Impostor

by Jill Hathaway

  “What do you think is going on?” he asks.

  I’ve been wondering the same thing. Samantha was unusually quiet last night after we got Regina’s text that Scotch had woken up. I know she’s furious at Regina for hanging around the hospital. I hope we get to her house before she does anything stupid.

  We pull into the parking lot, and Rollins finds a spot not far from Samantha’s front door. As soon as Rollins kills the ignition, I rush out of the car. I try the doorknob, but it’s locked. I start pounding on the door. “Regina? Sam, are you in there?”

  No one answers.

  We hear glass breaking somewhere inside.

  A girl screams.

  “Get back, Vee,” Rollins says gruffly.

  I take a step backward and stumble over a shrub. Mattie grabs my arm to steady me.

  Rollins rams the door with his shoulder. It doesn’t give. He tries again, this time moving back enough to give himself a running start. There’s a huge crack, and the door flies open. He takes a step inside, and I follow.

  There’s a flight of stairs leading up.

  Someone is crying. I think it’s Sam, but that’s crazy. Sam never cries.

  Rollins takes the steps two at a time. Mattie and I are close behind. When we reach the living room, we see Regina and Samantha. They’re both sobbing. Startled, Samantha turns toward us. That’s when I see the gun in her hands.

  I freeze, stunned.

  Samantha has a wild look in her eyes. She’s still in her pajamas, but she looks like she hasn’t slept in days. Her hands tremble, and I pray that she won’t accidentally pull the trigger.

  “What the hell, Samantha?” I cry. “What’s going on?”

  Rollins tries to stand in front of me and Mattie. I feel Mattie grab my arm and squeeze tightly. I reciprocate.

  Regina collapses onto the floor. “Samantha killed Scotch,” Regina wails. “And now she’s going to kill me.”

  “Shut up! Shut up!” Sam yells, swiveling and pointing the gun at Regina.

  I take a step forward, hoping I can distract Samantha from whatever craziness she has going on in her head. “What’s Regina talking about?” I ask. “Is she telling the truth?”

  Samantha looks in my direction. Her eyes are not the eyes of a cold-blooded killer. She wears the expression of a frightened child.

  I know Samantha.

  For the longest time, she was my best friend. Practically my only friend.

  She’s not capable of murder.

  Is she?

  “What happened, Samantha?”

  Not knowing where to point the gun, Samantha settles for a point between me and Regina. Rollins tries to pull me behind him, but I push his hand away.

  Samantha shakes her head, tears and snot running down her face. “I had to do it,” she whispers.

  “Do what?”

  “He wasn’t supposed to wake up.”

  I try to process her words. It’s hard to believe that Samantha was so afraid that Scotch would reveal our prank that she would kill him. “What did you think he would say, Samantha?”

  “Oh, I knew he’d tell the police. He already told Regina.”

  Regina moans. She tries to crawl behind the sofa, but Samantha turns the gun back toward her, and she stops in her tracks.

  “Scotch told Regina what?” My heart is hammering in my chest.

  “That I pushed him that night at Lookout Point,” Samantha says.

  All is quiet as her confession washes over me.

  “It was you?”

  “Yes,” she replies, her voice cracking.

  “But why?”

  She looks up at me pleadingly. “I did it for you, Vee. When you didn’t come back right away, I started getting nervous. I wasn’t sure you’d be able to handle Scotch on your own. We both know what he was capable of. So I came to see what was going on. You and Scotch were wrestling with each other at the edge of the cliff. And . . . I pushed him.”

  I stare at her with wide eyes.

  She pushed Scotch? For me?

  “I just kept thinking about Homecoming,” Samantha says. “How I stood there and watched him drag you away. And I didn’t do anything. I couldn’t let him hurt you again.”

  “Samantha,” I say, reaching toward her. Rollins keeps me from going any farther.

  “I’m so tired,” Samantha says, squeezing her eyes shut. Her head lolls against her chest. “I just want to go to sleep.”

  While Samantha’s head is down, Rollins breaks away from me and Mattie and circles the room, moving closer to Samantha. His muscles tense, and I think he’s going to jump on her.

  “Don’t,” I say.

  Samantha’s head snaps up. When she sees that Rollins is only a few feet away from her, she raises the gun in his direction.

  “No!” I scream.

  Confused, she turns toward me.

  Rollins uses that moment to lunge at her. He pushes her onto the floor. The gun flies out of her hand and bounces on the white carpet.

  A deafening sound.

  I crouch down, covering my ears with my hands.

  Mattie screams.

  I straighten up and see Mattie pointing at Rollins. He’s next to Samantha, who is crying quietly on the floor.

  “Rollins? Rollins, are you okay?”

  He doesn’t answer.

  I kick the gun far away from Samantha and run to Rollins’s side. Grabbing his arm, I flip him over so he’s facing me. His eyes are open. He doesn’t look like he’s breathing.

  “Rollins, talk to me.”

  I throw open his leather jacket, looking for the wound. A red stain is blooming from the top of his right shoulder. There’s so much blood. I pull off my hoodie and press it to Rollins’s chest.

  No, no. This can’t be happening.

  Regina is on the phone. I hear her talking, but I can’t make sense of the words. Mattie has her hand over her mouth.

  I drop my mouth to Rollins’s ear.

  Two words.

  “Don’t go.”

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  I’m not much for prayer.

  That’s always been Mattie’s thing.

  But sitting in the waiting room at the hospital, I wish very hard.

  I wish that Rollins being a good guy counts for something.

  I wish that whoever’s keeping score tallies up all the selfless things he’s done in his life and sees that it’s just not fair to take him away so soon.

  Too bad I know better.

  Life isn’t fair.

  And death certainly isn’t.

  I watch people coming and going all day long. A lot of them are sad, but there’s a lot of laughter, too. You’d be surprised how much laughter there is in the hospital. I guess even when people are scared they’re going to lose what’s most important to them, they need to celebrate what they still have.

  I still have a lot.

  I’ve got Mattie.

  She brings me coffee from the cafeteria and a toothbrush from the gift shop when it’s time to go to sleep. I won’t go home, so she helps me make a bed out of some of the uncomfortable chairs and gives me her sweater as a blanket. She sits by me then, as I try unsuccessfully to get some sleep.

  I’ve got my father.

  He didn’t say much as I explained what happened, but when I was done, he wrapped his arms around me and sat there for a long time, just holding me. He talks to Rollins’s doctors and translates the medicalese that I don’t understand. He tries to sound positive, but he doesn’t give me false hope because he believes that family and friends should have an accurate picture of how serious a situation is. That’s part of what makes him a good doctor, I suppose.

  I have so much, but all I want is Rollins. It’s strange and ironic that the only person I want right now, the only person who can make me feel better, isn’t here.

  He’s in an in-between place.

  It’s raining outside. I watch as the water streams down the window, almost as if to make up for the tears I’m not crying.<
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  I can’t cry.

  I can’t eat.

  I can’t think, especially not about what life will be like if my best friend doesn’t pull through.

  I won’t think about that.

  On the second day, Lydia walks in. She looks around, spots me and Mattie, and walks toward us.

  “Hello, girls.”

  Mattie looks up from her copy of Seventeen. “Oh, hey. I think I’m going to run to the cafeteria to get a pop. Do you guys want anything?”

  I shake my head. Lydia does the same.

  Mattie gets up and leaves. Lydia sets down her purse and takes the empty seat. I fix my eyes on my sneakers.

  “I suppose I owe you an apology,” I say, remembering how I hinted that Lydia might have had something to do with Scotch’s death.

  “Don’t worry about that now.”

  We sit silently for a few minutes.

  “I want to tell you why I came back to Iowa City after all these years,” Lydia says, playing with her sleeve.

  I think it’s a strange time and place to choose to come clean to me, but I’m up for anything that will take my mind off what’s happening right now. “Okay.”

  Lydia takes a deep breath. “There was a baby,” she finally says, so quietly I can barely make out her words.

  “A baby? In California?” I picture the man she left behind. Did she leave a child as well?

  “No. Not in California. When I was sixteen. After your father broke up with me to date your mother, I found solace in another man. He was older. Married.”

  “Jesus,” I whisper.

  “I . . . I couldn’t get rid of it. But I didn’t want anyone to know. So I left.” She grabs a couple of tissues from her purse and blows her nose.

  “I don’t understand. Why did you decide to come back to Iowa if your kid is in California?”

  Lydia dabs at her eyes. “She’s not in California. She’s here. I went away for the duration of the pregnancy. The man confessed the affair to his wife. She was furious, but they’d been trying to have a child for a long time. She made him a deal. If he agreed to never see me again, they would take the child and raise it as their own. That girl at the diner, Melody? She’s my biological daughter.”

  My jaw drops as I take this in. Despite my discomfort with the idea of Lydia dating my father, I can’t help but feel sorry for the pregnant teenager who felt she had to leave her family and then give away her child.

  “So why did you come back now? You could have come back anytime over the years. You could have seen my mother before she . . .” My voice trails off.

  “Believe me, I wish I did come back earlier. I was just so ashamed. The fact of the matter is that I got engaged this year. He’s a wonderful man. Better than I deserve. But I just couldn’t do it. I kept remembering the baby girl I left behind. That’s why I came back. Guess I needed some closure before I could move on with the rest of my life, you could say.”

  Lydia reaches out to hold my hand.

  I let her.

  “I would do anything to go back and tell your mother how much I loved her. Our fight was so stupid, and we let it ruin us for way too long.”

  I think of how hard it would be to learn that a loved one died without ever knowing how you really felt about them.

  I start to cry.

  It’s been three days.

  Three days of camping out in the waiting room, drinking coffee from the nurses’ station, and flipping through the same old magazines.

  Three days of watching people get good news and bad news, breaking into tears either way.

  Three days of no news about Rollins.

  Mattie snores in the chair next to me.

  My father walks into the waiting room.

  He.

  Is.

  Smiling.

  A moment ago, my heart was in a million pieces, and I was pretty sure I’d never have the strength to assemble it again. Even though I don’t really believe in a god, I was begging whoever was out there to please give me a chance to say good-bye to my best friend. I wanted to hold his hand and feel the pulse beneath his skin, just one more time.

  But now.

  My father is smiling.

  I open my mouth, and a strangled sound escapes. Adrenaline pours through my veins, and I leap to my feet. I turn, finding Mattie, who is jumping up and down. We crash into a hug, and I start sobbing.

  Now I can cry.

  “Can I see him?” I beg my father.

  He puts his hands on my shoulders. “Yes. He’s still very groggy, but you can see him.”

  Following him back to Rollins’s room, I can’t stop grinning through my tears.

  I will never stop.

  The door is ajar, and I push it open the rest of the way. It smells like medicine and blood and survival.

  Rollins is pale, his lips almost colorless. They took the lip ring out, and he looks naked without it. His eyes are closed, but his chest is rising and falling. I’ve never seen anything more beautiful.

  I’m wrong, though, because then he opens his brown eyes and sees me standing there, and his lips curve into a smile. It takes my breath away.

  “Hey, you,” he says weakly.

  I want to rush forward and press my lips against his and then kiss his eyelids and the warm spot just behind his ears, but I’m afraid I’ll disturb the cords that poke out from his body. So I just step closer and take his hand.

  There’s a lot of things I want to say right now, but they all seem too serious and morbid. Instead, I look at his chest, which is wrapped in bandages. “Does it hurt?”

  “Nah. They’ve got me on some pretty decent drugs. Your dad hooked me up.”

  I force a laugh. “That’s good.” My pathetic attempt at laughter turns into a sob.

  “Hey,” Rollins says softly. “Come here.”

  He pulls me into a hug. I’m careful to avoid pressing against his wound.

  “I’m so glad you’re okay,” I whisper. The words don’t seem like enough. They don’t express what I really mean to say. Finally I figure it out, and I say the right words.

  “I love you.”

  Rollins traces his finger along my jaw and brings me close for a kiss. It is soft and gentle and perfect.

  “I love you, too.”

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  I stand on Samantha’s doorstep, holding a bouquet of daffodils. It’s been a week since I stood in this exact same place, a week since Samantha was arrested for the murder of Scott Becker and the attempted murder of Rollins. I heard her parents had to rush home from Barbados to post an exorbitant amount of money for her bail. I guess she was lucky they let her come home at all.

  The door opens a crack. Samantha’s mother, looking frazzled, peeks out at me. “Sylvia?” She studies me warily. “What can I do for you?”

  “I was hoping I could come in, Mrs. Phillips. I brought these for Samantha.” I hold up the bouquet of flowers, in case the woman hadn’t noticed them before.

  “I’m very sorry, Sylvia. But Samantha doesn’t want to see anyone.” Mrs. Phillips starts to close the door.

  “Please,” I say. “I’d really like to speak to her.”

  The blond woman looks behind her and then back at me. Finally she seems to make up her mind and steps back. “Okay. But just for a minute.”

  I follow Mrs. Phillips up the stairs. When we pass through the living room, I try to avoid looking at the bloodstain that is still on the carpet.

  “She’s in her bedroom,” says Mrs. Phillips, walking into the kitchen. “You know where it is.”

  “Thank you,” I tell her, and then I make my way down the hallway to Samantha’s room. I knock on the door. All is quiet. I knock again.

  The door opens.

  “Vee,” Samantha whispers.

  She looks like shit.

  I hand her the bouquet of flowers. She accepts them, looking confused. “Why did you bring these?” She clutches them to her chest, searching my eyes for answers.

  I shrug.
“Because they’re pretty. And I know you can’t go outside.”

  We both look down at the electronic anklet on her leg.

  “Can I sit down?”

  She nods.

  I cross the room and sit gingerly on her bed. Still holding the daffodils close, Samantha follows me and sits down.

  “Is Rollins okay?” She avoids my gaze.

  “Yeah. He’s going to be just fine.”

  “I’m glad. You know I didn’t mean to—”

  “I know,” I say, reaching out to touch her hand. “I know.”

  We sit still for a moment, both staring at the flowers.

  I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about what could make a person do what Samantha did. I never in a million years would have thought she was capable of killing someone. But when I think about everything that led up to it, I guess I have a better understanding of her actions.

  It was like a snowball, coming down the mountain. First, Scotch stole her panties and made up a nasty story about her. In retaliation, we planned to get him naked and leave him at Lookout Point. When she saw me fighting with him at the edge of the cliff, her emotions went out of control, and that’s when she pushed him—not meaning to hurt him, but just to get him off me.

  And then she must have been terrified. She tried to cover up her actions by sneaking back to the car and then pretending not to know what happened to Scotch. She thought she’d get in trouble if anyone found out. I mean, I know how she was feeling. I was scared, too.

  “Do you want to talk about it?” I ask.

  She lifts the flowers to her nose and inhales. “Okay.”

  “I understand everything you did,” I say. “Up until the point you got to the hospital. I just didn’t think you were capable of . . . killing someone.”

  She looks over at me and gives me a sad smile. “I didn’t think I was, either. But I guess we were wrong.”

  She stands up, walks over to her desk, and dumps the pens and pencils out of a University of Iowa cup. As she starts to arrange the flowers, she speaks. “When I heard that Scotch woke up, I freaked out. I came home, and I was all by myself. I couldn’t stop shaking. I just kept thinking about what would happen to me when Scotch told everyone that I pushed him. How my parents would hate me. How everyone would hate me.”