl with a knife, a girl who’s proven herself ruthless where she’s concerned, and yet she’s not backing down. I admire that.

  And it doesn’t surprise me. I would do the same thing. We were always so much alike, me and her. Her and me.

  “I’m sorry,” I say, and I really am. I don’t know what’s going to happen. I can’t leave her here forever, but I know I can’t let her free to ruin my life. I’m finally okay, or as okay as I can be. I have a job I like that mak
es me feel useful, and I need to find out what happens to Skywoman after the cliff-hanger of the last issue of the comic book, which left her now-Blade-allied self at odds with Wonderman on the roof of the Silver Corporation. If I let Katharina go free, I can never work to put people like Stepmother behind bars, where they belong.

  I don’t realize I’m staring at the knife until I blink and see silver dazzling on the backs of my eyelids.

  “I’m sorry,” I say. I seem to have gotten stuck. Katharina covers her face with her hair, maybe so she won’t have to see what’s coming, and I feel a twinge deep in my belly. She thinks me capable of murder. Which isn’t surprising, given what she’s seen of me.

  My lip trembles—if you weren’t looking for it, you’d miss it. “I’m sorry,” I say, still looking at the knife, and then I hear the door open behind me.

  “Scarlett?” Melody’s voice cuts through the tension, and Katharina peers out through her hair. “Scarlett!” I swing around only to see that Melody isn’t talking to me.

  She’s talking to Katharina.

  Melody is talking to Katharina, is calling her Scarlett, but she should be talking to me. I drop the knife, feeling sick at what I almost considered doing.

  Pixie is dead. I killed Pixie when I slashed Stepmother with my stolen knife and ran out into the sun and ran through the woods and ran until my feet bled and ran out in front of the truck that stopped so close to me I could feel its heat touch my arms. I killed Pixie when I walked through the police station, leaving a trail of bloody footprints all the way, and told the police lady who wrapped me in a blanket and gave me hot chocolate that my name was Scarlett Contreras and I was from Merry Park, outside Chicago, and that I had never had pet rabbits. I killed Pixie when I let Scarlett’s parents hug me and bring me to Scarlett’s house and put me to sleep in Scarlett’s pink canopy bed, underneath Scarlett’s sea of glow-in-the-dark stars.