Body of a Girl

by Leah Stewart

  He swallows hard. “I don’t know.”

  “You don’t know?” I say gently.

  “I’ve gone running a lot, and I, uh . . . I just . . .” He trails off, then says, his voice very small, “I don’t know.”

  “How are your parents?”

  “My mother just sits in Allison’s room. I tell her that I’m going outside and she says, ‘Please don’t leave,’ and it’s like she thinks if I step outside the house . . . but she’s not talking to me. She’s not talking to my father. She’s just sitting on the edge of the bed. This morning I walked by there and she was curled up around Allison’s pillow. Not crying. Her feet were hanging off the end of the bed.” He swallows again and stops talking.

  I wonder if, lying there with her knees to her chest, the mother knew she was mimicking her daughter’s death pose.

  “You have a brother, right?” Peter asks me. “Are you close?”

  “Not really, no.”

  “How come?”

  “My family’s very religious,” I say. “I’m not.”

  “What’s your mother like?”

  For a moment, I’m at a loss. Then I say, “She’s nice. She does a lot of charity work.”

  “Charity work?” he says, and I think I hear in his voice that I should be able to say more than that about my own mother. “Do you see her much?”

  I find myself telling him about the last time I saw my mother, for dinner at my brother’s house. How they asked me about my job, and I answered with the truth. How my brother, Rob, took me aside afterward and hissed at me through his teeth, saying I wasn’t to talk about such things in front of his kids and for God’s sake didn’t I know it wasn’t normal? How my mother said she couldn’t understand why I had to intrude on other people’s tragedies, though I know she scours the papers for them. How all my life she has read to me about the carjackers who would box me in on a dark road, the men who would drag me from my car at stoplights, the rapists who would come upon me walking alone through the park and force me into the bushes.

  “She doesn’t have to read me those stories anymore. Now I write them.”

  “Now I am one of those stories,” the boy on the phone says. “Or my sister is.”

  I wince. “Oh God, I’m sorry. How thoughtless of me.”

  “That’s okay.” There’s another silence. Then he says, abruptly, “I think you’re a good person.”

  Tears spring into my eyes. How odd, I think, blinking them away. “Thank you.”

  “I have to go,” he says. “I’ll talk to you again.”

  “I hope so,” I say.

  I hang up the phone and sit for a little while, staring at the wall. Then I pull his sister’s picture closer to me. I trace the curve of her face with the end of my pen. Who are you? I think. Tell me. Some superstitious impulse makes me close my eyes and wait for the answer. The only voice inside my head is my own.

  “Olivia?”

  I open my eyes. Evan is looking at me, his head cocked quizzically. He says, “Me and Bishop are going to get a drink. Want to come?”

  The M&O is Bishop’s favorite hangout, close and dark, with a pool table in the back and city politicians and eccentrics caricatured in bright colors on the walls and the ceiling. We come here after work two or three times a week to have a beer or two and ease into going home. Bishop likes to ask questions—what’s the most pain you’ve ever been in, what’s the craziest thing you’ve done for love—and after Evan and I tell our stories, he looks into his beer mug like it’s a crystal ball until one of us asks him the same question. Then, no matter how good our stories were, he tops them.

  Tonight, Bishop buys a pitcher of beer and says, “What’s the worst story you’ve ever had to write?”

  “How do you mean, worst?” I say. “I can tell you the stupidest story I ever had to write.”

  Bishop nods at me, filling my mug.

  “When Charles and Di first hit the rocks,” I say, “I was working for the Nashville paper, and they asked me to call marriage counselors and ask them if the marriage could be saved.”

  “You’re kidding,” Evan says.

  “I called one guy, who was horrified by the question, and wouldn’t talk to me. I was so embarrassed, I lied to my editor and said I had called seven people and none of them would talk to me. She said, ‘You’d think people would have more of a sense of humor,’ but she didn’t make me do the story.”

  “Okay,” Bishop says, unimpressed. He nods at Evan. “What’s yours?”

  “It would have to be one of those man-on-the-street stories,” Evan says. He acts it out. “Excuse me, sir, what do you think about the situation in Bosnia?” Then he says, in a redneck drawl, “Kill ’em all, let God sort ’em out.”

  “Ah,” Bishop says. He takes a swig of his beer, sets it down slowly, and gazes deeply into it.

  “Okay, I give,” I say. “What’s yours?”

  “Well, my children,” he says. “You may recall that kid who got killed in DeSoto County. Yours truly was assigned to go talk to the parents, never an enviable task. When the photog and I got to the parents’ house, the lawn was packed with reporters, photographers, TV cameras, everything. And the father was standing there, drinking a beer, wearing a T-shirt.” He forms a square with his hands, like a director sizing up a shot. “Now picture this,” he says. “The shirt has a bottle of Jack Daniel’s on it, and there’s this hand wrapped around the neck of the bottle. Across the top it said ‘Jack-off Daniel’s.’ And everybody’s snapping this guy’s picture.”

  Evan roars, slapping the table. “You’re shitting me,” he says.

  “You’re changing the rules,” I say. “What’s that got to do with the worst story you had to write?”

  “That was a pretty bad case,” he says. “That murder.” I can see him withdrawing into himself—his head down, his shoulders pulled in.

  “If that’s what you mean,” I say, “the story I just wrote is the worst. The dead girl.” I reach in my pocket and find the picture Angela gave me. “Let me show you guys something.” I put the photo on the table. They lean in close to see.

  “Is one of them her?” Evan asks.

  “Yeah,” Bishop answers for me. “The one on the left.” Then he looks at me. “What about it?”

  “Look at her,” I say, and obediently they fix their gazes on her face. “You don’t think I look like her, do you?”

  “Why?” Evan says.

  “People keep telling me I do,” I say. “I don’t believe it.”

  Bishop sits back in his chair. “Hate to tell you, but they’re right,” he says. “There’s a slight resemblance.”

  Evan is nodding, looking from the picture to my face and back again. “Definitely,” he says. “Around the eyes.”

  “Sergeant Morris said it was the shape of my face,” I say. “You guys wouldn’t have noticed if I hadn’t asked.”

  “I noticed earlier,” Bishop says.

  “And you didn’t say anything?”

  “I don’t say everything I think,” he says, turning his gaze back to his beer mug.

  “Forget it,” I say, reaching for the picture and slipping it back in my pocket. “It’s no big deal.” Then I reach for the pitcher and top off our mugs.

  Bishop appraises us. He says, “How about this: What’s the farthest you’ve ever gone for a story?”

  “Into a Dumpster,” Evan says, and laughs. “I ruined my shoes.”

  “Did you find anything?” I ask.

  “I showed you,” he says. “That witchcraft magazine.” He lifts his glass and says, “Front page!” We clink our glasses against his.

  Bishop nods at me. “Come back to me,” I say. “I have to think. You answer.”

  Bishop tells us about the time he was trying to get a quote from a state senator suspected of tax fraud. While he’s talking, I signal the waitress and order a bourbon, straight up. I watch her walk across the bar and bring the drink back, the little glass in the center of her large round tray.

/>   Bishop tells us he followed the guy to a four-star restaurant, where he had his terrible car valet-parked, borrowed a jacket and tie from the maître d’, and sat down to a five-course meal, keeping his eye on the senator while he ate his Cornish game hen. When the senator got up to go to the bathroom, Bishop followed. He sallied up to the urinal next to his. “So we’re standing there pissing, right,” Bishop says, “and I zip up and turn to the guy, who’s still going, and I stick out my hand to shake and say, ‘Hello, Senator, I’m Martin Bishop from the paper. What can you tell me about the charges made against you?”

  “What did he do?” Evan says.

  “He shook my hand,” Bishop says. Evan bursts out laughing. “I guess it was a reflex,” Bishop says.

  “I hope you washed your hands,” I say.

  “Of course,” Bishop says. “With soap and hot water.”

  “Did he give you a quote?” Evan asks.

  “He said, ‘They’re absolutely false, son. I’m guilty of nothing. Now pardon me while I zip my pants.’ ”

  “You’re making that up,” I say.

  Bishop holds his hands in the air, palms out. “Would I do such a thing?” He nods at me. “Now you.”

  “I’m thinking, I’m thinking,” I say.

  “Time’s up,” Evan says.

  “I don’t know,” I say. “I don’t think I’ve done it yet.”

  The waitress passes by and leans down to pick up my glass. “You want another, honey?” she says.

  “Sure,” I say. “Why not.” Evan raises his eyebrows at me. “What?” I say.

  “You drank that fast,” he says.

  “I’m a reporter,” I say. “I’m supposed to drink hard.” When the waitress brings my drink, I pick it up and throw it back in one motion. It burns going down but I don’t flinch. I smile at Evan and turn the glass upside down on the table. He shakes his head. Bishop laughs. “Go easy, cowgirl.” He winks at me. Then he says, “Why did you become a reporter?” and looks from one to the other of us before he fixes his eyes on Evan.

  “Because I wanted to be like Woodward and Bernstein in All the President’s Men,” Evan says. “I wanted to be the person who found the truth and made sure others were held accountable for their actions. It sounds silly . . .” He trails off.

  “Go on,” Bishop says.

  “I felt like I had a mission.”

  Bishop nods and turns to me. “Why did you become a reporter?”

  I spin my empty glass on the table. “The same reasons as Evan.”

  Bishop smiles and shakes his head. “Why did you become a reporter?”

  “I just told you.”

  “If you ask a cop why he became a cop, what do you think he’ll say?”

  “Because he wanted to protect and serve,” I say, looking around for the waitress.

  “And why do you think he really became a cop?”

  “Power. A gun at his side and a siren so that he could go flying past everybody else on the road.”

  “Right,” Bishop says.

  “That’s not fair,” Evan protests. “Some cops do want to protect and serve.”

  Bishop ignores him, keeping his eyes on me. “Why did you become a reporter?”

  “Why don’t you ask Evan again?” I say, signaling the waitress to bring me one more drink.

  “Evan told the truth,” he says. “I want to know what about you makes you do this job. Are you curious? Are you a thrill seeker? Do you find it easier to examine others’ lives than to live your own? Why did you become a reporter?”

  I look hard at him. “I just did.” Sometimes it doesn’t feel like something I chose. It’s just what I became, the way I grew a few inches every year until I was five feet two.

  “It’s never that simple and you know it,” Bishop says. “You’d never take that answer from someone you were interviewing.”

  The other day I said to Sergeant Morris, “I need to know,” and he didn’t ask me why. It never occurs to anyone to ask me why. That’s my job. “Okay, how about this,” I say. “My mother says I always wanted to watch people. She says I would cry if someone held me so that I couldn’t see the rest of the room.”

  “So you were born for it?” Bishop asks me, turning the words over in his mouth like they taste bad.

  “I guess,” I say. “Why did you become a reporter?”

  “I’m curious,” he says. “I’m a thrill seeker. I find it easier to examine others’ lives than to live my own.” He grins at me and lifts his glass as though in a toast. “Don’t worry,” he says gently. “I’ve been at this longer than you.”

  I have another drink while they make their way through the pitcher. When the beer is gone, Evan says it’s time to go. “One more drink,” I say. “Come on.”

  He stands up. “You’ve had enough,” he says. “I’ll drive you home.”

  “No thanks,” I say. “I want another.” I turn to Bishop and smile. “Bishop? One more drink?”

  “Can’t turn down a lady,” he says, deepening his southern accent. “I’ll have a whiskey.”

  Evan leaves, saying again that I shouldn’t drive home. Bishop and I sit and order drinks and he tells me stories, some of them terrible, all of them funny. He imitates a drunk who was arrested taking pot-shots at neighborhood pets in the street, weaving a little as he sights down an imaginary gun, loading on the accent as he calls, “Here, kitty, kitty, kitty.” He tells the “Jack-off Daniel’s” story again.

  “That’s terrible,” I say, over and over, laughing helplessly. “That’s terrible.”

  “Let me tell you, kid,” Bishop says. “That’s not the half of it.”

  There is nothing Bishop doesn’t know about this city. Everywhere he goes he sees a story he wrote.

  If I go to the music festival next May, I’ll watch crowds of people walk right over the spot where that car crushed Allison Avery’s skull. I’ll watch them: the dreadlocked white kids in hemp necklaces, the cowboys in tight Wranglers and sharp-pointed boots, the middle-aged couples in denim jackets, the frat boys in khakis and baseball caps, the girls with too much makeup, breasts swelling out of tank tops. The guys squeezing the girls’ butts, the people huddling under umbrellas as their feet sink into the mud, the enormous bouncers glaring with their backs to the stage, the screaming women, grabbing at the air when Al Green throws down a rose. Plastic beer cups and candy wrappers will litter the ground, churned to mud by the rain and the thousands of moving feet. There will be no sign it ever happened. But I’ll know. I’ll know exactly where.

  I have to call Hannah to come pick me up. “You’re wasted,” she says accusingly as soon as I get in the car. “You’re not walking straight.”

  “Well, hello to you too,” I say. This is a bad drunk. When I finally get in my bed, I’m going to have to keep one foot on the ground to stop the room from spinning. We pull over three times so I can lean out the door to vomit.

  Our neighbor Denise’s car is blocking the driveway, so Hannah drops me in front of our duplex and goes to find a parking place on the street . . . I’m on my hands and knees at the edge of the curb, my whole body swaying. I get up and go to sit in a dignified manner on the front steps.

  I wake up. There are steps beneath my back, and the porch light shines right in my eyes. I turn my head from side to side and see that my arms are spread out above my head. I lift my head a little and look down. My legs are spread as wide as my arms, and my skirt is hiked up around my waist. I can see my underwear. Blue stripes. I hear footsteps. “Hannah?” I call out, but no one answers, and when I raise my head again, a man is just passing me. He turns to look at me, and the thought of what I must look like hits me so hard I almost feel sober. “Hey,” he says. “Are you okay?”

  “I’m fine,” I say. I sit up and yank my skirt down.

  He takes a step toward me. “I’m fine,” I say again, but my voice wobbles, and he takes another step toward me and starts to reach out his hand. I squawk, and he jerks his hand back. “Go away,” I shout.
r />   He takes a step backward, hesitating. He is not tall, but thick and powerful through the shoulders, his features indistinct in the darkness beyond the porch. The porch light flickers. My thighs, pressed together, are sticky with sweat. No one else is on the street. When I turn my head I see nothing but darkness, houses where everyone sleeps behind locked doors.

  I stare at him. He stares at me. If he moves in my direction I’ll scream. “What do you want?” I say. My voice comes out terrified.

  I think I see him smile, a ferocious appraising smile, and panic bubbles up in my throat. “Look, miss,” he says. “I’m just being nice. I’m just a Good Samaritan.” His voice drips with scorn. “Take a look at yourself, why don’t you. Ask yourself what you want. You’re the one sprawled out half-naked on the street.” Then he rotates on his heel and stalks away.

  I bite my fingers to stop my hands from shaking. I was passed out on the front porch, arms and legs out, spread out like a starfish just waiting to be slipped in someone’s pocket. “Where are you, Hannah,” I say. “Where are you, where are you.”

  Then I’m halfway across the porch, half falling, half leaning on Hannah. “Did I pass out again?”

  “Yes,” Hannah says.

  “Where are we going?”

  “To bed.”

  “Hannah,” I say. “I feel awful.”

  “Okay,” she says, propping me against the wall so she can unlock the front door. She looks at me. “You’re going to have a bad headache.”

  In my bedroom, she eases me onto the bed and goes out of the room. When I close my eyes I see red, blood red. Everything spins together like clothes in a drier, the dead girl, the man on the street, my messy room. Hannah is standing there. I prop myself up on one elbow and catch her wrist with my other hand. “You have to be careful,” I tell her. “The world is filled with danger.” I shake her arm. “Promise me you’ll be careful.”

  “You’re just drunk.” She extracts her wrist from my grasp.

  “Oh. Okay.” I lie back down. My throat fills with the urge to cry. “A lump of sorrow,” I say, stupidly, trying not to weep.

  “Open your mouth,” Hannah says. She puts two aspirin on my tongue and hands me a glass of water.