by Hannah Jayne
Chloe gestured over her shoulder at the pool of kids behind her. “Gossip.”
Sawyer checked her watch. “Why is everyone out here? The last bell should have rung two minutes ago.”
“It did.”
“Grief counselors again?”
“I haven’t seen them, but there are cop cars everywhere.”
Sawyer stiffened, ice water going through her veins. “Cop cars? Do they think—is there something that led them back here?”
“Like what? Clues or something?” Chloe shrugged again. “I don’t know. Last I saw that short, fat detective guy was going into Principal Chappie’s office.” Chloe leaned close, her voice dropping. “I heard that she was strangled—or suffocated or something—with the sash from her choir dress.”
Sawyer felt her face pale. She thought back to Maggie’s memorial, to her mother noting that there had been no red sash with her daughter’s black satin choir dress.
“Red fibers,” she whispered.
“Hey, let’s go in.”
Logan was inside the school, striding down the hallway. He pushed open the doors and smiled at Chloe and Sawyer. “Hi, Sawyer.”
“Hey, Logan. It’s nice to see you. What are you doing in here?” She tried to hide her unease, but her voice sounded false, insincere, even in her own ears.
“I took the early bus. I was working in the computer lab, so Principal Chappie let me stay inside.”
Chloe’s eyebrows shot up. “So you’ve been inside the whole time? Do you know anything? Did you hear the police talking?”
“About Maggie’s murder,” Sawyer said.
Logan’s jaw dropped open. “I thought Maggie committed suicide.”
Chloe shook her head. “No, it was all over the papers this morning and on the radio. What, do you live under a rock?”
Color bloomed in Logan’s cheeks. He held up his iPod. “I was plugged in all morning. Someone murdered Maggie?”
Sawyer narrowed her eyes at Logan, trying to read his expression. Was he feigning ignorance to hide his crime?
“Your brother didn’t tell you?” she asked.
“Stephen? No, he doesn’t tell me anything that happens at the station.” Logan turned to Chloe. “So, do they know who did it? Did they catch him?”
Sawyer shook her head.
“Why? Does anyone know why?”
“She was kind of an über bitch.”
“Chloe! She’s dead,” Sawyer snapped. She saw the hurt look in Chloe’s eyes and sighed. “She wasn’t very nice, but she didn’t deserve to die.”
A throng of kids pushed through the open door then, separating Logan and Sawyer by a few arms’ length. Just before the crush, Sawyer was sure she heard Logan mumble the words, “Like Kevin.”
She couldn’t shake the chill that rolled through her.
Homeroom passed with a textbook discussion of teen suicide, the teacher lecturing on how many lives are cut short by bad, spur-of-the-moment decisions. Her eyes flashed to Sawyer when she said this and went round and sympathetic; Sawyer’s eyes started to water.
She raised a hand. “Can I go to the nurse, please? I don’t feel so well.”
Mrs. Fluke nodded her head and scribbled out a pass; Sawyer picked up her bag and stepped out into the deserted hallway. Her cell phone buzzed in her pocket, and she slid it out: a text from Chloe.
U OK?
JUST NEED AIR, Sawyer thumbed back.
BRB?
Sawyer was about to text that she would be right back when the clanging of a locker distracted her. One bank up began the junior hall, where her locker was located. Principal Chappie, Detective Biggs, and an officer Sawyer recognized, with a sinking feeling, as Stephen Haas, were standing shoulder to shoulder, watching as the principal unlocked a student locker. Sawyer silently counted the rows—one bank down, three lockers in.
Logan’s locker.
A cold sweat broke out all over her body; for the first time since the note appeared in her locker, Sawyer was able to suck in a deep, relieved breath. She liked Logan, but if there were something in his locker that incriminated him as her admirer, that pointed to him as the one who killed Maggie, Sawyer wanted him stopped. Her eyes shifted over Stephen, and she briefly wondered if he knew that this was his brother’s locker.
She choked on her deep breath when she saw Detective Biggs lean over, stepping backward with something wrapped around the edge of his pencil.
It was a long, crimson sash.
“Oh no, Logan,” she whispered. But she stopped cold when the men turned and Sawyer could see that it was her locker door that was pried open—and that the edge of the sash was still in there.
Sawyer’s eyes were wide. She sucked her breath in and flattened herself against the wall, praying the bank of lockers to her left would allow her some cover. She could hear the men talking, their voices harsh but muffled. When they quieted, she chanced a peek, her stomach rolling in on itself as she did. Detective Biggs was pawing through her things. He handed out items—her chemistry book, her math book—to Stephen, who held out latex glove–covered hands. Detective Biggs slowed when he came to a large envelope Sawyer had never seen. Her breath sped up when she noticed its telltale mint-green color. Biggs slid open the envelope and pored through it, handing each piece to Stephen as he did. The article about Kevin’s death. The peanut butter wrapper and what Sawyer surmised was the folded printout of the anaphylaxis web page. A large photograph of her and Kevin. The crumpled test paper from Mr. Hanson’s classroom. There were a few other things that Sawyer couldn’t make out, but the last item the detective pulled out made her blood run cold.
Detective Biggs sighed and handed Stephen the framed photograph of her and Maggie that had been on the Gaines’s mantle. The glass was cracked, and even from where Sawyer was standing, she could see that Maggie’s face had been scratched out.
Sawyer’s feet were moving before she knew she was running. Her book bag thumped against her hip; she didn’t breathe until she pushed through the wide double doors and felt the sting of the cold, damp air on her face.
“Oh my God,” she moaned, doubling over.
The mumbling voices of Principal Chappie and the officers were coming down the hall and when Sawyer straightened up, she saw the threesome opening the door to Mrs. Fluke’s classroom.
Her cell phone was chirping by the time she had unlocked her car door. It was Chloe—
WHERE RU? CHAP & POLICE LKNG 4U.
Sawyer sucked in a shaky breath, then started typing.
GETTING ANSWERS.
***
The police station parking lot was nearly deserted, and for that Sawyer was relieved. She still chose a parking spot that camouflaged her car as much as possible, just in case.
“May I help you?” The woman at the front desk was in uniform, her hair clipped short and her face freshly washed.
Sawyer pasted on her best eager smile. “Yes, actually. I am from the school paper. I’m supposed to interview Officer Haas.” She neglected to note which school paper, and the young officer didn’t ask.
“He is not in the office right now.”
Sawyer nodded. “Right, he told me that. He should have left a file for me. Some questions. Basic stuff”—she smiled brightly, willing an innocent blush into her cheeks—“about becoming a cop and all.”
The officer nodded kindly at Sawyer and pointed with her pencil. “Haas sits over there. Do you know where the file is?” She craned her neck. “Looks like there’s a big stack.”
“Oh, yeah, he told me exactly. He said it would be right there on his desk.”
“Knock yourself out.”
Sawyer beelined to Stephen’s desk, quickly sifting through the stack of manila file folders, silently thanking God that the little police department had money for silk plants, but not for a digital file system.
Anderson, Kevin.
She looked around, confident that no one was paying attention to her, and slipped that one in her bag as well.
“Finding everything you need?” The female officer was smiling at Sawyer, looking over her shoulder.
Sawyer’s heart thrummed with embarrassment. “Yep, got it. Thanks.”
The folders seemed to vibrate in Sawyer’s bag, and her fingers itched to pull them out and examine them, but she smiled graciously at the female officer, and walked slowly out of the police station. As if on cue, her cell phone began to chirp once Sawyer stepped into the parking lot. She looked at the digital readout and sighed.
“Dad,” she muttered to the empty car.
She hit the ignore button on the phone and slid it into her purse.
Sawyer got on the highway, guiding her car down the first exit. The trees that had looked so black and ominous the night of Maggie’s death looked cheery and welcoming now, and Sawyer’s little Accord zipped past, her heart seeming to speed up with every mile crossed. She pulled her car to a stop across the street from Maggie’s house and killed the engine, breathing in the silence.
Sawyer slid the file folders from her bag and found Maggie’s, running her fingertip over the handwritten marker—Gaines, Maggie E. She flipped the manila folder open quickly, her stomach clenching at the two side-by-side photographs clipped to the front cover of the folder. They were both of Maggie, her long hair brushed back from her forehead, her lips pursed. In the photograph on the left, her lips were a glossy, impish pink, the edges slightly turned up. Her eyes stared straight out, daring you to look away; they seemed to hold a world of mystery, of mischief. In the photograph to the left, the glossy pink on Maggie’s lip was replaced by a matte, unnatural blue. The edges that had so often turned up in a grin or a snarl were slack now, giving way to sallow-colored cheeks. Her eyes were open but the spark was gone, the mischief, the mystery faded. Her eyes stared at Sawyer, unseeing, milky white, dead.
Sawyer was surprised when a fat tear plopped on the file folder. She sniffed, willed her shaking fingers to turn the page. The autopsy report was clipped in next and read like the newspaper article—nothing Sawyer didn’t know—nothing she wanted to know.
Finally, she pushed open the car door and approached Maggie’s house. It stood quiet, the entire street desolate. Sawyer pushed her hands in her pocket, unsure of what she wanted to do. When she went to reach for the doorbell, she saw the upstairs curtain twitch, a snatch of blond hair. Her heartbeat sped up. She knocked.
Olivia opened the door a few inches, her red-rimmed eyes zeroing in on Sawyer. “What are you doing here?”
“I’m sorry, Olivia, I know I’m probably the last person you want to see right now.”
Olivia swallowed hard and looked over her shoulder into the darkened house. She opened the door a small bit more and slid out. Sawyer was surprised at how small and frail the girl looked, even though only a few days had passed.
“I don’t want my mother to see you,” she said.
Sawyer nodded. “I understand.”
“I know you weren’t bullying her.” Olivia sunk down on the porch step, slipping her sweatshirt over her knees.
“Do you know if anyone else was?”
Olivia shook her head soundlessly, and Sawyer bit her bottom lip. “I need to get into Maggie’s room.”
Olivia’s eyes flashed, brows high. “Why? What do you want from her?”
Sawyer held up her hands placatingly. “Nothing. I don’t want anything from Maggie. We may not have been friends at the end but we were, once. We were best friends, remember? I want to help her.”
“No one can help my sister anymore. She’s dead.”
Sawyer closed her eyes, struck by the bitterness in Olivia’s voice. “I know. I want to find out who did this to her.”
Olivia looked over her shoulder again as if considering. “My mom took a pill. You have five minutes.”
Sawyer nodded and followed the girl into the house.
Maggie’s bedroom hadn’t changed much since she and Sawyer had been friends in elementary school. The walls were painted the same billowy pink, the bed was still spread with the lacy linens that Sawyer remembered walking her Barbies on and telling ghost stories under. The only difference was the posters and pictures tacked everywhere—Libby, Maggie and Kevin, cheerleaders, bands that Sawyer had never much cared for.
That, and the silence.
An overwhelming silence permeated the whole room, as if everything in there knew that Maggie wasn’t coming back.
Sawyer wasn’t sure what she was looking for and touched things gingerly—Maggie’s schoolbooks, her cheer uniform, the pompons discarded on the floor. When she turned and faced the closet, beads of sweat pricked out at her hairline.
She tried hard not to think of Maggie’s final moments and instead dropped to her knees, feeling around the closet floor. Her fingers closed around a woven bracelet, her heart speeding up as she brought it closer to examine it.
“Best friends,” Sawyer breathed. The words were embroidered into the thing, a bracelet that she and Maggie shared the summer they spent at camp. Like Maggie’s, her own was probably discarded somewhere in her closet.
“Time to leave,” Olivia said from the doorway.
Sawyer slid the bracelet into her jeans pocket and stood, passing Olivia as she left.
“Did you get what you came for?” Olivia wanted to know.
Sawyer just nodded, her emotions knotted in her throat.
When Sawyer got back to her car, she noticed she had missed another two calls from her father. She ignored them and put the car in gear.
Sawyer drove home on autopilot, was at the gates to Blackwood Hills Estates before she realized where she was going. She paused briefly to glance at a car just inside the gate. It was mud splattered and parked on a stretch of untouched earth that Sawyer’s dad assured her would one day be a community park. Sawyer blinked at the car, faint recognition glowing in the back of her mind. It was the same make as Cooper’s, but this one had a heavily dented passenger door that seemed to be slightly open. Sadness throbbed in her throat. There wasn’t much chance that Sawyer’s life would go back to normal now; not much chance that a nice guy like Cooper would be interested in a girl being chased by the police. She sighed and pressed on the gas, leaving the car—and thoughts about Cooper—behind.
The rain was falling in heavy sheets now, darkening the sky and giving the bare trees and vacant homes in the tract an ominous look. Sawyer zipped past them and parked in her own driveway, car skewed. The yawning living room was awash in shadows, and Sawyer turned on every light, clearing this morning’s paper from the kitchen table and laying out the file folders. On a steeling sigh, she pulled Kevin’s to the top of the pile and opened it.
Stapled to one cover was the coroner’s report. Sawyer winced, trying her best not to fixate on anything there—grisly descriptions of textbook body parts—body parts that had belonged to Kevin, that she had loved and caressed and brushed up against. Her fingertips brushed over the toxicology report, listing Kevin’s blood alcohol level 0.22. A heavy black X covered the box marked legally intoxicated. Sawyer sighed, pinching her bottom lip and peeling open the envelope included in Kevin’s report.
Her stomach roiled, and she clamped her lips down hard as she spilled out the contents of the envelope. Full-color crime scene photos littered the top of the dining table, and Sawyer’s fingers fumbled as she worked to gather them up, stacking each horrid image one on top of the other. Her mouth filled with blood, but she kept her teeth gritted hard, her hands fisted as she forced herself to sift through each picture, taking in every putrid detail—the crushed, buckled metal of the broken car, the spli
nters of blood-edged glass staining the concrete. The first few shots were exterior, and Sawyer smelled the acrid smell of hot metal, the choking stench of blood on the night air. It stung her nostrils and she flipped, fingers shaking, to the next group of photos. These were interior, and Sawyer was blinking, the itch from her tears tracking over her cheeks. She remembered the soft feel of the ruined leather, the glint from the tiny crystal that hung from the rearview mirror. She remembered the night she gave it to him.
It was September, but summer still hung on the stillness of the night air, the long days being slowly chased away by tiny wisps of fall on the breeze.
“I got you something,” Sawyer said, a smile playing at the edges of her pink, glossed lips.
Kevin’s head lolled against the gray leather headrest and he grinned at her, eyebrows raised sexily. “Oh yeah? What’s that?”
She pulled the little charm from her pocket—a cut glass football that she had picked up at the Boardwalk—and dangled it between forefinger and thumb. The orb caught the yellow glow from the streetlight and broke it into a thousand tiny shards of rainbow-colored light.
Kevin’s fingers brushed against hers as he took the charm. Electricity, like the lights of the prism, broke through Sawyer in a thousand tiny, twittering vessels.
“Do you like it?” she breathed.
“It’s from you, isn’t it?” He hung it over his rearview mirror. “That means I love it.”
Sawyer felt a cold shiver of delight.
“Here,” Kevin said, shrugging out of his hoodie. “I don’t want my girl to get cold.” He slipped the well-worn sweatshirt over Sawyer’s bare shoulders and pulled her to him; she softened, fitting her curves against his angles.
“This is perfect,” she said, breathing deeply, letting the familiar cut-grass cologne scent of Kevin’s hoodie envelope her. “So, so perfect.”
She closed her eyes and could still smell Kevin, the fading scent of cologne on his hoodie. She pushed away the photographs and held her head in her hands, breathing deeply. The edge of a photo caught her eye.
Beer bottles. Crushed brown glass on the floor of Kevin’s car.