“Honey, the police are here,” a woman finally gasps. “Please. Come home.”
I awaken abruptly. Mattie is above me, holding my shoulders, shaking me. When she sees that I’m conscious, she breathes a sigh of relief. “Are you okay? You passed out. Why are you holding this dirty old glove?”
I crumple the glove into a ball and hide it behind my back, thinking belatedly that will only make Mattie more curious. “What?” I ask stupidly.
“Rollins is on the phone,” Mattie says, holding it out.
I accept the phone and bring it to my ear. “Rollins?”
He coughs. “Hey, I looked for you after school. I’m getting the feeling that you’re avoiding me.”
Mattie watches me curiously. I shoo her out of the room.
Switching the phone to my opposite ear, I try to think of something to say, anything other than the truth—which is that I don’t want to hang out with Anna.
“I’ve just . . . had a lot on my mind.”
“Is this about your aunt?” Rollins asks.
I get off my bed, walk over to the door, and peek out to make sure no one is listening. “I’d rather not talk about it right now. Tomorrow?” I push the door closed, but even then I’m paranoid about Lydia hearing our conversation.
He’s quiet for a moment. Finally he says, “Sure. I guess.”
I know that tone of voice. Rollins is pissed that I won’t open up to him. But there’s not much I can do about it now.
“Okay, I’ll see you tomorrow morning,” I say, and then I push End Call.
Where was I?
Picking up the crumpled glove from my bed, I remember Scotch’s father’s phone call. My heart starts to pound as I remember his wife’s words: Honey, the police are here. Come home.
This time I lock the door.
I’m sitting in the living room in Scotch’s house. His mother, wearing a bandanna on her head, sits next to me. I recall what Regina said about his mother having lung cancer and feel terrible. This woman has been through enough. Should she have to bury her son, too?
Sitting across from us is Officer Teahen, the policeman who investigated Sophie’s murder. I actually haven’t seen him since he came to our door to tell us about Zane’s accident. He looks like he’s aged since then. Lines have appeared around his eyes and mouth. I wonder how many of them are due to dead teenagers.
Officer Teahen speaks. “Do you remember the name of the girl he said he was going out with?”
I feel Scotch’s father shake his head. “He dates a different girl every week, almost. There’s no way we can keep track of them all.” I’m not sure if it’s my imagination, but there’s a slight undertone of pride in the man’s voice that makes me feel ill. Still, I’m glad that Regina’s name doesn’t come up. She’d crumble if she had to talk to the cops.
“We’re wondering if the girl who made the call from the school today is the same one Scott went out with last night. Tomorrow we’ll send an officer to ask around and see if Scott mentioned his date to any of his friends.”
Scotch’s mother coughs into a Kleenex. I see a splotch of blood on it. “I don’t understand why the girl didn’t call last night. Just thinking of my boy, lying there, all by himself . . .”
I have never felt guiltier in my life.
“My guess is that she’s afraid of getting busted for underage drinking. We found a bottle of rum in Scott’s car.”
Scotch’s father curses.
His mother speaks again, her voice getting louder than I’d ever guessed it could. “Who would care about getting a ticket for underage drinking when a boy’s life is at stake? He could have died last night.”
Huh?
Hold everything.
Is Scotch alive?
For a moment I feel relief. But then the implications of this possibility swirl around my head. If Scotch is still alive, did he see what happened before he fell? Did he see me?
“I agree, it’s a very strange situation. But sometimes teenagers don’t make very rational decisions,” Officer Teahen says. “Luckily, the paramedics got there in time. I understand your son is in stable condition.”
“Yeah, no thanks to the bitch who left him there,” Scotch’s father says.
Scotch’s mother starts to cry. His father scoots closer to her and takes her hand. He speaks sternly to the officer. “I think my wife has had enough. Can we cut this conversation short?”
Officer Teahen, looking like he would very much mind cutting the conversation short, opens his mouth, seems to think better of it, and then shuts it again. “Of course. We’ll be in touch as soon as we have more information.”
The two men stand and shake hands. The officer walks to the front door, gives a polite nod, and then shows himself out.
Scotch’s father settles back down with his wife, who is doubled up and coughing into her handkerchief. He pushes her hair out of her eyes tenderly. “It’s okay, honey. It’s all going to be okay.”
Someone knocks on my door. I glance at my clock and note my father won’t be home for another hour or so. I heave a sigh and open the door, expecting Mattie to be on the other side, ready for another round.
But it isn’t Mattie.
It’s Lydia.
Her face is grave.
“Something has happened,” she says.
I don’t move. Don’t speak.
“You should probably be sitting down for this.”
I shuffle toward my bed and pull the comforter around my shoulders. Lydia lowers herself into the rocking chair. She leans forward, sympathy etched into her face. Sympathy, and something else.
“Sylvia, I have some . . . news for you. An acquaintance of yours has been in an accident. It was on TV.”
“Scott,” I say. She raises her eyebrows. “How did you know?”
“He, uh . . . wasn’t at school today.”
“They found him at the bottom of Lookout Point. He’s in stable condition, but he’s comatose.” She seems to scrutinize my face closely to judge my reaction to this news.
“Well, at least he’s alive,” I say.
Lydia clears her throat. “You know, Mattie told me what Scott did to you last year. I understand that you must be experiencing some conflicted feelings right now. I want you to know that it’s okay if you’re not devastated by this news.”
I gasp.
“Mattie told you that?”
I can’t believe this. Mattie divulged my most guarded secret to a woman who robbed our mother and skipped town twenty years ago, a woman who—it seems—has been screwing with my head ever since she got into town. How could she?
“I didn’t want him to get hurt!” I scream. “Get out of my room!”
“We’ll get through this together, hon. We really will, okay?”
“Get out!”
Lydia slowly rises and goes to the door. There, she lingers, and she can’t resist one last comment. “Don’t worry, Sylvia. I’ll do whatever I can to protect you girls.” And then she’s gone.
Chapter Nineteen
I’m in a strange place.
It’s dark and raining, and tombstones jut out of the ground all around me.
The cemetery.
For a brief moment, I wonder if I’ve slid into someone, but when I look down and see my fraying purple robe and fuzzy slippers, I realize I’ve been hijacked once again.
My first thought is that Lydia is messing with me again, but then I remember I got the picture back from her. I suppose she could have found something else with my imprint on it.
I look down at the grave before me and see my mother’s name etched into the stone. I trace my shivering fingers over the cold, hard rock.
SUSAN BELL
Tears spill down my cheeks, mixing with the rain. I fall to the ground and press my face against the grass. If only she were here. She would know what to do. She’d help me untangle the mess with Scotch and clear up the mystery surrounding Aunt Lydia.
“Mom,” I say hoarsely. My voice becomes louder,
turns into a yell. “Mom!” I’m screaming into the wind. It’s a useless noise, my fury against the forces of nature. “Mom! Mom!”
The storm begins to pick up. Lightning spears its way across the sky, and a split second later, thunder slams into my ears. That was close. Too close. But I wonder, maybe it’s a sign. Is she listening to me?
I make myself stand up, and the wind pushes me off balance. It knocks me onto the ground. Mud soaks my clothes, and I start to shiver. For a minute, I just lie there, weeping.
Strong arms encircle me. I smell the familiar scent of Rollins’s leather jacket. Heat from his body pours through my soaked robe and T-shirt and shorts. He’s stroking my hair and whispering to me, but they are angry whispers, full of admonishment.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing out here?” he demands.
“What are you doing here?” I ask.
“I was driving home from the radio station. I saw some crazy girl walking along the road in her pajamas. Took me a minute to figure out it was you. Vee, you had me scared to death. You must be freezing.”
He presses his body against me to warm me up.
Something happens to me in the cemetery.
I become brave.
Beneath Rollins’s jacket, I let my fingers explore the places I’ve never touched before. The muscles on his chest, his back. I nestle my head in the crook of his neck, and we lay there for a second. It just feels right. His hands in my hair, my fingers gliding over the plains and valleys of him.
Panting, I knot my fingers in his hair, pulling him down until his mouth is on my own. For a moment, he hesitates, but then his mouth opens up, and his tongue caresses mine. We writhe against each other, both admitting we need the other in a way we never have before. When thunder crashes around us again, Rollins pulls away. I’m out of breath.
And then I realize.
“Wait. What about Anna?”
Rollins gives me an odd look. “What about her?”
“You’ve been spending so much time with her. I thought you . . .” I let my words dangle.
He stares at me in amusement. “Vee, the reason I’ve been spending so much time with her is because you keep pushing me away. I don’t like her that way.”
I shake my head. “But . . . but the other night, when I tried to kiss you . . . and then someone called, and you rushed out.”
He traces my lips with the tip of his finger. “I was preoccupied. My mother fell out of her wheelchair last week and broke her hip. My uncle called, needing help at home.”
“Oh,” I say, feeling monumentally stupid.
He kisses me again.
Lightning flashes, and a resounding clap from the sky breaks us apart.
“We have to go,” Rollins says, and I nod. I let him pull me to my feet and lead me out of the cemetery, weaving our way through the tombstones. We climb the crest of a hill, and I see his car waiting for us in the parking lot.
Inside, Rollins cranks up the heater. “So explain to me what you were doing in the cemetery just now? Let me guess. You don’t know how you got there.”
I shake my head. “I don’t know. I don’t remember leaving the house.” I pause, thinking of Lydia. Did she purposely lead me to my mother’s grave? If she was the one to bring me here, what was the point?
If it wasn’t Lydia, who was it?
I think of the strange woman who drove me home the night of the accident. Diane. Didn’t I see her lurking around my neighborhood again? Could she have something to do with this?
“I don’t want to go home.” I bite my lip, not knowing where Rollins could take me instead. I’ve still never been to his house because he’s so self-conscious about his incapacitated mother.
“Then come home with me,” he says, to my surprise. He shifts his eyes away from the road long enough to look at me and smile shyly. I reach over and grab his hand and squeeze it.
We are silent the rest of the way.
When we pull up to his trailer, it is dark with only the flickering light of a television coming from within. I follow him up the crumbling cement path and climb the steps. Rollins shuts the door quietly behind me, and I turn to survey the scene.
A skinny man sits on a raggedy old couch with his feet up on a milk crate that’s been repurposed as a coffee table. He’s watching Nick@Nite. He looks from the television to Rollins to me, and then returns to his show, taking a swig of his Budweiser.
Rollins leads me toward the back of the trailer. He nods at a door, saying, “My mother’s asleep.” We continue to the next room, which I recognize instantly as Rollins’s. The makeshift bookcase, the jeans slung over the back of a chair, the tattered Stephen King novel lying on his bed. It is so very Rollins.
“Sorry about my uncle,” he says. “He’ll be leaving for the hospital soon. He always has to psych himself up with a few beers before he goes and cleans up vomit and crap all night. Or at least that’s what he says.” Vaguely, I remember Rollins telling me his uncle works as a custodian at the hospital.
I sit down on the bed, and he disappears into the hallway, returning a moment later with a faded orange towel. I dab my face and hair dry, but no amount of patting with a little towel is going to dry off my clothes. Pulling off the robe, I realize my white T-shirt has become completely transparent. I feel my face go red as I cross my arms over my chest.
Rollins must have noticed, too, because he looks away, a tiny smile tugging at the corners of his mouth. He pulls open a chipped drawer and finds a Sonic Youth T-shirt to pass my way. From another drawer, he grabs a pair of athletic shorts. I take them gratefully.
“I’m going to duck in the shower,” he says. “Be right back.”
Once the door closes, I strip off my wet T-shirt and shorts. My whole body is covered in goosebumps. I rub the towel over my skin until I’m reasonably dry and then throw on Rollins’s T-shirt and shorts. Then, shivering, I jump into his bed and pull the comforter up to my chin. It takes several minutes for my teeth to stop chattering.
There’s a soft rap at the door, and Rollins opens it just wide enough to whisper, “Are you decent?”
“I’m dressed,” I say. “The decent thing is debatable.”
He laughs and opens the door the rest of the way. I suck in my breath when I see that he’s dressed in only a light blue towel, which is knotted around his waist. He goes to his chest of drawers and starts to search for some clothes. I watch the muscles in his back move under his skin. Never have I realized how built Rollins is. I guess he’d have to be, to lift his mother out of her wheelchair all the time.
Rollins slides on some shorts beneath his towel and then pulls on a plain black T-shirt. “My uncle went to work,” he says, jutting his thumb in the direction of the living room. “I’ll be on the couch if you need anything.”
I open my mouth and then—not sure what to say—close it again. I guess I thought he’d sleep in here with me. If not in the bed, then on the floor or something. The thought of sleeping here, by myself, freaks me out. Rollins flips off the light and shuts the door before I can protest.
Turning onto my side, I stare at the sliver of light beneath the door. It’s okay. He’s only in the next room. I snuggle up in his blankets and breathe in the scent of him. Leather and spice. And something else—something indescribable. Something so Rollins. Like the essence of him.
Seconds pass.
Minutes.
I realize there’s no way I’m going to sleep after everything that’s happened. My life is such a mess. Someone keeps sliding into me and manipulating me into doing strange things and going weird places. If the police keep searching, they’re going to nail me for a crime I didn’t commit. I could be put in prison. And now I’m realizing I’m in love with my best friend.
I peel back the covers and slip out of Rollins’s bed. Not wanting to wake his mother, I tiptoe across the room and carefully twist the doorknob. The door eases open, and I hurry through the hallway and into the room where Rollins’s uncle was watching television on
ly an hour ago.
“Rollins,” I whisper.
The lump on the sofa shifts. Rollins opens one eye.
“You okay, Vee? You need some water or something?”
I go to the side of the couch and kneel beside him. “Rollins, can you come back to your room? Please? I can’t sleep.”
He sits up and yawns.
“Sure. I just didn’t want you to be uncomfortable.”
“I know,” I say, smiling. “But I’d be a lot more comfortable with you there.”
Rollins stands, his blanket around his shoulders. I retrace my steps back to his room and wait for him to follow me. I close the door behind us. He starts to arrange the blanket on the floor, but I put my hand on his wrist to stop him.
“No. I want you to sleep with me.”
His gaze is steady. “Are you sure?”
I nod.
I climb into bed first, and then he tucks himself in beside me. Though I feel like I know Rollins better than almost anyone in the world, I feel like there’s so much history I don’t know about. What was his life like before he came to Iowa? Who is his father? What happened to his mother to put her into a wheelchair?
Resting my head on his shoulder, I say, “Tell me about your mom.”
He is quiet, and I’m afraid I’ve pushed too far. Rollins is so protective of his mother. I know he doesn’t like to talk about her.
“She had me when she was a teenager,” Rollins says. “I never met my dad. He was a drug addict who dumped my mom when he found out she was pregnant. So we lived with my grandparents. My mom worked nights doing custodial work, and when I was big enough to go to school, she got a job with this telemarketing firm. Of course, this was before the accident.”
I feel him tense up.
The accident.
“She was riding her bike home from work. She didn’t see the car, and the driver didn’t see her. At least that’s what he said. It was bad. I thought she was going to die. In fact, I remember holding her hand in the hospital, trying not to let her see how scared I was. I was eight years old.”
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