Vanished

by E. E. Cooper

  “My personality can be an acquired taste.” She glanced at me. “I’m not allowed to interview Britney. They think I’ll upset her. And with her parents being good friends with the mayor, along with both of our state senators, that means no one wants to upset the little princess.”

  “Do you have things you want to ask her?”

  “There are a few things I wouldn’t mind getting clarified. Technically we should have talked to her before her parents did, but that’s not how things went down.”

  “I had some messages,” I said softly. “Online chats that were supposedly from Beth. But they couldn’t have been. They must have come from Brit.”

  “That’s what you were trying to tell me and your parents.”

  I nodded. “I didn’t believe it was Beth. I mean, I did at first, but then I knew it couldn’t be.”

  “Can you send them to me?”

  “They were deleted. It might have been the chat program, but I think Brit did it. Could you get some kind of warrant to retrieve them from the company?”

  Officer Siegel shook her head. “A warrant requires more than a suspicion. Besides, chat records wouldn’t prove anything. You could have had them with yourself.”

  “I didn’t do that,” I said.

  “I didn’t say you did. I said I couldn’t prove it.” Officer Siegel sighed. “We know Beth died from a blow to the head. What we can’t prove is how it happened. Britney’s story of Beth trying to stop her and falling also matches the evidence.”

  “They’ll know more from the autopsy, though, right?” I asked. An image flashed in my mind of sophomore-year biology class, when we pinned frogs to wax trays and dissected them, their organs looking sort of plastic and purple under the fluorescent lights. I swallowed hard. I needed to be careful. Very careful. I knew how Britney dealt with betrayal.

  Still. Brit was smart, but she must have messed up somehow. There must be a fiber or hair that would raise alarm bells. Now that they knew there was reason to be suspicious, they’d look more carefully at Beth’s body.

  Siegel’s expression made me nervous. “There won’t be a full autopsy. The body was cremated.”

  I closed my eyes, wanting to block out reality.

  “The body should never have been released until the DNA tests were back, but Britney’s parents pressed the county to allow them to lay her to rest. Someone’s likely going to lose their job over it.”

  “So now they’ll never know how Beth died.” I wanted to slide down the wall and curl into a fetal ball. I thought when Brit came back I was close to the finish line. That I was going to win. That this whole horrible situation would at least end with justice. But it wasn’t going to. It was a marathon with no end. I’d keep running until my lungs shredded and my bleeding feet gave out. Brit was going to get away with it.

  “There was a preliminary autopsy. I know they did a tox screen and the doctor would have looked over the body then. But everyone was so sure it was a suicide, and the body was in the water for some time. No one knew they should be looking for anything suspicious.” Officer Siegel shrugged. “Now everyone wants to sweep this ugly situation right under the rug, along with any hints that things weren’t done correctly.”

  I wiped a tear off my cheek. It was so unfair to Beth. She’d done nothing wrong, certainly nothing to deserve this. They’d carved her up, they’d cremated her, but they never even really saw her.

  Officer Siegel handed me a Kleenex. “Beth’s beyond any pain or humiliation now.”

  My grandma would have told me the same. Hindus believe the Atman, or spirit, is what is immortal. The body, and the pain that goes with it, is just temporary. I wished I knew what I believed.

  “Do you buy into the idea of heaven?” I asked. I wanted to have faith that Beth was someplace better. She deserved so much more than how things had turned out. She deserved justice.

  “I don’t know. I know I want to,” Office Siegel said.

  “What would it be like?”

  I liked that Officer Siegel took time to think about it. She didn’t give me a flip answer. “I think it would be different for every person. For me, it would be like this old ski cabin my grandparents used to have in Canada. I’d sit inside with a nice fire and some hot chocolate. It would smell like pine trees. There’d be a couple dogs with me on the sofa, a fluffy blanket, and it would be almost perfectly quiet. Just the soft hush of snow falling outside.”

  I considered that. “I think mine would be one of those perfect spring days. Where I’d be outside lying on the ground and it would be warm from the sun. It would smell like fresh-cut grass and dirt.” In my mind I pictured Beth lying next to me. Her hand reaching for mine, our pinky fingers linked as we watched the clouds float past.

  “Nice,” Officer Siegel said. “What about Beth’s idea of heaven?”

  “I don’t know,” I admitted.

  “Try.”

  I closed my eyes for a second. “I think it might be a tea party. Earl Grey and scones. A giant Alice in Wonderland tea party with the Mad Hatter, the White Rabbit, and the Cheshire cat, the whole gang swapping weird literary quotes with each other.”

  “Then that’s how you should picture her.”

  And so I did. I could see Beth laughing the way she always did, with her head thrown back as if she didn’t have a care in the world, her front tooth just slightly crooked. She’d daintily select a cookie from a silver tray like she’d done in my bedroom. “Don’t mind if I do,” she’d say. “After all, it’s my unbirthday.” I imagined her taking a big bite, crumbs spilling down her shirt as she winked at me. I couldn’t help grinning for the first time since I’d known Beth was gone for good. And then I realized Officer Siegel was watching me, a faint smile of reflection on her own face.

  “Siegel! Let’s get a move on.” Detective Cabot called, heading toward the waiting room. He turned around without even waiting for her to respond.

  “That’s my exit cue.” She took a few steps down the hall. “Just remember, if you have your head down, sometimes you can run right into something. Take care.”

  I met her eyes. I couldn’t tell if she was saying good-bye or warning me.

  When Officer Siegel pushed through the swinging doors at the end of the hall there was an explosion of camera flashes and people yelling out questions.

  The world was ready to welcome Brit back. Their star had come home.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  Beth’s parents didn’t have a funeral for her. At first I thought maybe they were hosting a small, family-only kind of thing, but they didn’t even do that. I didn’t know you could bury someone without doing something, but apparently you can. Or maybe they didn’t bury her. Maybe they just kept the ashes in a can.

  Some parents are naturals at the whole mom-and-dad thing. They leave notes in their kids’ lunch bags. They run alongside them on the sidewalks to teach them how to ride bikes, and don’t freak out if they accidentally grind Play-Doh into the carpet. I know not everyone gets good parents, or even decent parents, but it seemed any parent should pull together a funeral for a dead daughter. I was disgusted with Beth’s mom and dad, but my mom told me to go easy on them.

  “To bury one child is an unimaginable hell, but for them to lose both—” My mom’s voice broke and she shook her head violently, as if to whip the thoughts from her mind. “I can’t even fathom it.” She bustled around the kitchen. She’d organized a brigade of neighborhood families to make meals for Beth’s parents and to make sure their yard got mowed. “Now isn’t the time to judge what they’re doing,” she told me. “Now is the time for us to try to think of what we can do for them.”

  I was sitting on one of the stools watching my mom. “What about Beth?” I asked.

  Mom came over and hugged me. She smelled like curry and spices from cooking. “It’s not the size of the funeral that matters.” She pulled back and tapped my chest. “It’s the size of the hole they leave in our hearts when they go. There is no greater compliment to Beth, and
the person she was, than the fact that you miss her.”

  “I loved her,” I said, staring down at my hands.

  “I know you did,” Mom said.

  “No. Not like that. I loved her,” I said, looking up. I was surprised the words were out of my mouth. I hadn’t planned to say anything, but I couldn’t stand the way everyone had pushed Beth aside. You couldn’t turn on the television or pick up a newspaper without seeing Britney’s picture smiling out. Beth wasn’t a story. She was dead and gone, but not for me.

  My mom’s eyes filled with tears and she came quickly around the island and wrapped me in a hug. “Oh, Kalah, I am so sorry.” I could hear the pain in her voice. And how she loved me.

  I sobbed into her chest. She stroked my hair and let me cry. When I finished she went to the sink to wet a handful of paper towels, and pressed them gently to my face. “I didn’t know,” she said. “I had no idea.”

  I sniffed. “I didn’t want you to know.” I took another paper towel and blew my nose. “I didn’t want anyone to know.”

  Mom tucked a lock of hair behind my ear. “Love can be confusing at the best of times. I can’t say I understand what you’re going through, but I want to.”

  “I’m not sure it matters now. Beth’s gone.” My breath kept hitching in my chest.

  “It matters that you loved her. That’s never gone.”

  I nodded. I didn’t trust myself to say anything else without starting to cry all over again.

  “I’m going to make us some tea.” Mom put the kettle on the stove. She opened the cupboard and pursed her lips. “Mint or chai?”

  “Mint,” I said.

  She pulled out the tin and swirled hot water in the teapot, getting it ready. She grabbed some honey. It relaxed me to watch her. She moved through the kitchen like a ballet dancer. “I’m glad you have Britney back in your life,” she said.

  Hearing Brit’s name was like a sliver of ice through my chest.

  “I know I was critical of her at times, but I also know how important friendships can be. You two will both do better knowing you have each other to get through this.”

  I nodded again.

  Mom turned and smiled. “Good friends are everything.”

  I stayed home from school. The official story was that I had a cold, but the truth was I wasn’t ready to face the world and my parents weren’t interested in pushing me.

  I’d decided to have my own service for Beth. I went to Lighthouse Park.

  The beach was empty of people but full of stuff. Now that people knew that Beth was the one who’d died, they’d turned the spot into some kind of shrine for her, leaving notes and tokens and flowers there. People thought she’d died at the Point saving Brit. I knew she hadn’t died there, that she’d been murdered in Britney’s basement, but this was still where she’d kissed me for the first time. I felt closer to her here.

  I crouched down near the driftwood log where people had left candles and gifts. I put down the bouquet of bright gerbera daisies I’d bought—red, orange, yellow, and hot pink. There was a huge bouquet of dark roses already there. I read the card.

  With our deepest condolences, the Ryerson-Matson family.

  I plucked one of the rose heads from the stem. The velvet-soft petals bruised as I crushed them in my hand. I let go and they sprinkled down on the ground. I brushed my hand against my leg. I had to remember why I came.

  I pulled out Beth’s copy of Alice in Wonderland. “I thought I should say a few words,” I said into the wind. “It seemed to me you wouldn’t want me to give some kind of big speech, so I thought you might like this better.” I cleared my throat and found the places I’d marked with a Post-it note.

  “The sun was shining on the sea,

  Shining with all his might:

  He did his very best to make

  The billows smooth and bright—

  And this was odd, because it was

  The middle of the night.

  The moon was shining sulkily,

  Because she thought the sun

  Had got no business to be there

  After the day was done—

  ‘It’s very rude of him,’ she said,

  ‘To come and spoil the fun!’

  The sea was wet as wet could be,

  The sands were dry as dry.

  You could not see a cloud, because

  No cloud was in the sky:

  No birds were flying overhead—

  There were no birds to fly.

  In a Wonderland they lie

  Dreaming as the days go by,

  Dreaming as the summers die.”

  I closed the book. There wasn’t any sound other than the wind whispering in the long beach grass. “I was going to tell you, if I ever got up the guts, that I love you.” I felt a little silly talking to the empty air, but I forced myself to keep going. I wouldn’t be able to move forward if I didn’t try to find some way to tell her what I felt.

  “I like to think that you knew, but I still wish I had told you. I didn’t say anything before for all sorts of reasons. Because I was afraid you might not feel the same way. Because I was afraid you might think I was being weird, all mushy and overly emotional. Because maybe you were just messing around and I was making it into something it wasn’t. Because I was confused about Zach and my feelings for him. Because I wasn’t sure if loving you meant I might be gay and if I could even handle that.

  “Basically, it comes down to all the stuff I was afraid might happen if I told you. It never occurred to me to be afraid of what might happen if I didn’t take the chance. I assumed we had all this time, but I was wrong.

  “This is sort of a bitch of a way to learn that regretting stuff you didn’t do is worse than regretting stuff you tried and failed at. The point is, now I’ll never be able to tell you.” I glanced down at the log, remembering sitting there with her, sharing her dad’s bourbon. Clueless of what was going to happen. “Nothing against this conversation, but it doesn’t really count.

  “I wanted to tell you that knowing you, loving you, made me a better person. I want to be the person you deserved. This might seem stupid, but when we first started hanging out I thought of you like some kind of modern fairy godmother come to life. You were beautiful and smart and brave, but you weren’t the type to wait for anyone else to rescue you. The fact that you noticed me and seemed to like me, it made me like myself better. If you could find me interesting, then you must have seen something that I hadn’t seen yet, maybe hadn’t realized yet.”

  I bent down and brushed a clump of rose petals off the log. “I’m so sorry I didn’t get a chance to do this right.” I closed my eyes and let myself remember the sensation of her brushing the sand from my lips before that first kiss.

  I stood and took a deep breath, trying to clear my head. Part of me wanted to let this tragedy end here. There wasn’t going to be any easy solution to what had happened. No one was interested in digging up the truth. Not Britney’s parents, or mine, not the police, not the teachers at school, not the media. Everyone liked the story the way it was.

  I wanted to go back to a time when all I worried about was pop quizzes and field hockey and whether it would be better to get a job at the mall for the summer or try for a position as a camp counselor. I wanted to have concerns that were everyday and simple and not about death and lies. I didn’t want to think about what would happen if Brit realized I knew the truth.

  But as much as I wanted to shut the door and declare it as past tense, I couldn’t forget Beth that easily. I couldn’t pretend that I didn’t know what Brit had done. Brit had killed Beth, and she was getting away with it. The only person who could fix that was me.

  Sooner or later Brit would slip up. She would make a mistake. She would give something away.

  And I would be right by her side when she made that mistake. I would use it to bring her down.

  This had to be Brit’s fantasy come to life. There was a giant banner in the main hall with foot-high letters paint
ed in blue: WELCOME BACK, BRITNEY! She was standing by her locker holding court. Her hair was back to the perfect shade of blond, and it looked like she’d had a blowout this morning. No doubt she wanted to look good. She had a media image to keep up.

  I’d seen Britney on TV last night. She’d done a personal interview with a reporter from CNN. She’d sat on her parents’ sofa, sandwiched between them, perfect Swarovski crystal tears hovering in each eye. The lights of the camera glinting off the new highlights in her hair.

  “Beth was like a sister to me.” Brit had covered her heart with her hand. She’d had a manicure, a tasteful pale pink. “I wish I could remember more, but I know she died trying to save me. She’s my hero.”

  I’d watched the TV, the remote clutched in one hand, pushing back a wall of rage.

  “I plan to honor my best friend’s memory by living my life to its fullest. I know that’s what Beth would want.” Britney had faced the camera and smiled through her tears.

  I watched Brit now from the front door of the school. She reminded me of a silent movie actress, big eyes and lots of dramatic hand motions as she spoke to her admiring fans. She glanced over and spotted me at the doorway. I sensed she’d been waiting for me to show up. It was now or never. Showtime.

  “Brit-Brit!” I yelled out.

  “Kah-bear!” she called back, throwing both of her arms in the air.

  We ran toward each other like one of those slow-motion scenes in cheesy movies. I did my best not to flinch as we hugged. Her bracelets jangled in my ear.

  “I’m so glad you’re back. You have no idea how much I missed you,” I gushed, squeezing her tight. This was the only strategy I had. I was going to be Britney’s new best friend. I had to make her believe everything I’d told her in those chat sessions was real. That I would be there for her no matter what.

  I’d be the most devoted best friend she’d ever imagined, until I found a way to destroy her.